Davos: Is it an elite book club or something even worse?

I am an artist, and an artist never retires. Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum

This week from January 20 - 23, 2500 delegates will convene in the Swiss town of Davos to improve the state of the world through four intoxicating days of intense collaboration. It is a gathering of the elite of the elite of the elite (the private jet parking lot is full) that are further stratified with an elaborate badge system that includes and excludes elites from super-duper-uber-elite secret meetings. For example, if your badge has a hologram, you get special access to the IGWEL or Informal Gathering of World Economic Leaders.

If it weren't all so serious, it would be silly. Supersillious.

The man behind Davos is someone you probably don't know, but you should. Klaus Schwab is the founder of the World Economic Forum and is setting the agenda in Davos. If Davos is where wisdom goes to become conventional, Klaus Schwab is the traffic cop of world wisdom.

He looks a bit like a Swiss Homer Simpson.

Professor Schwab, with doctorates in Mechanical Engineering and Economics, and a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard, founded the The World Economic Forum forty-five years ago in 1971. Back then it was called the European Management Symposium and its purpose was to help European businessmen get up to speed on American business practices. In 1974 political leaders were invited, and in 1987 it was renamed the World Economic Forum with a mandate that included the informal settling of international conflicts. Violinist/conductor Yehudi Menuhin was invited in 1999, heralding the celebrity phase of Davos' evolution. 

Klaus Schwab is the ringleader of Davos, but he has a problem: although at 77 he says he has the fitness of a "well-trained fifty year old" there is a possibility, however remote, that one day he may not be able to lead the World Economic Forum due to a chronic condition known as death.

What is Klaus Schwab's solution to the issue of mortality? Write a book called The Fourth Industrial Revolution, make it the theme of Davos and let it set the agenda for all the Davoses in the foreseeable future.

I read The Fourth Industrial Revolution this weekend, so that you wouldn't have to.  

Digitization also enables large incumbents to cross industry boundaries by leveraging their customer base, infrastructure or technology.

Alas, The Fourth Industrial Revolution is the textual equivalent of Swiss cuisine, a fondue of academic business jargon that makes you want to light a fire under it and stick a fork with a fluffy marshmallow into it. 

According to the Financial Times, The Fourth Industrial Revolution has 77 "I"s in it. What is it about alpine air that incubates secret organizations such as FIFA, the International Olympic Committee and World Economic Forum, and makes their leaders want to send the world snapshots that say, "Look at my large genius"?

The fourth industrial revolution is a concept that some people such as Jeremy Rifkin think Klaus Schwab has pulled out of his alpenhorn. Most economists believe that we're still in the third industrial revolution that began in the 1960s with computers and digital technology.

Klaus Schwab argues that, since the turn of the 21st century, we have entered a new phase where technology is coming together at a rapid pace across physical, digital and biological domains. The fourth industrial revolution has arrived because the Internet of Things has more things to do, faster, and with greater disruptive effects. 

The world lacks a consistent, positive and common narrative that outlines the opportunities and challenges of the fourth industrial revolution, and Klaus Schwab wants to be the person who authors this new narrative. His book The Fourth Industrial Revolution has three main themes:

1. The world is changing faster than ever--everyone has to continuously learn and adapt;

2. The changes could be good or they could be bad, but will probably be good if...

3. Davos can enable collaboration among elites to save the world from itself so that business can peacefully rule the world.

Klaus Schwab, the man few people have heard of and nobody elected, is a de facto world leader. He is the nondescript enigma in the photos of people you recognize, a Zelig who would prefer that others conform to his view, rather than he bend to theirs.

Professor Schwab has set the framework for discussions at Davos where the world's top business and political leaders gather each year. He has silenced dissenting voices by inviting them to Davos where they happily attend in the hope that they might rub shoulders with one of the elitist elites and put in a good word for their cause.

Klaus Schwab is a man who believes the world is made up of interconnected stakeholders, but some stakeholders have a greater stake than others. Business is the stakeholder of the future of the fourth industrial revolution, and should be allowed to do business unfettered, but...

A regulatory backlash could happen, thereby reasserting the power of policymakers in the process, and straining the adaptive forces of a complex system. (trans. if business oversteps ethical boundaries, government might step with regulations that totally fück things up.)

Professor Schwab is also an avowed introvert who believes in the power of purpose, reflection and physical fitness--each year he climbs a mountain of at least 4,000 meters and skis a marathon--so he can't be all bad, but who knows for sure? We don't even know how much he's paid to be the world's greatest event planner. 

We do know that Klaus Schwab is a fan of Will.i.am, who will be receiving an award in Davos this week in honour of his contribution to education. Will.i.am celebrates women in his lumpy lyrical fashion:

My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump,
My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump.
My lovely lady lumps (lumps)
My lovely lady lumps (lumps)
My lovely lady lumps (lumps)
In the back and in the front (lumps)
My lovin' got you.

Davos celebrates women too, professing that gender equality is a goal, yet they are far from over that hump. Only 18% of Davos attendees are women and most are excluded from panels of serious discussion of the most serious issues. The Davos Man is emphatically not a woman. Apparently there aren't enough elite women in the world to qualify for an invitation to Davos, and even if they make it there, they don't qualify for the special badge with the hologram on it (except for Angela Merkel, but she won't be in Davos this year because she has more pressing concerns at home).

Leonardo DiCaprio will surely get a special badge in Davos this week and will light up every room he enters--he's there to pick up an award for combating the effects of the climate crisis on wildlife. Bono once referred to Davos as "fat cats in the snow" but now that he's a regular Davos attendee, you won't hear a disparaging rattle or hum out of him. Kevin Spacey will be there (a proxy for POTUS), as will Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who will make his Davos debut, and celebrity business leaders Sheryl Sandberg, Michael Dell and Eric Schmidt will also attend. All the attention on celebrities draws attention away from Klaus Schwab, but he is the person we really should be looking at. Who is this man who runs Davos and is also involved with those conspiratorial Bilderbergers, and what does he want?

All he wants is to make the world in his image. The Fourth Industrial Revolution outlines his game plan. It's a world in which elected politicians are referees whose main task is to stay out of the way and let companies play. Klaus Schwab is not a bad man, he just kinda looks that way. 

It is human, all too human, to be hierarchical, to divide the world into friend and foe, to view elites with suspicion until they welcome you as an elite. The elite of the world are shaping their views and setting their agendas in Davos this week, and The Fourth Industrial Revolution is their guide. Davos not a bad thing, it just kinda looks that way.

About the Author: Lynne Everatt wishes attendees at Davos would read Jon Kabat-Zinn's Wherever You Go [in Davos] There You Are instead.

Do you think Davos attendees are up to no good? What book would you recommend that they read and why? The best suggestion as judged by an elite panel will receive a very special elite prize.