Davos Diary, Day 5: Never tempt Providence

An improvident editor at FP placed a hubristic headline on my last post: “Fatigue can’t stop this blogger.”

Never tempt Providence. Fatigue did stop this blogger Friday morning. Or maybe just plain laziness.

After four nights of minimal sleep, my body decided it didn’t want to catch a 7 a.m. bus from Klosters to listen to President Musharraf assure a hot-ticket breakfast crowd that the fate of Pakistani democracy was safe in his hands. It went a step further and decided it could do without a serious discussion on Corporate Global Citizenship in the 21st Century, featuring British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Cisco Systems CEO John T. Chambers, and PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi.

JOEL SAGET/AFP/Getty Images

When I finally stirred myself and trudged out on a surprisingly sunny morning, the Klosters to Davos shuttle bus, supposedly scheduled at 20-minute intervals, took 35 minutes to arrive. Two fellow passengers were raving about the panel I’d just missed. Ever the diligent blogger, I pulled out my notepad: “What did they say?” An abashed silence followed. “I don’t really recall,” one attendee confessed. “Queen Rania of Jordan was seated right in the middle and I just looked at her the whole time.”

I eventually surmised that the panelists had agreed that it made business sense for corporations to make social responsibility a priority. They’ve been saying that for years at Davos, of course, but this time there was an added flourish: Indra Nooyi declared that philanthropy had “unleashed the emotions” of PepsiCo’s employees. Brown and Chambers agreed that customers are not just supportive, they are demanding that corporations become more socially and environmentally aware.

When I finally got to the Forum, I decided to pass up the Ukrainian lunch to which I’d been invited by Viktor Pinchuk, a son-in-law of ex-President Leonid Kuchma whose invitations had remained highly popular with the Davos glitterati (he was also the host of the relocated philanthropic round table I’d missed yesterday, on that occasion for no fault of mine). My choice was clear: the risk of long speeches on Ukraine versus a chance to catch up on the Davos buzz. The latter was useful, because it helped me realize that in attending only the panels that interested me I’d steered clear of what all the business journalists were focusing on: the loss by the French bank Société Générale of the small sum of $7.1 billion, which the bank was blaming on a reckless (and dishonest) trader—Barings all over again, except with more zeroes.

I’d also missed the interminable arguments about whether the world economy was in crisis or not (they don’t know any more than you do) and whether it was the fault of the regulators or the speculators (or possibly both). As someone once famously said, if you put all the economists in the world end to end, they’d never reach a conclusion. I have never been a practitioner of the dismal science, so I skipped a BBC debate on global economics (though I commend it unseen to those who care, if only because its moderator, my friend Nik Gowing, knows how to keep an argument moving). And I returned to the topics that interested me.

Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Just as well, because I caught two terrific panels back to back, which doesn’t always happen in Davos. The first, on Indian innovation, was stimulating and educative, and it was attended (judging by the badges of the questioners) by a surprisingly large number of Davos spouses who had actually traveled or worked in India. The second was even better: a first-rate discussion on what could have been too well-worn a subject—development. Despite the absence of the advertised Kofi Annan (on a mediation trip in Kenya rather than on the stage in Davos), the panel featured Gordon Brown, Bill Gates, World Bank President Robert Zoellick, South African Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, and the chairman of both Unilever and Ericsson, Michael Treschow, all ably moderated by PepsiCo’s Indra Nooyi. The conversation managed to be both thoughtful and wide-ranging: In the span of an hour, the heavyweights spoke of skill-building and education, corruption and good governance, the empowerment of women, African agriculture, mobile telephony and entrepreneurship (and a lot else besides). Though the focus was principally on Africa—as if other regions don’t still have major development challenges to overcome—it was a first-rate conversation, Brown especially coming off as an insightful and committed leader on the issue. If the British voters ever tire of him, he should be put in charge of a global development agency.

I managed to make an appearance at three of the six receptions to which I’d been invited (the fact that two were at the same hotel helped) before arriving at my dinner panel. I’d groaned at the topic—”The Rise of the Multicultural Couple”—and at first sight I was convinced this was going to be a disaster. There were five speakers, six paying dinner guests, and four Forum staff around the table. But it turned out to be a delightful discussion, covering inter-religious marriage, the case for cosmopolitanism, and even an exchange about the neurological consequences of falling in love. That Davos still retains the capacity to put on a panel like that humanizes the place.

Since yesterday’s format appears to have won some approbation, I’ll end with a few notes from the events I attended:

Most intriguing facts I learned about India today:

• One hundred fifty of the Fortune 500 companies have established R&D operations in India.
• In 2002, more people traveled by train in one day in India than by plane in an entire year.
• Of the 300 million children in India between the ages of 6 and 16 today, 270 million will reach adulthood without the benefit of a formal education.

Swiss Image/World Economic Forum

Most irrelevant observations about Davos: The “no-tie” rule proclaimed by founder Klaus Schwab, in an effort to preserve the informality of the Forum, is honored by the corporate types but not by the officials. At the development panel, Brown sported a splendid purple tie, Manuel a vivid red one, and Zoellick a drab navy tie. Far worse sartorially is the number of women wearing high heeled shoes and stiletto boots amidst the snow and the ice. How do they do it, one is tempted to marvel. But more to the point: Why do they do it?

Most memorable corridor confabs: I greeted my old friend Carl Bildt, the foreign minister of Sweden, most warmly, and only after a few minutes realized whom I’d interrupted him chatting with. It was the Duke of York. Davos rules prevent further indiscretion about the subsequent conversation, but even a staunch republican like me doesn’t treat running into royalty lightly.

Most quotable one-liners:

• “Economics has made us interdependent and politics divides us. We need to bring our politics in line with our economics.” –Trevor Manuel, finance minister of South Africa
• “The most significant breakthrough innovations are made out of fear.” –Sunil Bharti Mittal, CEO of Bharti Airtel, India’s largest telecom company
• “Cosmopolitans are rich; evangelicals are poor.” –David McWilliams, Irish entrepreneur

Shashi Tharoor, a former Under Secretary General of the United Nations, was India’s candidate in the 2006 race to succeed Kofi Annan as Secretary General and came second out of seven contenders. He is the award-winning author of 10 books, most recently The Elephant, the Tiger and the Cellphone: Reflections on India in the 21st Century. Visit him at www.shashitharoor.com.

You can find Tharoor’s previous Diary entries here or at the following links:

• Day 4: Fatigue can’t stop this blogger
• Day 3: Panels galore
• Day 2: Snowy arrival
• Day 1: Setting the scene