To save the United Nations from the irrelevance in which it now wallows, the next secretary general will require the concerted backing of the few powers that govern the security council.(要把联合国从眼下深陷的无关紧要的泥潭中拯救出来，下一任秘书长将需要安理会那几个主导大国的齐心协力支持。)
要把联合国从眼下深陷的无关紧要的泥潭中拯救出来，下一任秘书长将需要安理会那几个主导大国的齐心协力支持。
The paradox is that the great powers who created the institution in the 1940s and recently treat it with a cavalier cynicism are now the ones who need it most, as does the rest of the world.(悖论在于，20世纪40年代创建这一机构、近来又对它报以傲慢的犬儒态度的大国，如今恰恰是最需要它的国家，世界其他地方也是如此。)
悖论在于，20世纪40年代创建这一机构、近来又对它报以傲慢的犬儒态度的大国，如今恰恰是最需要它的国家，世界其他地方也是如此。
This is not about nostalgia(怀旧；念旧) for what was created after the second world war. That world has changed. We are no longer in the cold war. But it is carelessness of high order to assume that some mystical process will create a world while, in the meantime, the most powerful give license to some dangerous pathologies that have brought us to ruin in the past.(但如果以为某种神秘的过程会自动创造出一个新世界，而与此同时最强大的国家却纵容那些曾把我们引向毁灭的危险痼疾，那就是极大的疏忽。)
这并不是要怀念二战后建立的那套秩序。那个世界已经变了。我们不再处于冷战之中。但如果以为某种神秘的过程会自动创造出一个新世界，而与此同时最强大的国家却纵容那些曾把我们引向毁灭的危险痼疾，那就是极大的疏忽。