(International Observation) The Difficulty of the Davos Forum: When Weaknesses Are Amplified by Multiple Crisis
China News Agency, Davos, January 22, title: The Difficulties of the Davos Forum: When Weaknesses Are Amplified by Multiple Crisis
China News Agency reporter De Yongjian
On January 20, the 2023 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting (Davos Forum) came to an end.
If you sort out the key words of the forum, it is hard to ignore the term "polycrisis", which is used to describe the intertwined and superimposed crises of geopolitics, energy, climate change, food security and so on.
During the five-day meeting, it was frequently talked about by the participants, and more importantly, it was right in front of the Davos Forum.
Due to the intensification of the country's energy problems, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa canceled his trip to Davos at the last moment; due to the historically warm winter, the amount of snowfall in Davos this year is significantly less, and it is rare to see heavy snow; due to increased inflation, The World Economic Forum report ranks the rising cost of living as the most serious short-term risk globally in 2023.
The Davos forum prides itself on finding solutions to global problems, and it is working hard in the face of multiple crises.
According to the briefing after the meeting, this forum focused on the "relationship between major systemic challenges". More than 2,700 "leading figures" (including 47 heads of government) were invited to participate in the forum, and a total of more than 480 meetings were held. Reach consensus or cooperation intentions in a series of fields such as trade, climate change, energy, and geopolitical cooperation.
However, before the opening of this forum, the tone of criticism from the outside world was on the rise, ranging from "the forum symbolizes inequality" to "the lack of substantive content". Some observers also said that even in Western countries, the G7 Only German Chancellor Scholz, the leader of the Group (G7), attended the meeting, reflecting the current attitude of the political circles towards the Davos Forum from the side.
The reason is that multiple crises are amplifying the weakness of the Davos Forum.
Take climate change as an example. The venue where the conference is held is a vivid example of climate warming. The business giants participating in the conference still choose to take private jets to attend the conference. Off-site environmental protection groups are very dissatisfied with this. Expose the selfishness and hypocrisy of some elites.
Another example is the issue of people's livelihood. After the 2008 financial crisis, the Davos Forum was criticized by "elite clubs" and "rich people's parties". , Do you really empathize with the suffering of the masses?
Moreover, these issues are related to the standard of living, and are often imminent, and just "sit and talk" will not help.
In fact, at the 2022 Davos Forum held in May last year, issues such as food supply received "special attention". At that time, some participants revealed that due to factors such as changes in guests, there were not many discussions on people's livelihood issues at the forum, which caused Response was also limited, indicating that the Davos Forum needs to further narrow the distance with ordinary people.
In the face of multiple crises and many difficulties, the theme of this year's Davos Forum is "strengthening cooperation in a divided world". After the closing of the forum on January 20, Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, called for Innovation, friendliness, originality and other forces can turn challenges into opportunities. This spirit of solving problems through mutual respect and cooperation is the "Davos spirit".
Obviously, in today's "divided world", including the Davos Forum itself, whether it can "turn crises into opportunities" in the future may depend on how far the Davos Forum can go on the road to overcome its weaknesses.
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