Davos puts the world's leaders on equal terms

BEFORE I attended my first World Economic Forum (WEF) at Davos, I was sceptical about just how useful it was going to be. Running any business is a full-time job, and a few days in the company of the world’s foremost movers and shakers struck me as potentially interesting, but not necessarily much help when it came to sorting out real issues.
Yet this year will be my fourth visit, and I’m really looking forward to it. Only at Davos is it possible to see influential world leaders, for once bereft of their teams of advisers, shuffling about with that gait of the terminally lost.

Only at Davos is an entire city so thoroughly taken over that every shop, bar and restaurant is caught up in the atmosphere. Only at Davos can you talk to people from every walk of life about arts, politics, business and culture on a completely equal footing.

And that is the key to the WEF. Everyone who attends is equal, from a world leader to a humble businessman. It gives us access to an environment in which we can discuss global challenges in an informal, open and honest way, and no single opinion is counted as more important than any other, and no subject is off-limits.

I know there are critics who say the annual get-together is nothing more than a talking shop, designed to make those who attend to feel important but makes little difference to those outside of its privileged boundaries. Yet these critics propose no serious alternative solutions and are guilty of carping from the sidelines, rather than joining in the most serious game of all: making the inevitable onset of globalisation a force for good rather than evil.

As leaders in their respective fields, the participants of the WEF need to be clear about what success for the global economy will look like. The established models of one nation’s success at the expense of a neighbour will be less relevant in the future than it has been in the past. The opportunities of global wealth creation must not be sacrificed to narrow and short-term national interests.

This is why the WEF matters. It provides an important bridge across the physical, cultural and intellectual barriers that have kept people apart in the past. It offers the potential for leaders to confront change, creating the prospect of a prosperous future for those who follow. And that is worth a few days of anyone’s time.

Ben Verwaayen is the chief executive of BT Group. Read his diary on The Times Online

Comments

[Wolfgang Finsterle]

Dear Ben,
Have you ever thought of how ironical your essay on the informal and open ambiance of the WEF might sound to the local people of Davos? When you think you can "..talk to people from every walk of life about arts, politics, business and culture on a completely equal footing" then how does that fit to the massive fences and barbwire which lock up our streets and parks? Some 5000 troops in the area, jet fighters continuously patrolling the skies? People who live in the vicinity of the venue have to register with the police before being allowed to their own homes, access to the Davos valley is restricted, you have to allow an extra 40 minutes for personal security checks when travelling to Davos, the local buses may or may not run depending on security issues, some areas by the heliport are completely locked during tens of minutes at a time (imagine that happens on your walk to work at 20 below in the morning!) etc.
To me these are not the attributes of an informal and open event. In fact, they make me feel rather unwelcome to my own home town. I'd wish the WEF would held its annual meeting somewhere where no locals have to be locked away. As a tourist resort we are used to all sorts of crowds jamming our streets. But unlike the WEF those crowds ACCEPT our way of living.