Justin's Faery Dust Dims

It's somehow fitting that our new prime minister is tying Canada's future to the "fourth industrial revolution" at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland this week.

Klaus Schwab in 2012

Just four years ago Davos co-founder Klaus Schwab astonished observers with his keynote remarks at the opening of the 2012 gathering of world political leaders and businessmen.  At the time, we posted a blog item that we called a placeholder in the Conversation of a Generation.  That was because we frankly didn't  know what to make of Professor Schwab's assertions that capitalism, in its present form, has outlived its usefulness.

The professor's analysis came on the heels of the Occupy Wall Street movement that caused people to question the sustainability of the gulf opening up between the economically disadvantaged and the crony capitalists who are killing their own golden goose one big slice at a time.

This time Justin Trudeau is the keynote speaker, an acknowledgement of his miraculous political upset of Stephen Harper only three months ago.  With the global economy sliding toward the brink of the unknown,  organizers undoubtedly felt that some boosterism might help. 

 Trudeau rose to the occasion  with the pitch that "My predecessor wanted you to know Canada for its resources.  I want you to know Canadians for our resourcefulness."

Neil Nails It

It took CBC correspondent Neil Macdonald to rein in this show horse: "prime ministers have to cheerlead; they all do. But Trudeau's ... happy talk is beginning to sound a bit detached from certain realties that the unimaginably important heavy-hitters in Davos are probably quite aware of".

In other words, enough of the faery dust already. When Trudeau gets back on Canadian terra firma there are real issues to be addressed with more than incantations of diversity, cooperation and inclusivity.  It's time we had more to tell our partners in counter-terrorism who didn't invite Canada to the NATO conference on that subject this week.  Provinces and municipalities deserve a better sense of how the government plans to deliver its infrastructure commitments than Trudeau's standard reminder of how many 'just  folks'  he listened to while he was wandering in the political wilderness as leader of the third party.   

Leave it to Neil to state  the obvious:  "... we must all have internalized that there is value in diversity, and that we must work together as Canadians, and that we are an incredible, wonderful, virtuous place."

"We also have problems, though. Time to get at them, no?"

Bookmark This Moment

We want to post this bookmark leading to Davos co-founder Klaus Schwab's astonishing keynote remarks at the opening of this year's World Economic Forum.  By using this technique, we are inserting a placeholder in the Conversation of a Generation.  That's because we frankly don't know what to make of Professor Schwab's assertion that capitalism, in its present form, has outlived its usefulness.

 CBC correspondent Terry Milewski posted one of the most pertinent commentaries on the Schwab analysis, reporting that the Davos doyen remarked:  "Capitalism, in its current form, no longer fits the world around us... A global transformation is urgently needed and it must start with reinstating a global sense of social responsibility."

Remarkable as the professor's words were, considering that he has presided over this annual celebration of the western democracies' economic success story for 40 years, it isn't clear that his diagnosis carried the day in 2012.  Bill Gates, for example, told the BBC that the economic system that made him the richest man in the world, is a "phenomenal system". 

"We're going through a tough period, but there is no other system that has improved humanity," the Microsoft founder told the BBC.  Amen to Bill's assessment.  But despite his brilliant success and his stellar philanthropic role model, Gates won't have the last word on the subject. After all, about the time Davos was getting under way four decades ago, the blue chip Club of Rome declared the widsom of "limits to growth".  Despite the veracity of this prognosis and the widespread promotion of its message by the club's leading disciples, including Canadians Pierre Trudeau and Maurice Strong, the lemming-like swarm still went over the cliff in 2008.

Only time will tell if this year's Davos diagnosis makes any difference.  Professor Schwab's declaration was overtaken by competing voices before the conference concluded.  But as a signal event his words are worth remembering for what they represent.