Hay muchas organizaciones en el mundo donde los líderes empresariales y los gobiernos trabajan en estrecha colaboración. Pero se dice que pocos son tan polarizadores como el Foro Económico Mundial y su fundador, Klaus Schwab.

Por un lado, casi cada enero unos cuantos miles de destacados ejecutivos de empresas, políticos, periodistas y otras personas acuden en masa a la minúscula aldea alpina de Davos-Klosters, Suiza, para la reunión anual exclusiva del WEF, a la que sólo se puede acceder mediante invitación. Los periodistas de televisión, radio y prensa adulan a los llamados buenos y grandes. 

Personas como Jamie Dimon, director ejecutivo de JPMorgan Chase, y el fundador de Microsoft, Bill Gates, estuvieron presentes en el evento que duró del 15 al 19 de enero, y ambos fueron vistos por televisión. A primera vista, las cosas pueden parecer benignas. Pero si rascas la superficie verás algo bastante diferente.

«Lo que resulta interesante cuando se analiza cómo se inició el FEM», dice Alan Mendoza, director ejecutivo de la Sociedad Henry Jackson, un grupo de expertos en políticas con sede en Londres, Inglaterra. «No fue al azar».

MILEI DE ARGENTINA ADVIERTE AL FEM QUE RECHACE EL SOCIALISMO, DICE ‘EL MUNDO OCCIDENTAL ESTÁ EN PELIGRO’

El fundador del Foro Económico Mundial, Klaus Schwab, habla en Davos el 16 de enero de 2024. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP vía Getty Images)

En 1971, con la ayuda de la Comisión Europea (CE), un organismo gubernamental, Klaus Schwab, entonces profesor de negocios en la Universidad de Ginebra, fundó el Foro Europeo de Gestión e invitó a 450 ejecutivos de empresas a una conferencia en Davos. La idea era lograr que los líderes europeos aprendieran algo sobre cómo funcionan las empresas estadounidenses. 

«Tenías respaldo institucional», dice Mendoza. «Esto atrae a los empresarios y luego a los políticos». También considera que uno de los logros más impactantes de Schwab es «la magnitud de lo que ha logrado».

Sin embargo, existen preocupaciones sobre el futuro del FEM después de Schwab, que tiene 86 años. Hasta ahora no ha nombrado un sucesor y eso, a su vez, tiene a los patrocinadores de la organización preocupados por el futuro del FEM, según un informe de Politico de 2023. 

La estación alpina de Davos antes de la 54ª reunión anual del Foro Económico Mundial, el 30 de diciembre de 2023. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP vía Getty Images)

The Politico report cites insiders as saying he’s like a monarch who will stay in the job until death. In a similar way, he also employs family members in high-ranking posts within the not-for-profit organization. The report also states that insiders wouldn’t talk on the record as they feared reprisals such as being banned from WEF events or even being fired just for talking.

Other insiders, both current and former employees, anonymously compare Schwab to Russia’s dictator, according to a Guardian newspaper report last year. «Klaus picks his leaders using the same criteria Putin uses to pick deputies for the state duma: loyalty, guile, sex appeal,» the paper quotes one of the sources as saying. Another source in the report called Schwab’s top team «nobodies.»

‘DISEASE X’: WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM CREATING CONTINGENCY PLAN FOR INFECTIOUS VIRUS OUTBREAK

World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab listens as German Chancellor Olaf Scholz addresses the delegates in Davos, Switzerland, May 26, 2022. (Reuters/Arnd Wiegmann)

By 1987, it had morphed into the WEF, and from then, seemingly nothing could stop it. And that’s where critics say the first problem with WEF arrives.

As the WEF has grown in popularity, they say it looks more and more like an exclusive networking club for the mega-rich and super-powerful. «It is nothing more than an official mechanism by which cronyism can flourish,» says Ben Habib, co-deputy leader of British political party Reform UK. «The event legitimizes cronyism.»

Others who have attended Davos, as the annual event is known, see it as a competitive event where the guests play a game of high-stakes social climbing where the winners get cushy high-paid jobs at the top of massive multinational corporations.

Facebook and Blackrock are examples of where former U.K. government ministers have taken on senior roles. Nick Clegg, former leader of Britain’s center left Lib-Dems, is now the president of global affairs at Meta. Similarly, for a while, George Osbourne, former chancellor of the exchequer (finance chief) for the U.K. government, took a role as a senior adviser to the giant U.S.-based fund management company Black Rock.

Private jets are lined up at Zurich Kloten Airport as participants arrive for the World Economic Forum in Davos, on Jan. 18, 2024. (Piero Cruciatti/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Habib says it’s no wonder big business and top politicians are deeply in bed with each other. And it is viewed by many as a powerful yet unaccountable organization that doesn’t reflect the needs or wants of all society. Instead, it has an invitation-only policy to the annual event.

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM TO KICK OFF IN DAVOS, SWITZERLAND WITH GLOBAL ELITES LIKELY TO FACE FLAK FOR PRIVATE JETS

A logo of the World Economic Forum at its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, Jan. 9, 2024. (Lian Yi/Xinhua via Getty Images)

Indeed, WEF has the following statement on its website: «Our activities are shaped by a unique institutional culture founded on the stakeholder theory, which asserts that an organization is accountable to all parts of society.»

The WEF didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the seeming discrepancy between its statement about serving everyone and having an invite-only policy.

«The little guy is not represented anywhere in these major international forums,» Mendoza says. The issue with WEF is its huge scale, he says. «If we have problems with [the little guy being silent], it is not a WEF problem, it’s a broader capitalism issue.»

Another issue that has irked its critics revolves around demands at past WEF events calling for a greener global economy and the idea of reducing the world’s use of carbon-based energy. That contrasts with the 1,000 private jets that reportedly ferried in the big shots this year for the annual meeting, which ended Jan. 19. Those private jets emit 10 times more carbon than commercial jetliners and 50 times more than trains.

ZELENSKYY MAKES URGENT CALL FOR SUPPORT AT WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM AT DAVOS

Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Ukraine’s president, second right, with, from left, Steve Schwarzman, Blackstone CEO, Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, and Lakshmi Mittal, CEO of ArcelorMittal, during a meeting with business leaders in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2024. (Chiara Albanese/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Mendoza notes that while a couple of decades ago the secretive Bilderberg Group had been the  focal point of conspiracy theorists, now WEF has become a lightning rod for similar ideas. Habib concurs, stating, «There are many people who think Schwab controls the world. I’m not one of them.» But he doesn’t like the people who Schwab hangs out with. «He has embedded himself with the ‘great and good,’ but they ain’t so great and ain’t so good.»

Observers say a turning point was in 2021 after the previous year’s COVID-19 pandemic. It was then that the idea of «the Great Reset» took off. «The pandemic represents a rare but narrow window of opportunity to reflect, reimagine, and reset our world to create a healthier, more equitable, and more prosperous future,» Schwab said. And he spoke about wealth taxes.

Instead of something new and better happening in the economy, something as old as the hills manifested; The richest people got even richer, and the poor got poorer. Earlier this month, Forbes magazine found that the top five wealthiest people in the world had collectively more than doubled their wealth. These include investing guru Warren Buffett and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Meanwhile, U.K.-based charity Oxfam says five billion people got poorer over the same period, primarily due to surging inflation and war.

Klaus Schwab hace gestos durante una conferencia de prensa en Cologny, cerca de Ginebra, Suiza, el 10 de enero de 2017. (Laurent Gillieron/Keystone vía AP)

HAGA CLIC AQUÍ PARA OBTENER LA APLICACIÓN FOX NEWS

El WEF no respondió de inmediato a la solicitud de Fox News Digital de comentar sobre el enorme cambio de riqueza global.

Mendoza se pregunta por qué el FEM no lucha contra su mala imagen pública. «Hay que preguntarse: ¿hay alguna sensación de que continúe con esta imagen negativa?» él dice. «No estoy seguro de que sea un lugar sensato para que alguien quiera estar».