This year the spirit is definitely downcast. Maybe Davos-man ought to “go medieval”…
It may not be evident from the website launching this years World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2014 in Davos. In its presentation the organisers call for us to “reshape the world” or in other words “get our act together”. No more talk about crisis, please…use the word “challenges” instead; and then, let’s return to business-as-usual. What this consists of becomes very apparent if you do a simple word-count of the programme. It appears the most frequent buzz-words at Davos 2014 apart from conjugations, adverbs etc are:
- Global (63)
- World (50)
- Time (50)
- Idea (50)
- New (46)
- Davos (43)
- Refugee (41)
- Growth (38)
- Future (38)
- Economic (36)
Apart from “refugee” and Syria(n) (24) it appears no real-life clinchers signal any profound interest in the real world among the Davos-men. Thus “Environmental” only figure 9 times, while “Green” is only mentioned once.. Even more curious is the fact that the word renaissance only crops up four times in spite of the fact that this is definitely one of the buzz-words elsewhere used to designate that we are moving away from the crisis (vis words like “energy renaissance” (fracking) , “manufacturing renaissance” and “technological renaissance”.
Yet another example are the words employment (11) and unemployment (6). Arguably these words denote some of the most pressing questions in the real lives of real people outside dreamy snow-wrapped Switzerland, where just to mention one aspect youth-unemployment in Europe averages 22.6%. In Greece a staggering 60% of youngsters between 16 and 24 while Spain musters 55% (Eurostat 2013)
To be fair this challenge does figure on top of the executive summery of the agenda. However the programme still leaves us with a profound feeling that the Davos-men are basically clue-less. Full of newspeak and hot air! It serves them well that the chances are they will be met by rain, sleet and temperatures hovering around 0 Co.
The fact is that looking away from the snowy glitter of Davos and coming to terms with reality, it becomes apparent that the world is in worse shambles than ever before. Looking around at our overfed, tattooed and pierced neighbours clad in an assortment of cheap Chinese rags from H&M, it seems that there is no end to unemployment, environmental degradation and the lack of real business opportunities worth backing up by real capital (alias money, which may keep its value plus interest.) To make matters worse, all this is registered, but not dealt with by a group of professional politicians, of whom many have inherited their cushioned political careers and positions from their grandfathers. At the same time there seems to be – once again – no end to new and fantastic ponzi-schemes letting other-peoples-money in for a new and upbeat global recirculation. Whether the moment is truly apocalyptic or just gathering speed right now, is not quite apparent. But we are getting there. What to do?
Today we stand at the abyss – tomorrow is another day
In the 70ties this dictum was found sprayed on a wall in Nørrebro, (the Bronx of Copenhagen). Apparently the Icelanders took this to their heart when not only recession, but literally bankruptcy hit them in in 2008.
Here is the morale. Struggling at first they got rid of the government, which had colluded with the (later convicted) bankers and businessmen; later they voted against paying back the international debt of the defaulted banks and finally they started developing their economy by reaching back to former medieval strategies – fishing and knitting.
Although the catch this time is mackerel and the return of the fishing wars of yesteryear have been looming, it is interesting to watch, how the island, which faced with ecological degradation invented the business of exporting dried cod around year 1000, once more is turning to this mainstay of their subsistence economy.
Another (re)invention of tradition is knitting. Although not quite as medieval, the technique of knitting seems to have been taken up in Iceland in the late 15th century. However, very quickly became an important proto-industrial market commodity produced as part of a cottage industry. A few years ago the traditional woollen patterns were only sold in the tourist-shops in Reykjavik. Fashion was instead to get one of the “new modern designs” marketed on the internet. Now, however, Iceland is fighting once again to get their wool-industry up and working, and once more Icelanders are flaunting their heirlooms as well as producing their signature “lopipeysa” (not quite the same one, which was made famous by made famous by the Danish actress playing “Sarah Lund” in “The Killing”, but near enough. In the third instalment of the series, she wears an authentic Icelandic one!) At the same time Iceland is debating whether the actual knitting of an Icelandic Sweater made from Icelandic wool can be outsourced to China and still be authentic…
To conclude: in the “naughties” before the crisis, global businessmen organised social trips to the North Atlantic to study the so-called Icelandic miracle and bathe in the Blue lagoon together with their blond trophy-wives. Today Iceland has jumped on the cruise-industry and are offering “Transatlantic Knitting Cruises” (18 days sailing the high waters, eating traditional cod and knitting in the company of other knitters).
There are many reasons why the Icelandic strategy to overcome the crisis is fascinating (amongst other things they are experiencing economic growth once more and are busy paying back their debt to the international community). Another reason, however, is the decidedly medieval whiff the whole process has. While rediscovering their sense of place and its natural resources, it appears the Icelanders have reinvented old medieval crafts and proto-industries and used them to their advantage. Perhaps not making an exorbitant amount of money, but apparently enough to go around. A pity Davos-man has not booked his flight up North to this scene for medieval re-enactment and living history. He might have learned that sometimes moving forward is best served by moving backwards.
Karen Schousboe