Learning by Training

By Arend van Campen

DAVOS, THE WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM

Every year since 2009 I have read the Global Risks Report issued just before the Davos meetings of the World Economic Forum (WEF). Today, in the year of our Lord 2020, I reluctantly admit that none of the Global Risks stipulated back in 2009 has been mitigated - let alone solved. One of the major risks is climate change.

Researchers at the WEF and many collaborating think-tanks, universities and institutes write that there is only one decade (10 years) left to halt global warming. As a ‘Climate Optimist’, I am not claiming that the earth’s temperatures are not rising, but we have to be open to that information in the form of science that contradicts climate change. For example, there are more polar bears at present than before; ice melts, but ice also grows.

What I worry about much more is the loss of biodiversity, the social instability, the asset bubbles, cyberattacks and the ethics or non-ethics of Artifi cial Intelligence (AI). The fact is that the loss of species that we as humans depend on threatens our survival. So let’s focus on what can be done about these global risks and crises because they harm our businesses too.

But what about our business models? Could it be that they cause harm and biodiversity loss too? In the WEF report I could not fi nd the causality of the risks it described. It did not talk about the fact that our economic and fi nancial system depends on perpetual growth as if we have three planets to live on.

Limited planetary capacity does not support growth based on fi nancial markets or the measurement of GDP. Growth is okay, but only balanced growth combined with circularity and sustenance of the environment, social cohesion, so life for all species, can be guaranteed. No, the WEF, despite perhaps its benevolent intentions, does not want to upset its customers who pay good money to talk in Davos. Hundreds of panel discussions, speeches by political and business leaders don’t seem to make much difference, because when all is said and done, business as usual continues.

But, now what? What can be done to stop those activities that are jeopardising our very existence? For one, we can apply systems science, we can choose to listen, to talk and to share information. Did you know that information and energy obey the same physical laws and that by using all relevant information we can rebuild society, create order and structure?

I know, perhaps you will read this column and conclude that it makes sense, but if no one actually is doing the right thing for a change, the decade the WEF mentions may even be too long. I see that decline, chaos, disorder, confl ict, pollution and twenty or so other risks are making happy living on earth virtually impossible.

This is the latest in a series of articles by Arend van Campen, founder of TankTerminalTraining. More information on the company’s activities can be found at www.tankterminaltraining.com. Those interested in responding personally can contact him directly at arendvc@tankterminaltraining.com.