World economic forum
Panacea or sinister plot? Schawb’s comments about elites hit at the heart of a big problem – how the WEF’s intentions are perceived beyond the meeting rooms of Davos. During the pandemic – the instigating factor in the Great Reset – the wealth of the world’s richest 1% ballooned. Yet many of them are the guests at Davos, rubbing shoulders with heads of state and leading academics. In fact, Davos is seen by some as a gathering not of the 1% but of the .000001%. “The WEF does have a perception problem, but it is grounded in some reality,” says William Burke- White, non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a non-profit public policy organisation in Washington, DC. “The visuals of the world’s richest and most powerful people gathering in a Swiss ski resort is dissonant with an era concerned with equity and inclusivity.”
Above: Anti-lockdown protests took place in major cities around the world, including London.
Opening page: Davos, Switzerland hosts the World Economic Forum conference every year.
Bluntly put, Schwab sees three possible outcomes. The first is that increasing egotism on national, international and individual levels will further increase. The second is that people assume everything will go back to the way it was before, which he argues is pure fiction. His favoured third option is to learn the lessons of the pandemic and create a more resilient, more inclusive and more sustainable world. To do this requires redefining the social contract to be more inclusive and to consider our responsibility to the next generation, rather than leaving young people to pay for our mistakes. It also involves decarbonising the economy to head off an environmental crisis and, simultaneously, to take care of nature, create jobs and invigorate the global economy.
“We should not underestimate the historical significance of the situation we are in. We know the world will look different when we move out of the acute phase of the virus.”
Klaus Schwab, WEF $4tn 18
The growth in wealth of the world’s 2,365 billionaires (54%) during the first year of the pandemic.
The Institute for Policy Studies
The technologies of the fourth industrial revolution, adopted with great zeal during the pandemic, will promote a new era of digitalisation, underpinned by new ethical, human-oriented principles. Post-Covid, Schwab also wants companies to move from ‘shareholder capitalism’ to ‘stakeholder capitalism’, balancing short-term profitability with long-term sustainability. In short, he wants a fairer, cleaner, smarter world. “Some people may say it is too idealistic, but what other choice do we have?,” Schwab asks. “It can’t be left to elites to address the needs of the general public. We need an all-inclusive approach.”
It is an image that has led some critics to craft elaborate conspiracy theories around the WEF and, particularly, the Great Reset, which they’ve styled not only as an attack on free-market enterprise and the profit-seeking imperative of Western capitalist societies, but as an attempt to enslave people in the service of a one-world government. For instance, Thierry Baudet, leader of the Dutch right-wing populist party Forum for Democracy, has enthusiastically pushed Great Reset conspiracy theories. His claims that the initiative is a covert plan to destroy capitalism and use the pandemic to usher in an authoritarian government that will enact forced vaccination programmes, digital ID cards and the end of private property. “The reality is that we try to get people who
don’t normally talk to each other to talk to each other,” says Adrian Monck, the WEF’s director of public engagement. “That involves creating vehicles for them to have conversations. You have to create an architecture for that and what we did in light of Covid is the Great Reset.”
“If you’re sitting at home and you’ve lost your job, you might look at that and say these guys are planning something and there is some great scheme afoot, and I can relate to that,” he adds. “I wish someone was flying the global plane, but it is not that simple and it is certainly not a conspiracy.” Monck’s defence of the elitist optics around Davos is that big companies are rivals and rarely sit around the table talking about important, long- term global issues. The WEF’s annual meeting, he believes, gets them to do just that. ”We’re hosting conversations, but people think we are reworking the world in a way that is suspicious,” he remarks. “It is a no-brainer that capitalism red in tooth and claw needs a little restraining. Every country on the planet has rules
Chief Executive Officer /
www.the-chiefexecutive.com
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