The effort to stop chaos spreading from the civil wars in Iraq and Syria will be one of the top agenda items this year at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos. The current global focus on seeking an Iraqi solution to an Iraqi problem is reflected by the expected presence of Iraqi Prime Minster Haider Al Abadi and President of the Kurdish Region Masoud Barzani, but many others from all over the world will be anxious to see a positive way forward in the war against Daesh.
These will certainly include French President Francois Hollande who is due to be at the Annual Meeting and has led France and Europe in a remarkably heartening response to the savagery of the killings in Charlie Hebdo and other parts of France, along with many Arab and Muslim leaders who share in the global outrage and find the barbaric murders totally disgusting.
The condemnation of the killings by the vast majority of European Muslims will also form part of the Davos dialogue, and an interesting dialogue has already started about how far satire should go. While everyone has lined up to condemn the killings as totally wrong, there is also a debate within the confines of civilised society about how insulting an insult should be. For example, the editor of the Danish Jyllands Posten which published cartoons in 2005, which were condemned across the Muslim world, has refused to reprint those published by Charlie Hebdo.
Economic issues are never very far from Davos, particularly as the Annual Meeting coincides with Mario Draghi of the European Central Bank announcing its next round of Quantitative Easing, and immediately follows the surprise announcement of the Swiss de-linking from the Euro which bounced the Swiss Franc up an uncomfortable 40 per cent at one stage.
The collapsing oil price will at the top of the agenda for speakers like Saudi Aramco President Khalid Al Falih and General Motors CEO Mary Barra, and Abdullah Al Badri of Opec. The rest of the business world will be anxious to hear how long they think the price will stay low and where they think it will end up. A price of $40 (Dh147) for more than six months will trigger major changes in the world. But a final price in the $60 to 80 range will be something that most economies will he happy to live with for as long as it lasts till the next crisis.
But Davos would not be itself if there was not a look at the long term issues, which in Davos means very long term. This is one of the few international forums where climate change remains very much at the top of the agenda, and the Annual Meeting is where business leaders and government officials meet to discuss priorities forthcoming next round of negotiations to give the world another treaty after the Kyoto Protocol expires.
The recent positive announcements by long term defaulters China and the USA will give new impetus to speakers like former US vice-president Al Gore, Christiana Figueres of the United Nations and President of Peru Ollanta Tasso, who will be leading the charge to find a consensus that will hold and move the world away from producing so much CO2 that will lead to eventual planetary over heating and destruction.
A background thread throughout the Annual Meeting will be the importance of the emerging economies, even if they are not the global stars that they were last year. The slow establishment of countries like India, Brazil, and Indonesia as vital and leading parts of the global economy is one of the great stories of this decade, and there ups and downs are closely followed.
China is now a crucial part of any global economic success and anything that Prime Minister Li Keqiang says will be carefully noted, as the Chinese growth stays lower than previously but is on a scale that makes it a vital part of any multinationals plans. Finally, the emerging giant of Africa will be well represented, even if one of the focuses is the immediate emergency of how to deal with Ebola. Longer term, the African economies are an area of major growth, as President Jacob Zuma of South Africa will no doubt make clear.
