The World Economic Forum and the world’s “elite”

From 15 to 19 January, another meeting of the highly influential World Economic Forum (WEF) was held in Davos, with more than 2,800 participants, including over 60 heads of state and government. This time, the motto was: Rebuilding Trust. The author Wolfgang Bittner takes a dissecting look at this construct and its efforts to create a globalised, under private-law, undemocratic world order.

The disturbing plans of this forum for a fundamental reorganisation of society are barely known to the population. They are overshadowed by the confusing chaos of information, the climate panic and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. The WEF, a foundation and globally networked lobby organisation, has its headquarters in Switzerland near Geneva and organises annual meetings, mostly in Davos, which are attended by the world’s “elite”. It has offices in New York, Tokyo and Beijing. The power of this organisation – just like that of the Bilderberg Group¹ – is often underestimated. After all, it is not a harmless society of dignitaries that meets in the Swiss mountains to have an amiable chat.

The “elites” and the “Spirit of Davos”:
 steering and controlling the world

The aim of the Open Forum, which takes place parallel to the annual meeting, is, according to the organisation, “to allow the public to participate in discussions between decision-makers from politics, business, science and civil society”. It continues: “Our panellists regularly include high-ranking government representatives, business leaders, scientists, artists and activists who share their stories and perspectives with the audience. In the spirit of Davos, the Open Forum aims to promote dialogue between decision-makers from different sectors and life situations in order to find solutions to the most pressing global challenges of our time.”²
  That doesn’t sound like a conspiracy at all. But the aim becomes somewhat clearer, and therefore problematic, when the WEF demands in its “Global Redesign” report from 2010 “that a globalised world is best managed by a coalition of multinational companies, governments and also through the United Nations (UN) system and selected civil society organisations (CSOs)”. Governments are no longer “the overwhelmingly dominant actors on the world stage”, so that “the time has come for a new stakeholder paradigm of international governance”.³

A plutocratic dictatorship?

In other words, the WEF plans to replace democratic forms of organisation, in which power in the state is supposed to emanate from the people through elected representatives, with a system of rule in which a group of “stakeholders”, i.e., “leading personalities”, form a global decision-making body. Seen positively, this would be the rule of the wise, whoever that may be. Viewed critically, it would mean a plutocratic dictatorship in a border-free, supranational world. A self-appointed “elite” would therefore take power and form a kind of world government. In this respect, the WEF presents itself as an extraordinarily influential quasi-Mafia organisation that is preparing a global takeover by “leaders” who are not democratically legitimised. Phases of global instability, such as the coronavirus pandemic, famine or the effects of the war in Ukraine, can then be used to implement the programme. Communications researcher and author Nick Buxton, who has analysed the WEF’s intentions in detail, concludes that “we are increasingly entering a world where gatherings such as Davos are not laughable billionaire playgrounds, but rather the future of global governance. It is nothing less than a silent global coup d’etat.”⁴

The “strategic partners” …

The objectives and power of the WEF become particularly clear when you look at who participates in what way in the WEF. There are around 1,000 member companies, each with annual revenues of over five billion US dollars each⁵, including the most important companies in their sector, which also play a political role. The basic membership fee is 42,000 Swiss francs plus a fee of 18,000 Swiss francs for the participation of the respective president at the annual meeting. Members from industry and strategic partners pay 250,000 Swiss francs and 500,000 Swiss francs respectively to be able to play a significant role in the Forum’s initiatives.⁶ Strategic partners include BlackRock, the Gates Foundation, Goldman Sachs, Google, The Coca Cola Company, Allianz, Bank of America, BP Amoco, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Post DHL, Facebook, the pharmaceutical group Johnson & Johnson, Mastercard, Mitsubishi Corporation, Paypal, SAP, Saudi Aramco, Siemens and the media group Thomson Reuters.⁷

… and the “Young Global Leaders”

In 1992, the WEF launched a programme for “Global Leaders of Tomorrow”, which has been called “Young Global Leaders” since 2004, to promote suitable future leaders. This created a global network of important leaders from politics, business, media, art and culture, the aristocracy and so on, who are committed to the WEF’s plans. In an interview, its founder Klaus Schwab said: “What we are very proud of […] is that we are penetrating the cabinets with our Young Global Leaders.”⁸ In this way, the WEF influences public life worldwide.
  The very first programme in 1992 was attended by well-known personalities as Angela Merkel, Tony Blair, Nicolas Sarkozy, Manuel Barroso and Bill Gates. In the years that followed, hundreds more joined the programme and gradually took on important positions: Emmanuel Macron, David Cameron, Sebastian Kurz, Annalena Baerbock, Mark Zuckerberg (founder of Facebook), Jacinda Ardern (Prime Minister of New Zealand), Sanna Marin (Prime Minister of Finland), Ida Auken (ex-Minister of the Environment of Denmark), Crown Prince Haakon of Norway, Larry Page (co-founder of Google), Leonardo DiCaprio (actor), Niklas Zennström (co-developer of Skype) and Jimmy Wales (co-founder of Wikipedia).
  In 2019, more than 400 civil society organisations and 40 international networks opposed a partnership agreement between the WEF and the United Nations. The UN Secretary-General was called upon to end the agreement as it was a “disturbing corporate capture” of the UN that “moves the world dangerously towards a privatised and undemocratic global governance”.⁹
  US journalist considers the WEF to be a “combination of capitalist consultancy and gigantic lobby”, focussed on “digital innovation, massive automation through ‘artificial intelligence’ and ultimately even the ‘improvement’ of humans by artificially endowing them with some of the characteristics of robots: e.g. problem solving without ethical distractions.” She warns against the “voice of would-be Global Governance.  From on high, experts decide what the masses ought to want, and twist the alleged popular wishes to fit the profit-making schemes they are peddling.”¹⁰

“Great Reset” and transhumanism

In 2021, the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, spoke out and criticised the fact that people like Klaus Schwab were sitting “on the throne of their wealth” and were not affected by the everyday difficulties and suffering of people caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Instead, they see such crises as an opportunity to push through their programme of a meritocratic global “Great Reset” with increasing control over society.¹¹ Müller criticised support from areas such as transhumanism¹². He was countered with accusations of antisemitism.
  Klaus Schwab and the French economist and “global strategist” Thierry Malleret wrote about the intentions of the WEF in their bestseller “The Great Reset”, published jointly in 2020: “It is about making the world less divided, less polluting, less destructive, more inclusive, more just and fairer than we left it in the pre-pandemic era.” There could be changes “that seemed unimaginable before the outbreak of the pandemic”, there would be a “new normality”.¹³
  Asked in an interview on 19 November 2020 about his ideas for the intended “global new beginning”, Schwab replied: “I think the word ‘reset’ is appropriate […]. Because one thing is clear: we cannot return to the old normality.” With regard to combating the coronavirus pandemic, he took the following view: “So what we need in our world is a more systemic approach, […] a reform of the international system.”¹⁴

Comprehensive digitalisation,
centralisation and surveillance

The coronavirus pandemic phase is therefore seen as an epochal change that will fundamentally alter conditions in the world in line with the WEF agenda outlined above. It remains to be seen how this will happen once the war in Ukraine is over. In the meantime, countries are completely in debt, the economy and finances are in tatters and many people are completely at a loss, so that the ideas of the World Economic Forum’s trustees are increasingly gaining weight, regardless of whether there will be a “great war” or not.
  The optimally networked WEF aims for a globalised world order under private-law that is not democratically controlled. According to informed circles, the ideas are moving in the direction of comprehensive digitalisation, centralisation and surveillance.¹⁵ These plans must be prevented and the focus directed towards humane, more adequate forms of human coexistence.  •

¹ The “Bilderbergers” are also an extremely influential, informal grouping that meets globally and is headed by the chairman of a steering group. The circle of participants is similar to that of the WEF; see Wikipedia, Bilderberg Meeting, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilderberg_Meeting (2 October 2022)
² cited from https://www.weforum.org/open-forum/pages/about/
³ cited as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Economic_Forum (18 August 2021); critical of this: Springer Link, 29 November 2019: “The Role of Public and Private Actors and Means in Implementing the SDGs: Reclaiming the Public Policy Space for Sustainable Development and Human Rights”; https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-30469-0_12
⁴ quoted from Transnational Institute: “Davos and its danger to Democracy”, 18 January 2016; https://www.tni.org/en/article/davos-and-its-danger-to-democracy/
⁵ cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Economic_Forum (26 January 2022)
⁶ cf. Allen, Pigman Geoffrey. The World Economic Forum. A multi-stakeholder approach to global governance. London 2007
⁷ cf. World Economic Forum: Strategic Partners; www.weforum.org/communities/strategic-partnership-b5337725-fac7-4f8a-9a4f-c89072b96a0d (20 October 2020)
⁸ cited as BITCHUTE, 25 January 2022; www.bitchute.com/video/Md4l9RsMwxr5/ (26 January 2022)
⁹ cited in Transnational Institute: “Hundreds of civil society organisations worldwide condemn the takeover of the UN by the World Economic Forum”, 17.1.2020; www.tni.org/en/node/24855?content_language=es
¹⁰ https://apolut.net/the-great-pretext-der-grosse-vorwand-fuer-eine-dystopie-von-diana-johnstone/
¹¹ quoted from Süddeutsche Zeitung, 15 December 2021; www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/antisemitismus-kritik-an-kardinal-mueller-1.5489031
¹² Transhumanism = ideology for the expansion of physical, psychological and intellectual human possibilities through technological processes
¹³ cited from Schwab, Klaus; Malleret, Thierry. Covid-19: The great upheaval, Cologny/Geneva 2020, p. 293
¹⁴ quoted from YouTube: Klaus Schwab: “We cannot return to the old normality”, 19 November 2020; www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3M2CjHn5N8 (21 October 2022)
¹⁵ On this: Bittner, Wolfgang. Deutschland – verraten und verkauft (Germany – betrayed and sold out), p. 252, 253 ff., 260 ff.

* Wolfgang Bittner published “Die Eroberung Europas durch die USA” in 2014 (The Conquest of Europe by the USA), “Die Heimat, der Krieg und der Goldene Westen” (The Homeland, the War and the Golden West) and “Der neue West-Ost-Konflikt” (The New West-East Conflict) in 2019 and “Deutschland – verraten und verkauft. (Backgrounds and analyses). The above article is largely an excerpt from the book “Ausnahmezustand – Geopolitische Einsichten und Analysen unter Berücksichtigung des Ukraine-Konflikts”, published in 2023 (A state of emergency – geopolitical insights and analyses in light of the Ukraine conflict).