DAVOS, Switzerland — For more than a decade, forces on the ideological extremes have torn at the global political fabric. And for just as long, the luminaries at the World Economic Forum have fretted about how dangerous that phenomenon is — for the businesses they lead and the countries they govern.
But years into the transnational struggle with resurgent populism, the corporate leaders in Davos appear to have no serious solutions.
In conversation after conversation here, I detected resignation and helplessness among business executives when it came to their counterparts in government. There’s a desperate desire to see the world’s political leaders appeal more to moderates instead of capitalizing on extremes, but there’s also recognition that the political market doesn’t easily reward the people in the middle.
C-suite types fear the polarization will only deepen as half of the global population, in more than 60 countries, votes in 2024 — everywhere from South Africa to the United States. For them, financial consequences can be stark, especially if the results of an election threaten shipping lanes or when campaign rhetoric leads to violence in a place they’ve invested.
“The biggest concern is instability,” the CEO of a private equity fund told me.
These 12 months may well be
the biggest election year in history. Many of the campaigns are unfolding in hotbeds of populist and nationalist sentiment, including major democracies such as India.
Far from seeing this as a moment to turn back the tide of insularism, executives are girding for endless backlash. Some say they are worried about speaking up about politics because the far right and the ultra left see them as an enemy. They also have financial responsibilities to shareholders of all political stripes and so must be careful about taking certain stances.
The CEO of one consumer goods company expressed dismay at the bleak campaign messaging across the globe.
“What I worry about is that all the narratives are negative,” this person said.
The WEF’s
Global Risks Report 2024 made it clear that social fractures are a widespread worry. Respondents listed “societal and/or political polarization” in the top three concerns, behind No. 2 artificial intelligence-generated misinformation and disinformation and No. 1 extreme weather.
But even as they long for moderate forces to rise above the extremes, there appears to be little sense of how the business community can help make that happen. I kept asking for specific solutions that companies could offer to reduce societal polarization, but I received no concrete responses.
A health care company CEO — who, like others, was granted anonymity because the issue is sensitive in his circles — mused that by having workforces that are spread out and diverse, and by encouraging teamwork, maybe firms can counter destructive political forces.
“As much as politics fails in bringing people together, companies need to step up in bringing people together,” he said. “Many challenges from climate change to how to get equitable access to health care — opportunities and challenges — need debate and need teamwork, and not polarization and not simplification.”
It was a nice sentiment, but it didn’t inspire much more than vague hope.
Like many of the other political observations here, it could have been shared at any time in the past decade. If lessons have been learned from the world’s most acute populist convulsions — the first Trump administration, the Bolsonaro experience in Brazil, the implementation of Brexit and others — they were not in evidence.
Part of the problem for this crowd may be the incredible scale of the election year at hand.
Even some government leaders say the sheer number of elections makes for an uncertain business and regulatory landscape as politicians on the campaign trail put off difficult decisions until after the voting is over.
“I’m very nervous,” said Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, Norway’s minister of international development. “While all these countries are going into campaign mode, things are not getting done.”
Next month’s presidential election in Indonesia — a Muslim-majority country with a population above 270 million — is a case in point. Some corporate leaders are
expected to delay their initial public offerings until after they have a sense of how pro-business the new leadership will be.
But by far the No. 1 election of concern here is the one in the United States, which could see Donald Trump return to the White House.
Corporate leaders are reading closely about the Republican frontrunner’s views on tariffs and other economic practices, which are far more isolationist than even the relatively cautious Joe Biden. Whichever way the United States is heading will affect the policies of other governments, leading business executives to ask some very basic questions.
“It’s something as simple as this: Many businesses we have operate across borders. Is a country for or against free trade?” the private equity fund CEO said.
Among those warning Trump against putting up trade barriers is Jeremy Hunt, Britain’s chancellor of the exchequer.
“It would be a profound mistake to move back to protectionism,” he said in Davos when asked about a possible Trump return.
One top question is the fate of the massive Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act, which is spurring investment in green energy in the United States.
Trump’s team has
indicated he plans to gut the law. So business leaders wonder whether now’s the time to put their money in the United States or other places indirectly affected by that legislation or whether their long-term contracts could wind up meaning nothing in a year.
In fairness, talk of pure business far outstripped talk of politics as the snow fell in this ski town.
This is, after all, the World Economic Forum, and the sessions are more likely to be about sustainability metrics or taxes than the political scene.
Attendees hobnob over wine and endless cheese in storefronts taken over by Arab Gulf states or companies that go by inscrutable acronyms. Stand outside the bathrooms and ask passersby if they are CEOs and a shocking number will say yes. (“One day!” a woman responded with a smile.)
The coats are oversized, and so are the egos.
And so, in some cases, is the sense of self-pity. In this rarefied environment, I was told that it doesn’t help to be a billionaire, millionaire or merely very rich when it comes to the political environment these days.
After all, actors on both the far left and far right of the political spectrum have anger toward the rich gathered here in Davos, often blaming them for the world’s ills.
“The right says everyone is under threat. The left says the capitalist system is exploitative,” the consumer goods company CEO said.
Some in the Davos crowd preferred to focus on the positive, trusting the logic of the markets to overcome populist currents.
Several pointed to renewable energy as an area in which economic forces appeared to be overcoming partisan resistance because of the falling costs of turning to wind, solar and other sources of power. Even politically conservative places, such as the state of Texas, are taking advantage of non-fossil fuel energies, despite such resources being viewed as leftist.
“If you’re driving down a highway in Texas, and there’s lots of really long straight highways in Texas, you’re going to have oil rigs, as far as the eye can see on this side — you’ve got wind farms, as far as the eye can see on this [other] side,” Suni Harford, president of UBS Asset Management, said during a panel when I asked about electoral calendar concerns.
The Biden administration sent a notable delegation to the forum. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan delivered remarks and answered questions on the main stage, but they stuck to well-worn talking points.
Even if the U.S. officials had unveiled some grand new ideas, most people here would not have taken them too seriously — certainly not to the point of investing money. Attendees watch the polls, and they know that it’s possible the Biden administration could be gone in 2025.
It does not help matters that the U.S. election comes so late in the year, carrying the potential to upend the global order just two months before the Davos crowd gathers here again.
That intense uncertainty could be why, according to the private equity fund CEO, at this point “very few people have priced in the risk of Trump coming back” in their market analyses.
“In a sense, most people are looking at this as business as usual and not thinking about how disruptive the Trump administration is going to be on geopolitics,” he said.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
