When you think of the World Economic Forum, chances are your mind takes you here, to Davos. But WEF isn’t just a yearly summit in the Alps. So, what is the difference between WEF and Davos?
The World Economic Forum is famous for its annual week-long meeting in Davos, Switzerland – so much so, that ‘WEF’ and ‘Davos’ have pretty much become synonymous. The Alpine resort town normally plays host to skiing and hiking enthusiasts, but for one week a year, WEF invites business leaders, billionaires, heads of state, royalty, academics, journalists, and celebrities to gather 5,000 feet above sea levet to address the world’s most pressing challenges. But once the meetings are over, WEF packs up and returns to its headquarters 267 miles away in the suburbs of Geneva. Based there, around 600 of the international non-profit organization’s more than 800 employees. They say their mission is “improving the state of the world. “but with such a lofty goal, how do they attempt to achieve it? Let’s start with the people behind WEF. The head of the organization is and has always been Klaus Schwab. Back in 1971, the then lesser-known engineer and economist brought his first meeting to Davos. Called the ‘European Management Forum’, his objective was to encourage business leaders to be accountable to everyone – not just shareholders. Sinxe then, the list of attendees has expanded globally to include politicians, NGOs, scientists, and even religious and cultural leaders. It was renamed the World Economic Forum in 1987, and the history-making moments quickly followed. Among its biggest successes, the speech from West Germany’s Foreign Minister in 1987 calling on the West to reach out to the Soviets, signalling the end of the Cold War. The first meeting between North Korea and South Korea in 1989. The handshake between Nelson Mandela and former South African president de Klerk in 1992, symbolizing the end of apartheid. In 2003, Schwab left his posr as a professor at the University of Geneva to focus full-time on building the Forum into a recognized international organization. It worked. The Forum grew from 450 participants in 1971, to more than 2,700 guests in 2023. And for a non-profit, WEF is extremely successful at generating revenue. In its 2022/2023 financial year, it earned nearly 500 million dollars, with media company Semafor reporting that if it were for profit, it would likely be valued at over a billion dollars. Today, Schwab and the Forum are guided by a Board of Trustees, which is mafe up of influential leaders. Some trustees yu’ve probably heard of, like AI Gore, Yo-Yo Ma and Christine Lagarde, while others might be less familiar.

свернуть