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DAVOS, Switzerland — The World Economic Forum’s annual conclave in the Swiss Alps is the greatest intersection of wealth and political power on the global calendar, but this year the balance is shifting.
Each January, forum organizers got used to announcing another record-breaking list of national leaders, global officials and royalty making their way to the exclusive gathering.
The WEF would attract even the most skeptical of globalization: from US President Donald Trump to former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to climate activist Greta Thunberg.
While 52 heads of state are traveling to Davos this year, there are no leading politicians. US President Joe Biden and his Chinese and Russian counterparts Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are all making a splash.
French President Emmanuel Macron, who has vowed to make the planet great again, is skipping the Talkfest, as is new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and re-elected Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Instead, it is a European guest list: Chancellor Olaf Scholz is the only head of state from a G7 country and shares the top position with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, another German.
Even within Europe’s royal ranks, this year’s forum is more likely to attract figures like Queen Maxima of the Netherlands – a UN envoy for financial inclusion – than environmental activists like King Charles and Prince William.
Some of the best-known tech companies are returning participation amid rounds of heavy layoffs.
And the city’s biggest party hosts — Russian oligarchs — remain pushed out by sanctions imposed since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has an unrivaled star performance among the Davosers – but even one video appearance of his this year will be treated as subpar considering how many of them he’s making now.
It’s the C-suite, fool!
With the global political elite largely absent, this year’s WEF focuses on rising CEO numbers.
Among the 2,700 attendees at official WEF sessions, “we’re likely to surpass the old record set in 2020 of 600 global CEOs — including 1,500 at the C-suite level overall,” said George Schmitt, WEF’s head of digital and marketing 80 added CEOs are newcomers to Davos.
Those who claim Davos is dead have yet to be proven right, but critics of the WEF are now spreading beyond the activist world, which has long decried the juxtaposition of private jet opulence and hand-wringing forums about global poverty.
The WEF would attract even the most skeptical of globalization: from US President Donald Trump to former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to climate activist Greta Thunberg | Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images
The US delegation includes cabinet members like climate ambassador John Kerry, who will camp out in Davos for most of the week, but others like Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen are dropping out.
Not that Yellen has better things to do at home: she embarks on an 11-day journey, stopping in Senegal, Zambia and South Africa, with no time for Davos.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Beatrice Fihn, who campaigns for the elimination of nuclear weapons, said she “really forgot that Davos is still happening”.
“The format seems a bit outdated now. The private jets and oligarch parties no longer suit modern business [business] live,” said Scott Colvin, a Davos veteran who is now public affairs director at Aviva. “The events surrounding COP [the U.N.’s annual climate summit] feel a bigger deal now as they focus on a specific global policy goal,” he added.
The WEF is a victim of its own success and is in a demographic bind.
The Forum’s operating model requires that it provide a place for the world’s most powerful and influential people to speak.
According to Bloomberg, 119 billionaires joined the party in 2020, with combined assets of more than $500 billion.
The WEF’s effort to bring the super elite together is a stark annual reminder that they don’t look like the rest of us.
The best proportion of female attendees in face-to-face meetings in the WEF’s 52-year history was 24 percent in 2020.
Despite years of admonitions and incentives for members to bring in more female colleagues, the number often hovers between 18 and 20 percent. A WEF spokesman said 42 percent of speakers this year will be women.
The WEF aims for a global reach – but instead often lands in the middle of the Atlantic.
This year, Europe will provide most of the political leaders, while the US business delegation will again massively outweigh the others. The 700 Americans taking part this year outnumber the Chinese delegation by about 20 to 1.