The World Economic Forum opened yesterday in the ski resort of Davos, Switzerland, bringing together heads of state, corporate honchos, and high-profile academics (especially economists) to discuss issues of global and regional importance - everything from climate change and jobs to currency valuation and international trade. The forum includes public meetings, but my understanding is that nearly all of the serious conversation occurs behind closed doors in private meetings, beyond the ears of the media and the public. The World Economic Forum is a private, independent group, and the discussions have no official status. Corporations have to pay to play, forking up tens of thousands of dollars to interact with politicos.
In some respects, there seems to be a need for fora like Davos, where the movers and shakers can get together to plan the world (a grandiose-seeming phrase, but one that I think fits), even if it does smack of corporatism. On the other hand, it really does smack of corporatism, which is becoming something of a recurrent theme on this blog whenever I write about policy.
I can't tell you whether anything important or useful has ever come out of Davos; I haven't studied its history.
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