Davos 2023: A Journey Towards Cooperation in a Fragmented World

Many of my peers keep asking why am I going to the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, mostly fueled by conspiracy theories about plots by the rich to implant chips in our brains and put nanoparticles in our blood to transform us into “automatons”…. While I agree that the current system is rigged towards the privileged and still much is to be done by the highest level decision makers to create that inclusive world where everyone can flourish - this is *precisely* what the Davos meetings are addressing – and I am grateful to Don Tapscott for taking the time to spell it all out .

This year’s Theme: “Cooperation in a Fragmented World” is in stark contrast with what WEF stands for as a cheerleader for globalization, reflecting the tectonic shift in global markets and political relationships that have occurred since the pandemic.?And my first Panel “Cutting-edge, global solutions to provide immediate and lasting economic stability” attacked the causes of the “fragmentation” head-on, as together with co-panelists ??Jonathan Sun & Mila Bessmann I debated the massive institutional failure leading us to collectively create results that nobody wants: Climate change Hunger Poverty Violence Terrorism Pandemics Destruction of communities, nature, life—the foundations of our social, economic, ecological, and spiritual well-being.?

Institutional failure infused Davos this year directly, with the mutiny of WEF staff over the lack of a succession plan for Klaus Schwab , stirring rumors that Tony Blair , who spoke at several Davos gatherings this year – is considered the “best choice” as successor .?

The “WEF Metacrisis” mirrors so well the societal one trough the Structural Political Divide resulting in the inability to generate real participation for all. Add to this the Economic Divide: inability to generate well-being for all, and the Cultural Divide: fragmented consciousness – disconnect between self and “other”, from our fellow humans and from nature, and you get the full menu that brought the world on the brink of disaster in the past years .

Nature: from Resource (“commodity”) to Ecosystem (which humanity is an integral part of)

SHIFTS: Circular Economy; Ecosystem Restoration        

So, no wonder that Sustainability and climate were front and center in Davos this year – with Al Gore making the strongest case ever that the Davos elites have to stop the “blah blah reputation game” and take concrete and definitive action – given that the numbers show that all previous commitments leaders have made to date failed. This was echoed by several events hosted at the SDG tent where large industry players and governments pledged their commitment while presenting innovative approaches to reach “net zero”.

In this context, The Green Accelerator event housed a marathon of leading green-tech solutions : including SingularityNET Green Coin project, a tracer of green progress for the Planet .?

Following a powerful Keynote by (in)famous Prof. Nouriel Roubini, who gave everyone an ultimatum with evidence from his latest book “Megathreats" I led the panel “ESG: The Road from Promising and Preaching to Practicing” aiming to clarify what ESG really is together with Gabriel Thoumi, CFA, FRM, Certified Ecologist , Isabelle Canu and Christian Donn, MBA . We concluded that if we want to make ESG a useful indicator in the evaluation of investment risk we still will need to self-regulate and sharpen our moral compass, given the lack of clear regulatory frameworks and metrics . At the end of the day, the sad thing to admit was that in the past 18 years, ESG became a “back doorway to put in place an industrial policy that serves those in power”, e.g. in the US with the Financial Stability Oversight Council seating in the White House detracting from the real financial stability issues which we have to deal with nowadays in a world turmoiled by war, oil and gas shortages and an acutely inflationary economy.

Consumption: from “growth obligation” to inclusive growth. Disconnect between the infinite growth imperative and the finite resources of Planet Earth

How about the “moral metrics” – do the powerful algorithms that increase 
interest rates account for the realities of the poor?        

My first 2023 meeting, on Jan 3 was at the World Bank to discuss "inclusive growth" with Leading World Bank Economist, Professor Marcin Piatkowski , to prepare our Sessions for Davos . We decided to focus the discussion on how Blockchain technology can help the three billion people who have no access to the traditional financial system, how it can help in humanitarian aid and fundraising, and of course the "hot" case of Ukraine - where the technology is helping right now increase the resilience on many "fronts" .?

We also debated his amazing "inclusive growth thesis" to which he dedicated a renowned book summing up lessons from his native country, Poland, offering solutions for the growth of other countries from eastern Europe, and ultimately proposing an "inclusive growth" formula for every country.?

SHIFTS: Gross National Happiness replaces GDP; Participatory Budgeting         

The event at the Swiss House was Epic , as I moderated a Panel comprising the United Nations Director of the International Computing Centre, the Head of Digitalization at the Swiss Government, the Father of Crypto Valley and two Cardano Mavericks. In the Age of exponential tech are we moving at exponential speed to also put this powerful tech to create inclusive sustainable prosperity for *all* humans?... How about the “moral metrics” – do the powerful algorithms that increase interest rates account for the realities of the poor?

Under the backdrop of the hard questions reflective of the unbanked status quo, the discussion pointed to the need to redefine policies and practices like Benedikt Wechsler is doing while carrying the Swiss innovation flag all over the world. The time has come to use the power of technology to include everyone giving them access to financial and other services and products that meet their needs, and Carmen Hett is making strides in this regard at the UN, along with Sameer Chauhan who is leading the tech stack there. Technology like the distributed ledger which Allison Fromm is deploying with her team in the Ukraine trenches helps through innovations like self-sovereign identities and mobile payments which bring lower cost, increased functionality, and better access to services. While Shogo Ishida is supporting African women entrepreneurs to deploy financial tech that gives credit to the unbanked while substantially reducing the costs. And Mathias Ruch is fueling innovation ecosystems such as https://mazzuma.com/ , https://carmachain.com/and more.

Money: from Speculative Extractive Exclusive - to Intentional Inclusive which renews the social commons.

SHIFTS: Circular Currencies; Taxing Resources instead of Labor        

The future is embedded in the present landscape–the time has come to disrupt the economic inequality landscape and redefine the metrics that are currently serving the “haves” ignoring the needs of “the rest of us”!

Renowned historian Niall Ferguson , author of 16 books, among which "The Ascent of Money” exposed at several Davos venues the patterns by which the distributed ledger enables a better financial system by bringing about privacy, consent, lower transaction cost, access to credit and social security relief, increased functionality. While referring to the much-needed “moral metrics” in evaluating the current financial system he pointed out that not everything used in payments needs to be money, given that fundamentally the blockchain is the best ever instantiation that we can have to date of the trust relationship between debtor and creditor, given that ultimately the value of money is a measure of trust. The programmability of money enabled by smart contracts can support regenerative finance implementations and if we set the policies right taxing resources instead of labor, we can achieve the ideal of circular currencies and a true “digital factory” of circular economies!?

Technology: from Monopoly Power Abuse - to Empowering Accountable Participation

In the Age of exponential tech are we moving at exponential speed to also 
put this powerful tech at work to create inclusive sustainable prosperity 
for *all* humans?...        

We are creating our lives on the canvas of the World, through thoughts that trigger actions impacting the “canvas” in various ways now or in the future… Our social structures are supported by the technology stack (infrastructure) which influences the emergence of culture, and in the past decade, the technology was designed to enrich those who own the platforms by waging narrative & culture wars against us, making it increasingly difficult to have a shared sense of truth. The public education system did not promote the enlightenment of the individual, but rather suppressed critical thought and neurodiversity. It produced preformatted, standardized, and obedient worker-citizen consumers that are programmed to feed the system that holds them captured, exploited, and enslaved. Silently and collectively, they are sawing the branch of reason on which we are all sitting. Given the conditioning through which the education system throws sand in our eyes locking us in linear mechanistic ways of thinking, we are unable to recognize the effects the system we developed has on us and how we became passive consumers living with the illusion of being “active citizens” . Time has come to raise from the ashes and ask: Are we human or are we “dancers”, puppets on the strings of smarter and smarter technologies enslaving us...

What we need to escape this fate is not to “see” new landscapes, but to develop “new eyes” that enable us to “see” in new ways. For many years my friend Stan Stalnaker fostered the efforts to develop a community of leaders who “see” in ‘new ways” at #HubCulture . Between 2012 – 2014 I was involved together with Stan in an MIT Media Lab experiment led by John Henry Clippinger , along with several decentralization mavericks, among which the late bernard lietaer , David Bollier Peter Hirshberg Maurizio Rossi Jonathan Ledgard Patrick Deegan, PhD – to explore ways in which we can build more organic ways of governance. Our work culminated with the book “From Bitcoin to Burning Man and Beyond” in which the dozens of experiment participants proposed "recipes" for the “new eyes” with which we can approach a new cultural renaissance.?

SHIFTS: Platforms Enabling Holistic Decision-Making; Tools to visualize 
        the ecological footprint of action and consumption chooices        

“Decentralizing Art & Culture: How Web3 Can Build The Future By Saving The Past” Fireside Chat with Tom McLeod of Arkive, at the Hub Culture Tech Lodge was an opportunity to address this critical topic. We tackled the paradigm shift that can rescue the major societal drive -culture - from the centralized consumerist politicization that (social) media ensued by pushing the weak buttons of our evolutionary impediments (greed, tribalism, selfishness) and looked at how we can transcend limitations by actively engaging in the effort to redefine cultural values in a democratic manner enabled and empowered by technology .

It was surreal to have zeke.ai participate (via Stan Stalnaker ) in the fireside and ask pertinent questions while suggesting the most creative actions! You can witness it all in the recording

Leadership: from Ego-centric to Eco-centric

SHIFTS: Co-sensing infrastructure; Capacity building for the ego-to-eco shift        

What do we see when we contemplate the "Metacrisis"? We see ourselves. The problem is us. It is we who burn resources at 1.5 times the capacity of our planet to regenerate them. It is we who participate in economic arrangements that replicate the income divide and consumerism and burnout bubble that comes with it. And it is we who use mostly traditional banks for our financial transactions in spite of our knowledge that these banks are a big part of the problem. The time has come to take accountability for the way we live and do the "right thing"!

And of course, it is women leaders showing the right way – and this year the Annual Meeting opening night tradition brought together all of the exceptional women attending Davos to join forces in this common mission!

The last word: Technology for Good

My dream is that our quest to upgrade the socio-economic operating system will
succeed to an extent that will inspire WEF to declare as the Theme for 
Davos 2024: Humanity Thriving in Harmony with the Planet!        

Right now the SDGs depend on the most Centralized Institutions: IMF, World Bank, United Nations, and Central Banks, all of which are prone to the highest rate of institutional failure! Just like the social network behemoth, they are not the best custodians of our identities and pockets, capturing the value we create and keeping us captive in the “infinite growth obligation” economy. The time has come to ask ourselves: What kind of world do we want?” and put the power of technology in the service of people, giving back to the creators of the value they create. Because true Development means Freedom from Fear and Want!?

On the last day, the potential of blockchain technology to support this shift was explored at the Crypto-Summit where I was invited to have the last word with a Closing Keynote “Blockchain for the SDGs”.?Using examples of outstanding projects I illustrated how blockchain technology can help improve living conditions: in giving access for the three billion people who have no access to the traditional financial system, the so-called "unbanked"; in enabling those disenfranchised to take ownership of their land via digital certificates, ?in providing humanitarian aid and fundraising opportunities for displaced populations, etc.

Among the most notable examples was Green Coin , a new type of crypto tracer-coin from SingularityNET aiming to track humanity’s progress along multiple dimensions including in the pursuit of carbon neutrality towards a truly sustainable future in order to support the achievement of the SDGs. Green Coin is used in projects that help protect and restore biodiversity as well as enhance human well-being, which demonstrates how nature-based solutions can be deployed at scale. Green coin users can volunteer with any of the accredited NGOs in such fields and claim rewards by presenting the volunteering certificate.

The Climate Neutral Cardano (CNC) is a decentralized community-driven initiative that aims to achieve a net positive environmental impact for the Cardano blockchain.

CNC Ala is a food forest project in Madagascar that addresses SDG 1, 2, 11 & 13) through agroecology and reforestation while tracking progress and measuring impact to ensure positive outcomes for the local community and the environment Alliance.

Socious: where work meets Impact , addressing SDG 17 with the Mission to give everyone the chance to make a difference. Socious is a talent marketplace connecting purpose-driven talent with impact organizations. By leveraging blockchain technology, Socious makes social/environmental impact work traceable and rewards contributions with crypto tokens. They have more than 50k impact jobs listed on the platform and more than 2.3k impact talent has registered.

Takeaways...

Cooperation requires that we regain the ability to connect to the Whole 
and act having in mind the effects of our actions on the Whole.        

As MIT Professor Otto Scharmer made us aware long ago, a fragmented world is the result of our fragmented consciousness which manifests in the “us vs them” competitive race against nature and our fellow humans, a race to the bottom depleting us of our soul substance and the Planet of its natural substance… Cooperation requires that we regain the ability to connect to the Whole and act having in mind the effects of our actions on the Whole . Each area addressed above, nature, consumption, money, technology, and leadership represents a part of the system that has lost the connection to the Whole.?

Even if evolution didn’t prepare us for flourishing in the natural selection fight for survival, we can help ourselves transcend the evolutionary impediments by forging a culture of cooperation that reminds us of our interconnectedness with each other and with Nature, as Dr. Nader Maleki mentioned in his inspiring opening address at the INGLOSUS Foundation SDG Davos Forum. And with this awareness, we will hopefully choose the right leaders who will set governance systems with rules and stoppers that prevent the destructive effects of the techno-industrial complex.

There is no more important research challenge today than to invent, prototype, and scale the economic logic and institutional innovations that will power, scale, and sustain the ego-to-eco shift, which is the shift from extractive fragmentation to a whole system, regenerative approach to life and work. My dream is that our quest to upgrade the socio-economic operating system will succeed to an extent that will inspire WEF to declare as the Theme for Davos 2024: Humanity Thriving in Harmony with the Planet!

My dream is that our quest to upgrade the socio-economic operating system will
succeed to an extent that will inspire WEF to declare as the Theme for 
Davos 2024: Humanity Thriving in Harmony with the Planet!