tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/davos-2016-23931/articlesDavos 2016 – The Conversation2016-01-22T10:55:18Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/530812016-01-22T10:55:18Z2016-01-22T10:55:18ZHow basic income can solve one of the digital economy’s biggest problems<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108978/original/image-20160122-408-x5yivf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>At a time of global economic insecurity, an insightful commentator identified the existential threat that technology poses to work:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We are being afflicted with a new disease of which some readers may not yet have heard the name, but of which they will hear a great deal in the years to come – namely, technological unemployment. This means unemployment due to our discovery of means of economising the use of labour outrunning the pace at which we can find new uses for labour.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>These <a href="http://www.econ.yale.edu/smith/econ116a/keynes1.pdf">words by John Maynard Keynes</a> in 1930 remind us that contemporary anxiety over jobs being taken from us by robots is not so far removed from fears of a greater vintage. </p>
<p>Indeed, the more these fears are periodically recycled and perennially assuaged, the less potent they appear to those who are sensitive to the long arc of human history. Nonetheless, this has been one of the major themes of discussion by world leaders at Davos. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108972/original/image-20160122-421-sstrpj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">John Maynard Keynes.</span>
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<p>The exponential growth of digital technology since the 1990s has brought us <a href="https://theconversation.com/should-davos-delegates-live-in-fear-of-the-fourth-industrial-revolution-52874">to the “fourth industrial revolution”</a>. Advancements have reached the point where highly skilled jobs are as susceptible to replacement by automation as ones which do not require much education or training. This is vividly exemplified by Silicon Valley entrepreneur <a href="http://www.thelightsinthetunnel.com/">Martin Ford’s</a> contrasting of the radiologist’s vulnerability to automation with that of a housekeeper, whose decision-making processes are less easily replicated.</p>
<p>This is compounded by the concern that this new type of economy does not provide enough compensating positions for the jobs automated out of existence. As an illustration of how the most innovative digital companies can generate huge wealth on the back of the toil of relatively small numbers of people, look at how <a href="http://fortune.com/fortune500/google-40/">Google’s market value of US$377 billion</a> is supported by just 53,600 global employees. Contrast this with <a href="http://fortune.com/fortune500/general-motors-6/">General Motors</a>’ market value of US$60 billion and 216,000 employees. </p>
<p>This divergence would not be significant in an economy where the business of each company was completely separate. Now, though, the tech giants’ operations have seeped into other spheres of business, such that Google’s driverless cars makes the company a direct competitor of General Motors.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/enslave-the-robots-and-free-the-poor-1.1688671">Martin Wolf</a>, the Financial Times’ chief economics commentator, argues that these tectonic shifts should open up a space for a rethinking of our attitudes towards work and leisure. Rather than lamenting what automation robs us of, why not use it to generate greater opportunities for leisure and education, as well as liberate us from our constant anxiety that we will not be able to support our families in this unstable environment? </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108981/original/image-20160122-441-q5bi4m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Technology has come a long way.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/svensson/14585588073/in/photolist-odSXbr-oj6SWU-oAyxDQ-gmT4u9-gmSxNy-gmTjat-gmSLtK-gmSZah-gmSXnE-gmSwrW-gmSAJy-gmSBhs-gmSMs8-gmT32j-gmSCqQ-gmSTsK-gmThSt-gmT45w-gmSwJu-gmSBLy-gmSTd6-gmT2oq-gmTeoV-gmSP18-gmSCAE-gmSNLR-nWyVG3-oc2qXs-oc2utW-oe4wf4-odZY1h-gmThcv-6DxXa8-gmSQsr-4SKNjf-4SL6E7-gmSRVf-HBxiR-6pyC8F-eSEgCB-bHSj7D-agwLjb-5E8uJ9-b93RpR-bo6Ev5-7URewG-dkLb56-5LMydY-8M79Lk-dPcqJ1">Alexander Svensson</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>An age-old idea</h2>
<p>An obvious way to do this is by way of a basic income – redistribute wealth and give all citizens a flat, unconditional income. The idea is grounded in decades-old ideas and experiments. The Democratic candidate in the 1972 US election, George McGovern, for example, proposed a <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/02/09/should-government-pay-you-alive/aaLVJsUAc5pKh0iYTFrXpI/story.html">“Demogrant” of US$1,000 a year for every American</a>. </p>
<p>Robert Reich, the labour secretary in Bill Clinton’s first presidential term has also advocated a combination of minimum income, earnings insurance and a <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2001/SHOWBIZ/books/03/05/robert.reich/">US$60,000 nest egg</a> for each citizen to cushion against the violent vicissitudes of the modern global networked economy. And, as Wolf advocated, <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/business-25415501">Swiss campaigners for a basic income</a> framed their arguments around the notion of improving citizens’ work-life balance.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=941&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=941&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108984/original/image-20160122-403-1u3d3ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=941&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Libertarian economist Milton Friedman.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Friedman#/media/File:Portrait_of_Milton_Friedman.jpg">The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It might surprise the reader to discover that ideas for a basic income come from figures on the right too, including the libertarian economist <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/07/the-key-for-conservative-anti-poverty-plans-keep-it-simple/375392/">Friedrich Hayek</a>. They were manifest in proposals for a negative income tax, first advocated by <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/02/09/should-government-pay-you-alive/aaLVJsUAc5pKh0iYTFrXpI/story.html">Milton Friedman in 1962</a>, and which
almost came to fruition during the Richard Nixon presidency in the form of the <a href="http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc1/NegativeIncomeTax.html">Family Assistance Plan</a>. </p>
<p>The failure of this plan to get off the ground was accompanied by a series of <a href="http://www.vox.com/2014/7/23/5925041/guaranteed-income-basic-poverty-gobry-labor-supply">negative income tax pilot schemes</a> in a number of US cities with less than stellar results. Despite this, Conservative thinkers like <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/07/the-key-for-conservative-anti-poverty-plans-keep-it-simple/375392/">David Frum</a> argue that introducing a basic income would cut bureaucracy by eradicating the thicket of anti-poverty programmes currently in place. A number of new schemes – most recently in the Dutch city of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/26/dutch-city-utrecht-basic-income-uk-greens">Utrecht</a> – might give us a better indication than their 1970s forebears of how these experiments might work in our highly automated economies.</p>
<p>Something that the head of the World Economic Forum, Klaus Schwab, has been keen to emphasise is the increasing tendency for benefits of the digital revolution to accrue <a href="https://agenda.weforum.org/2015/12/the-fourth-industrial-revolution-what-it-means-and-how-to-respond/">to the many not the few</a>. “As automation substitutes for labour across the entire economy, the net displacement of workers by machines might exacerbate the gap between returns to capital and returns to labour,” he said.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.econ.yale.edu/smith/econ116a/keynes1.pdf">Keynes prediction in 1930</a> that within a hundred years people in the richest nations would be working only 15 hours a week might not come to pass. But given the potential of automation to confound economists’ employment projections, those gathering at Davos would be remiss to not consider a basic income as a credible policy response to contemporary anxieties about our role in the modern workplace.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53081/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew White is currently the interim director of the AHRC Centre for Digital Copyright and IP Research in China, though this article reflects his own views.</span></em></p>Basic income is a decades-old idea that will help us
harness technology and get a good work-life balance.Andrew White, Associate Professor of Creative Industries & Digital Media, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/533332016-01-21T06:23:26Z2016-01-21T06:23:26ZHow Davos power brokers can start tackling major environmental risks<p>The World Economic Forum (WEF) published its annual <a href="http://www.weforum.org/reports/the-global-risks-report-2016">Global Risks Report</a> in the run up to its annual meeting in Davos. Food and water crises, energy price shocks, biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse, extreme weather events and failure of climate change mitigation and adaptation, it said, are the biggest threats facing society. </p>
<p>Three of the top five global risks in terms of likelihood and three of the top five global risks in terms of impact have links to the environment. Of even greater concern, however, are the linkages between these systems, and the trade-offs associated with decisions in one area affecting another. </p>
<p>This growing recognition of environmental risks for business, and their interconnections, reflects what is emerging as <a href="http://www.thenexusnetwork.org/">“nexus” thinking</a> in the natural and social sciences.</p>
<p>Those with long memories will recall that these issues have been high on the Davos agenda for much of the past decade and, therefore, discussed by the great and the good of corporate and political life. So why has significant business action not necessarily followed?</p>
<h2>Making connections</h2>
<p>Five years ago the WEF launched a report on the “<a href="http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_WI_WaterSecurity_WaterFoodEnergyClimateNexus_2011.pdf">Water-Energy-Food-Climate Change nexus</a>”. It was a recognition that water concerns were closely linked to issues such as inequality, terrorism, famine, poverty and disease. This set the stage for business to consider a rounded approach to addressing the intimately interwoven threats from water scarcity, energy and food security and climate change. While there has been some progress, however, there is little evidence of a step change in attitudes and practices commensurate with the scale of the challenges.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108751/original/image-20160120-26125-1piqlim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Joined up thinking is needed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock.com</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>One reason for this inaction is what the Bank of England’s governor, Mark Carney, called the “tragedy of the horizon” in his <a href="http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/speeches/2015/844.aspx">speech to the insurance industry in September 2015</a>.</p>
<p>The impacts of many of these interconnected environmental risks fall outside the traditional decision-making horizons of most of those involved. Current decision makers have little incentive to fix the problem, even if they acknowledge and understand the risks. </p>
<p>This is illustrated in the latest Global Risks Report, which highlights an alarming finding:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… the relative absence of environmental risks and, more generally, of long-term issues among the top concerns of business leaders in their respective countries.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Myopic visions</h2>
<p>Of more than 13,000 business executives in more than 140 economies whose views were sought in the WEF’s <a href="http://reports.weforum.org/global-risks-2016/eos/">Executive Opinion Survey</a> none identified environmental risks as among their top risks for doing business, both in terms of impact or likelihood. </p>
<p>Similarly, there is a stark contrast in the report’s identification of the top five global risks of highest concern over longer and shorter time frames. The four most important risks over a ten-year period are all environment-related (water, climate change, extreme weather events and food crises), but none of these feature in the 18-month time horizon. </p>
<p>Responding to potential environmental risks seems to always be just beyond the current decision horizon – important, but not requiring immediate action. We hear much about long-term planning, but it’s about time that environment risks were brought into the here and now.</p>
<p>To do that we need to understand why there has been a lacklustre response from the global community. One possibility is that key people and institutions – from business, academia and politics – are not yet efficiently working together to create solutions, despite meetings such as those that are taking place this week at Davos. </p>
<h2>Co-creating responses, now</h2>
<p>The Global Risks Report highlights the need to recognise joint interests and bring people together across shared priorities, but we still lack some tangible way to bring these common agendas together.</p>
<p>The time is ripe for business leaders to shape the research that will enable them to better respond to major challenges across the nexus and empower them to act sooner rather than later. Instead of a reactive stance, responding when threats become immediate and unavoidable, there is an opportunity to shift to being proactive and collaborative. </p>
<p>As part of the <a href="http://www.cisl.cam.ac.uk/business-action/natural-resource-security/natural-capital-leaders-platform/projects/nexus-network/pdfs/nexus2020-summary-for-nexusnetwork-conference.pdf">Nexus2020 project</a> the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership recently convened academics and business leaders to collectively prioritise key issues that need to be addressed. We identified how to help companies manage their dependencies and impacts upon food, energy, water and the environment. </p>
<p>Those who are gathering at Davos need to seize the opportunity to overcome the tragedy of their short time horizons and work together to identify key questions and possible solutions. Otherwise, as Mark Carney has warned, by the time a problem becomes high on the agenda, it is often too late to respond. Moreover, these interconnected challenges will be harder and more costly to solve if action is delayed. The WEF presents a unique opportunity to co-create responses to the issues that are highlighted in this year’s Global Risks Report. Putting this off till the next meeting should not be an option.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53333/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhaskar Vira is associated with the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, which has received funding from the UK's Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) as part of the Nexus Network.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gemma Cranston works for the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL), which receives funding for the Natural Capital Leaders Platform by convening companies wishing to better understand and manage their impacts and dependencies on natural capital. CISL has also received funding from the UK's Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) as part of the Nexus Network. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Green receives funding from The Newton Trust and the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.</span></em></p>Food and water crises, energy price shocks and extreme weather are all problems for business – it’s time companies did more to tackle themBhaskar Vira, Reader in Political Economy at the Department of Geography and Fellow of Fitzwilliam College; Director, University of Cambridge Conservation Research Institute, University of CambridgeGemma Cranston, Senior Programme Manager, Natural Capital Leaders Programme, Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL), University of CambridgeJonathan Green, Postdoctoral research associate, University of CambridgeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/534002016-01-20T16:31:58Z2016-01-20T16:31:58ZHow the other 1% lives: wealth gap not the only way in which global elite is taking advantage<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108606/original/image-20160119-29766-1l3mscm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Subsistence fisherwomen in Vietnam, working on a beach owned by a luxury hotel</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Anna Childs</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Oxfam’s latest report, focused on an increasingly obscene wealth inequality and the stranglehold exerted by a global elite, had one central message: The era of tax havens that have made this possible must be brought to an end. </p>
<p>The report – <a href="http://policy-practice.oxfam.org.uk/publications/an-economy-for-the-1-how-privilege-and-power-in-the-economy-drive-extreme-inequ-592643">An Economy for the 1%</a> – was timed as a call to action for influential delegates to the <a href="http://www.weforum.org/events/world-economic-forum-annual-meeting-2016">annual meeting of the World Economic Forum</a> taking place in Davos, Switzerland. </p>
<p>The headline numbers showed that the top 1% own as much wealth as the other 99% and – even more startling – that the richest 62 individuals own more wealth than the poorest half of the world’s population (compared to 388 individuals in 2010). To put this into stark perspective, this group of 62 people own as much as the 3.6 billion people on the bottom of the heap.</p>
<p>Oxfam makes it clear that this distribution of wealth is not some incidental byproduct of rising worldwide prosperity. Since 2000, the poorest half of the world’s population has received just 1% of the total increase in global wealth, while 50% of that has gone to the 1% of people on the top of the pile – about 74m people. While the richest have been getting richer, the combined wealth of the poorest half of the planet has fallen by US$1 trillion (41%) in the past five years alone. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108603/original/image-20160119-29772-1azjl53.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An Economy for the 1%: facts and figures.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">From Oxfam Summary Report</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The power and privilege exercised by a global elite is forcing a crisis – and the report offers many illustrations to support Oxfam’s argument that our global economic system is broken. An industry of wealth managers, <a href="https://theconversation.com/double-trouble-why-landmark-oecd-tax-reform-is-doomed-before-it-starts-48115">tax avoidance schemes and offshore accounting proliferate</a> – for example, massive profits generated in core regional markets such as the UK and Japan are reported instead in countries that have no corporate income tax. As the report said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Globally, it is estimated that super-rich individuals have stashed a total of US$7.6 trillion in offshore accounts. If tax were paid on the income that this wealth generates, an extra US$190 billion would be available to governments every year.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The equality crisis is not a simple divide between rich and poor countries. For example, a total of US$500 billion generated from within Africa is held offshore in tax havens, costing an estimated US$14 billion a year in lost tax revenue across the continent. This sum could pay for enough healthcare to save the lives of 4m children and employ enough teachers to get every African child into school. </p>
<h2>Nations rise, poverty remains</h2>
<p>China and India have been responsible for a dramatic increase in the combined GDP of Asian countries. These figures, along with growing prosperity in smaller nations such as Ghana, mean that average incomes in poorer countries are catching up with those in richer ones, and <a href="http://www-wds.worldbank.org/servlet/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2013/12/11/000158349_20131211100152/Rendered/PDF/WPS6719.pdf">inequality between nations is falling</a>. </p>
<p>Oxfam’s report reminds us that 36% of the world population was living in extreme poverty in 1990, falling to 16% in 2010 and meeting the <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-the-millennium-development-goals-hit-their-targets-36527">Millennium Development Goal to halve extreme poverty</a> five years ahead of target. This progress is undeniable and led to the ambitious <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-the-worlds-new-sustainable-development-goals-47262">Sustainable Development Goal</a> to end extreme poverty completely by 2030. </p>
<p>However – and until we meet that goal there will always be a “however” – while inequality between countries is falling, inequality within countries is actually increasing. As much as <a href="http://www.ids.ac.uk/files/dmfile/InFocus26-Final2.pdf">80% of the world’s poorest people</a> are now estimated to live in middle income countries. During the period in which extreme poverty was halved, an extra 700m people could have escaped poverty if poor people had benefited more than the rich from economic growth. </p>
<p>Economies may be growing as poorer countries catch up with richer ones, but incomes of the poorest people all over the world are not keeping pace. </p>
<h2>Other inequalities</h2>
<p>Left alone, world gender parity would be roughly 50:50 and, if that were reflected in the wealthiest 62, I would settle for either 30 or 31 women to be a fair representation of a proportionate gender divide. In fact, just nine out of the total are women. A <a href="http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2015/sdn1520.pdf">study from The International Monetary Fund</a> found that higher income inequality in a nation aligns with bigger gender gaps in terms of health, education, labour market participation and representation in institutions such as parliaments. It also found that the gender pay gap was highest in the most unequal societies. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Women make up the majority of the world’s low-paid workers and are concentrated in the most precarious jobs. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another <a href="http://oxf.am/Ze4e">Oxfam report</a> from December 2015 demonstrated that while the poorest half of the planet live in areas most vulnerable to climate change, they are responsible for only around 10% of total global emissions: “The average footprint of the richest 1% globally could be as much as 175 times that of the poorest 10%.”</p>
<h2>Listen to the 99%</h2>
<p>Oxfam asserts that the current situation is the consequence of deliberate policy choices, of our leaders “listening to the 1% and their supporters rather than acting in the interests of the majority”. </p>
<p>Chief executive (UK) Mark Goldring said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>World leaders’ concern about the escalating inequality crisis has so far not translated into concrete action to ensure that those at the bottom get their fair share of economic growth … We need to end the era of tax havens which has allowed rich individuals and multinational companies to avoid their responsibilities to society by hiding ever increasing amounts of money offshore.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I hope that the wealthy and privileged few attending the forum in Davos will listen to Oxfam rather than their wealth managers – and start adding their considerable influence to arguably the single most effective action in the fight to end extreme poverty.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53400/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anna Childs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Oxfam’s report shows that as the gap between rich and poor grows, other inequalities are also on the rise.Anna Childs, Academic Director for International Development, The Open UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/529212016-01-20T13:28:49Z2016-01-20T13:28:49ZWhat philosophy can tell Davos about educating for a better future<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108416/original/image-20160118-31807-1ha2rx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=27%2C3%2C973%2C659&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Schooling doubt.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/eleaf/2536358399/in/photolist-4S8uZe-8vT9yB-wTgzo-7nxn9-71tSg-6zJVC8-5EMUpb-7vEVHQ-Lzpyo-5zEjFG-59WvCM-6eW5gH-ediLaQ-58vQCQ-8giHbr-72pPYr-h5uim-3pHNnz-BPFGkA-6dsVJK-FEdBM-7m7B7h-8W67ZC-93aPCq-fhRZKU-56eXRT-9YgfFw-c5hru-eAPnji-cRMpS-PmSW-3HEpWd-4bP9Xc-7pweVR-rrtnoF-5xY4fw-aiEhXH-bTQwfx-oqa96H-pW8qre-9UTUaB-9jasn7-bTQwf4-8VcPuq-BmH23n-bP1BNF-7BZHSj-8WCQvB-4LDVPT-cDFsSY">Ethan Lofton</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>How do you create a generation that can think its way out of problems and face the challenges of a rapidly changing world? The Davos meeting this year is all about how we can cope with the immense challenges posed by the so-called “Fourth Industrial Revolution” – an era of rapid and complex technological change, where our role in the world is resting on shifting sands. </p>
<p>The next generation of workers will have to be properly equipped to meet these enormous challenges. I believe that, if well-taught and using high-quality materials, philosophy classes can grant children, in Britain and across the world, extraordinary benefits as that era unfolds.</p>
<p>I will be taking part in several panel discussions at the World Economic Forum 2016 at Davos and as part of this, I will be trying to convince the policy makers and power brokers at the Swiss ski resort that we must insert practical philosophy into the heart of schooling.</p>
<p>Through my roles in the <a href="http://www.bpa.ac.uk/">British Philosophical Association</a> and the <a href="http://philosophyineducationproject.org/">Philosophy in Education project (PEP)</a>, I support the continuation of a philosophy A Level and the introduction of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-there-should-be-a-philosophy-gcse-34497">philosophy GCSE</a>. I would also like to see the introduction of at least a year – ideally many more – of non-examined philosophy classes for all children aged between seven and 14.</p>
<p>The range of ideas and arguments on offer in philosophy classes can show children that there are different ways of thinking and living than those immediately on offer in their own postcode. Philosophy is one of the main subjects which extends a child’s imaginative range of possible lives, and this is true for children from all socio-economic backgrounds. </p>
<p>We are not just products of our genetic inheritance and environment; reason can provide at least a partial way out – but only if reason is properly trained. The challenge is then to avoid circularity: is such a training only possible if one is lucky enough to go to a good school (or, in other words, is the development of reason in fact wholly dependent on one’s immediate environment after all)?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108417/original/image-20160118-31807-cac0tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Opening doors.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/klearchos/4761478827/in/photolist-8fKPLx-dojnXv-2chTP-r3gh5D-a4aUPj-AedkG1-55oBAY-7w8g1E-4JuXsm-8Xcuzw-avYLM2-u9mbhM-ekmrK3-7sf9ao-aVhv3-8AarqY-6XNed5-6YacYj-yEWgZu-BpyDoB-4DGxM1-6aipGp-615Wzw-ueGqAq-2tAibW-i95ZRK-qSf4q9-38jDwi-aUgaPB-2k1JSF-gMKfti-rrLHn2-5V3Kdy-eNk6G-92vTPd-d8NyVf-dgg7gd-8ftFVS-ekxJt3-6pJU6-6e7y2V-apsScZ-9ixW2J-aGYGLD-57mrJY-a8e2FA-5zwBi4-EYS12-9iNiqs-2aNgqm">Klearchos Kapoutsis</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is true only up to a point. There are excellent materials widely available, including online. But children do at the very least need to be aware that such materials exist, that there are doors to open. </p>
<h2>Questions of belief</h2>
<p>Crucially, philosophy can provide children with a superb training in how to ask questions, analyse concepts, analyse and construct both inductive and deductive arguments and, in general, consider whether there are any good reasons to believe whatever it is they are being told. It helps them to develop good habits of reasoning and thinking for themselves. </p>
<p>This would suggest that philosophy might give children a better chance of resisting any attempts to brainwash them, whether from political or religious extremists, advertisers, or indeed teachers. It is difficult to find hard data on this as yet, but <a href="http://bit.ly/1TPUomo">research from Britain’s Department for Education</a> does speak of “reported impacts”.</p>
<p>This idea would seem to have informed a recent British Council <a href="http://bit.ly/1m8k5nl">paper on education and extremism</a>. The education department’s own research in 2010 also suggested a link between philosophy teaching materials available from the group Philosophy for Children (P4C) and <a href="http://bit.ly/1TPUomo">protection against indocrination</a>. There is currently a working party exploring whether P4C is useful for the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/2010-to-2015-government-policy-counter-terrorism/2010-to-2015-government-policy-counter-terrorism">Prevent strategy</a>, but I am not sure whether that specific question is necessarily the right one to be asking.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108418/original/image-20160118-31837-ikkiv8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Teaching a way to leave the herd.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">REUTERS/Michaela Rehle</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Philosophy classes pitched at the right level have the merit of being inclusive, whereas some have criticised the Prevent programme <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bradford-west-yorkshire-33884645">for being divisive</a>. My point is that it is healthy for children to be encouraged to question and think for themselves – and philosophy is one of the subjects that is particularly good at this, irrespective of any particular agenda.</p>
<h2>Rigour and flair</h2>
<p>Philosophy hones both speaking and listening skills – and it fosters the ability to engage in robust yet respectful dialogue. It allows children to understand that you can disagree with someone without coming to blows and it encourages them to separate intellectual criticisms from personal attacks. It may therefore have a role to play in encouraging resilience and strength of character.</p>
<p>Both the clear, rigorous thinking and suppleness and flexibility of mind that philosophy requires and fosters will be key skills in a 21st-century workplace defined by constant innovation.</p>
<p>But, important though this is, philosophy does much more than train pupils for work. I believe that the activity of philosophy can in itself form one of the components of a flourishing life for children, both individually and collectively. This flourishing is not just a goal for their future adult selves, but also something that is important for them throughout their education. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108419/original/image-20160118-31831-jkilxk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Making happy grown-ups.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63114905@N06/20967925084/in/photolist-xWS6BJ-6pyzAt-6pCXAb-6kEFkE-6pyKJx-8cjd4w-BweAj-2B8kyT-6pCr1U-4vkHDm-6pyHJc-6pCQeh-6pyKh4-6pyGha-6pCAPo-6kEFSq-6pCk5A-52xNCD-6pCWEW-6pCGRo-6pyqZV-6pCmEG-6kE6Sd-6pyAmR-6pyfYp-6pyqFP-6kEFws-6kDSjy-6kAcer-62VWmU-riNvKb-6pCxJh-7oBQ1Q-2HbnSi-6kDScC-xxsDvk-6pyohv-6pyGYe-6pCR8m-6pCGLS-6pyChP-6kEFFs-c2FP8J-6pCRrm-6pCLDs-6pyBrZ-6pyhvB-6kEo6N-6kzYMV-atMRE6">Henrik Sandklef</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As schoolchildren mature, philosophy can help them reflect on such issues as flourishing, happiness and pleasure and how they may (or may not) interrelate. Philosophy can thus help children work out their own life goals.</p>
<h2>Encouraging doubt</h2>
<p>Those at Davos who are concerned about how the future of education should look in this age of uncertainty can find solace in philosophy. It can help children understand that ethical decisions have always had to be made in conditions of uncertainty and that technological advances have not changed that (though they may have deceived us into thinking that life is more predictable than it is).</p>
<p>Philosophy can also help children develop conceptions of flourishing which can exist in uncertain times and it can help provide them with the mental agility and adaptability that uncertain times require. It is not excess of doubt that is currently causing so many problems around the world – quite the reverse.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52921/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Angela Hobbs is an Honorary Patron of the Philosophy Foundation, a Patron of the Philosophy in Education Project (PEP) and on the Executive Committee of the British Philosophical Association.</span></em></p>Tackling extremism, building happier adults and delivering a generation that can adapt to rapid change. Putting thinking and thinkers at the heart of the curriculum should be an easy decision.Angie Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/528742016-01-19T17:38:25Z2016-01-19T17:38:25ZShould Davos delegates live in fear of the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’?<p>The World Economic Forum Meeting at Davos, Switzerland this year is all about navigating a path through the “Fourth Industrial Revolution”. Preceding industrial revolutions were centred on machinery, electrified mass production, and computers. The fourth is premised on emerging breakthrough technologies based on artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, brain research, robots, the internet of things, and much else. </p>
<p>Beneath the branding and the hype, major technological changes are happening that will have enormous implications for the organization of business, the pattern of work, daily life, and the future of capitalism. The rapid pace of change is set to continue, and the world will be very different in 30 years from now.</p>
<p>The publicity for the Davos meeting portends a world of joblessness, low productivity and inequality. But are these inevitable, and haven’t we heard such warnings before? It would be a mistake for delegates to assume that technological changes lead automatically to one set of possible socio-economic outcomes. </p>
<h2>Getting it wrong</h2>
<p>There is not a one-way causal relationship between technology and socio-economic arrangements. Causality works in both directions.</p>
<p>Financial, corporate, research and other institutions are necessary to finance, facilitate and nurture technological innovation. Furthermore, the diverse institutional arrangements that exist in modern global capitalism – compare the US, Japan, Germany, the UK and China, for example – show that similar technologies can be hosted by quite different financial, legal and business institutions. Consequently, technology alone is not the predictor of the kinds of socio-economic arrangements that may emerge in the next 30 years.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108583/original/image-20160119-29798-jj9b50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">No one finds it easy predicting the outcomes from rapid change.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/holger-wirth/6317808616/in/photolist-aChqoL-h3PbHo-6cSVZ7-62Y7GF-aGMhjM-afKZ9X-6fwNBN-5vAnTX-euQbnf-4L8gKZ-agjKEh-gVGtcT-5p5ixx-5Xe5S2-afKWut-afNLB3-afKWn4-bmWiMX-ncpVsF-nvFxzB-afNLpU-afNH41-afKWRR-9dPXpb-5CiB5N-bCMqkF-wvuh2v-8pX7po-6aCQZU-5CtedP-bqpWji-dss5S8-dkVsCu-afKZQp-9kN5AQ-jvBciE-abSwAd-98XbB-oFykAM-9dPWch-9racFW-4tKDuz-t44kMs-t4hHPR-s7h72C-s7t7gc-t4hBQg-sLPTh2-t1XGes-t1XpV5">Holger Wirth</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When considering the future impact of technology, two great economists got it very wrong in the past. <a href="http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/965">In Capital, Karl Marx argued</a> that new technology under capitalism would lead inevitably to the deskilling of the workforce. But as <a href="http://www.econlib.org/library/Marshall/marP.html">Alfred Marshall pointed out</a>, machines first replace the most monotonous and muscular labour. Other forms of work, involving adaptive skills and judgement, are less-readily replaced by machines. </p>
<p>Marx’s prediction of widespread deskilling has failed to materialise. Historical evidence shows that machines can enhance skills rather than reduce them. But this does not mean that extensive deskilling is ruled out: it is a possible scenario for the future. </p>
<h2>Information economy</h2>
<p>In another prediction, John Maynard Keynes <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/sep/01/economics">predicted in 1930 a dramatic shortening</a> of the average working day. He argued that his hypothetical grandchildren might have to work only 15 hours a week to satisfy their material needs. It is true that the average number of working hours has decreased in developed countries, but to nowhere near the levels envisaged by Keynes. Another prediction that has failed to materialise.</p>
<p>Both Marx and Keynes over-stressed the material aspects of production and underestimated the way in which economies entail the processing of information as well as the making of things. Any technology has to be organised, with effective communication between those involved. Specialist organisational, administrative and communication skills are required.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108599/original/image-20160119-29790-1884cdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Making connections.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/healthblog/8384110298/in/photolist-dLSKTQ-57T5n8-dpJEW-dpKit-7MJBQZ-4A5KLW-vDesca-4zCAGb-7MJBkT-7MNAww-7MJArK-dpKgT-dpKzy-dpJxV-dpK2n-dpJN8-dpJJc-dpK9K-dpJv3-4zyjbF-4zyj4Z-4zyj1R-dpJQZ-dpKvF-dpKmh-dpJZr-dpJz3-dpK5Z-dpJWd-dpKaN-dpJVr-4zWGpJ-4AKCxg-4zQCxD-4zHjHT-4zMwzj-7358jv-4wHwZ3-4wqhXa-p3ErN7-pCebY4-9fsTYw-cDuCz-2UT6CQ-jR9gc-4vuuEb-2fyKW5-7JWMTC-7TQ3o3-8UMRPQ">A Health Blog</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the growing complexity of capitalism, this facet and type of work has increased relentlessly over the last 200 years. It has now reached the point that the majority of work in developed economies involves the processing of information, rather than the production of material things.</p>
<h2>Real risks</h2>
<p>But we are told that the Fourth Industrial Revolution may change all this, and that is why the Davos delegates are being asked to gravely consider the implications.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SCGV1tNBoeU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The World Economic Forum’s take on the Fourth Industrial Revolution.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One of its key features is that artificial intelligence will develop to the point that it can replace humans in making judgements and in the administration of complex systems. It is also suggested that artificially intelligent systems will soon be able to learn and innovate. </p>
<p>Given this, then, both Marx’s and Keynes’s scenarios become more feasible. We can now, just about, imagine a world run by robots and computers. Humans would be consigned to a life of enforced leisure, a world where humans have no need to learn productive skills.</p>
<p>But this is not necessarily the outcome of the new technology. While artificial intelligence may become capable of sophisticated judgements, it is likely that a number of intuitive human skills will be irreplaceable for a long time to come. Furthermore, it would be both difficult and dangerous to program decisions concerning moral judgement into a machine. These factors leave an important and potentially large space for human intervention. </p>
<p>But within that debate over the future of our information economy lies a genuine, and palpable risk. There are large inequalities in the distribution of wealth, and these will remain unless the <a href="https://theconversation.com/piketty-has-redefined-capital-after-200-years-of-confusion-25770">high concentration of ownership of capitalizable assets</a> is reduced. Crucially, much capitalizable wealth owned by corporations now consists of immaterial, information-based assets. There is a concomitant danger that <a href="http://cje.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/08/04/cje.beu025">monopoly control of key information</a>
will also stifle the innovation that allows us to manage this transition. </p>
<p>The outcome of the Fourth Industrial Revolution will depend as much on political and other developments as on technology itself. What is certain, as both Paul Mason and I <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/C/bo18523749.html">have discussed in recent books</a>, is that the 21st century will bring massive changes to economic systems and our patterns of work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52874/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Geoffrey M Hodgson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>We live in changing times. Let’s hope the power brokers work out how to manage them.Geoffrey M Hodgson, Research Professor, Hertfordshire Business School, University of HertfordshireLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/530492016-01-15T11:15:26Z2016-01-15T11:15:26ZThe fourth industrial revolution: what does WEF’s Klaus Schwab leave out?<p>In April 2000, Bill Joy famously wrote in <a href="http://www.wired.com/2000/04/joy-2/">Wired Magazine</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Our most powerful 21st-century technologies – robotics, genetic engineering, and nanotech – are threatening to make humans an endangered species.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>At the time, Joy was an accomplished technologist and chief scientist at Sun Microsystems. Yet he argued passionately that society was in danger of being destroyed by the very technologies scientists and engineers thought could save it.</p>
<p>Nearly 16 years on, <a href="http://www.weforum.org/about/klaus-schwab">Klaus Schwab</a>, founder of the World Economic Forum (<a href="http://www.weforum.org/about/world-economic-forum">WEF</a>), has just published an equally passionate treatise on the power of emerging technologies. Unlike Joy, he maps out a vastly more optimistic future where technology innovation – and our ability to harness it – becomes a powerhouse for social and economic growth.</p>
<h2>Technology as a revolutionizing force for good</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108219/original/image-20160114-2343-1u6b9ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Klaus Schwab founded the World Economic Forum in 1971 to ‘improve the state of the world.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/5434144856">World Economic Forum</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In his new book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01AIT6SZ8">The Fourth Industrial Revolution</a> – published to coincide with the <a href="http://www.weforum.org/events/world-economic-forum-annual-meeting-2016">WEF annual meeting in Davos</a> – Schwab argues that we are at the beginning of a technological revolution that “is fundamentally changing the way we live, work, and relate to one another.”</p>
<p>At the heart of Schwab’s revolution is an accelerating convergence between our increasingly powerful technological capabilities. Autonomous vehicles, 3D printing, gene editing, robotics, artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things – these and many more emerging trends, he suggests, are arising from an unparalleled melding of physical, biological and digital worlds.</p>
<p>These coalescing capabilities are both transforming and being transformed by society. And it is this tight coupling that, to Schwab, signals a new era of technology innovation. Just as the widespread use of steam, electricity and computers have in the past revolutionized society, so, he argues, will this <a href="http://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/01/the-fourth-industrial-revolution-what-it-means-and-how-to-respond">new wave of technological convergence</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108184/original/image-20160114-2356-1tdp67w.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Are we entering a fourth industrial revolution?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">World Economic Forum. From The Fourth Industrial Revolution: what it means, how to respond</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Like Joy before him, Schwab is acutely aware of the intimate dynamic between technology and society. And he implies this could be a bloody revolution with massive casualties, if businesses, governments and society more generally don’t learn to master it.</p>
<p>Yet unlike Joy, Schwab – an economist – firmly believes that technology can drive social progress. He has an unerring faith that we can build a better future through technology innovation. As long as we understand the full nature of the opportunities and challenges that face us, the future he envisions is a bright one.</p>
<h2>A revolution that could ride off the rails</h2>
<p>Schwab’s vision is as broad as it is engaging. Yet I must confess that reading The Fourth Revolution, I could easily imagine many of my colleagues in the world of responsible innovation rolling their eyes.</p>
<p>I’m part of a global community of natural and social scientists, legal, ethical and policy scholars, policymakers, and civil society advocates, that has spent decades studying and acting on the interplay between science, society and emerging technologies. It’s a community that has its roots in the emergence of modern-day science, and influential works like Thomas Kuhn’s <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo13179781.html">The Structure of Scientific Revolutions</a>. This field has been deeply influential in helping governments, businesses and others understand and navigate the risks and benefits of technologies that range from genetically modified organisms and nanotechnology to synthetic biology, geoengineering and artificial intelligence. Many of us have been grappling with the challenges of developing complex and evolving technologies within an equally complex and evolving society for much of our professional lives.</p>
<p>Yet Schwab’s book often comes across as blissfully unaware of this provenance. Despite the many international initiatives, journals, conferences, think tanks, books and research programs – too many to list separately – dedicated to the responsible and beneficial development of emerging technologies, The Fourth Industrial Revolution reads as if it were written in a vacuum. The ideas are interesting, and in many cases important – but are rarely informed by current activities or thinking.</p>
<p>In my home institution alone, we have one of two U.S. <a href="https://cns.asu.edu/">Centers for Nanotechnology in Society</a>, a top academic think tank on <a href="http://cspo.org/">science, policy and outcomes</a>, and a whole school devoted to the <a href="https://sfis.asu.edu/">future of innovation in society</a>. And there are leading initiatives on science, technology and society in institutes as diverse as <a href="http://sts.cornell.edu/">Cornell</a>, <a href="http://web.mit.edu/sts/">MIT</a>, the <a href="http://www.uib.no/en/svt">University of Bergen</a> in Norway, the <a href="http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/">University of Sussex</a> in the U.K., the <a href="http://www.tsinghua.edu.cn/publish/istsen/4234/index.html">University of Tsinghua</a> in China, I could go on and on.</p>
<p>More pertinently, perhaps, there are established and emerging approaches to informing the governance and oversight of emerging technologies. <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/techassessment.pdf">Technology assessment</a>, for instance, which represents a whole slew of methodologies for forecasting and responding to emerging opportunities and challenges. Or <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0306312713508669">anticipatory governance</a> – an approach to technology innovation governance that has its roots in the nanotechnology and synthetic biology “revolutions.” Then there’s <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2013.05.008">responsible innovation</a> – a framing for responsible and beneficial technology development that has been <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/h2020-section/responsible-research-innovation">widely supported in Europe</a>, but is increasingly forming an <a href="https://cns.asu.edu/viri">international platform</a> for addressing emerging technologies. There are plenty more, including foresighting, scenario planning, real-time technology assessment, socio-technical integration research – it’s a long list.</p>
<p>Little of this is reflected in The Fourth Industrial Revolution.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/108220/original/image-20160114-2374-1kbo2n1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This book could be a primer for thought leaders who show up in Davos – but there’s a lot more to reaching that wonderful future Schwab envisions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/16139459690">World Economic Forum</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Part of the reason, I suspect, is that my community of researchers and practitioners is not the book’s target audience. Instead, Schwab is writing primarily for business, government and civil society leaders – the folks who fly into Davos for the WEF’s annual conference.</p>
<p>Because of this, the book is worth reading, despite my imagined academic eye-rolling. I would, however, suggest it be read within a much broader context than the one it provides. </p>
<p>This context should include what governments, businesses, civil society and academics are already doing – and have been doing for some time. It should incorporate current tools, thinking and social science on how to navigate the technological future. And it should be cognizant of emerging ideas, such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/thinking-innovatively-about-the-risks-of-tech-innovation-52934">risk innovation</a> and <a href="http://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2015.286">actionable empathy</a>.</p>
<p>In writing The Fourth Industrial Revolution, Schwab is successfully exposing high-level decision-makers to a world they may not be aware of, but should be – and this is the book’s strength. It’s a relatively quick read at just over 100 pages. Yet within these pages, he paints a picture of a technology future that demands our full attention in the here-and-now.</p>
<h2>It’ll take work to attain that rosy future</h2>
<p>Here, Schwab’s message is clear – if the future is to be one in which inequalities are reduced, health, well-being and prosperity are increased, and we as a society remain in charge of our destiny, then public and private leaders need to think and act differently now when it comes to the potential and perils of increasingly powerful and fast-moving technologies.</p>
<p>Schwab fleshes this out with three specific challenges:</p>
<ul>
<li>Raise awareness and understanding of the promise and pitfalls of the fourth industrial revolution across all sectors of society.</li>
<li>Develop narratives around how stakeholders can shape the revolution for current and future generations.</li>
<li>Restructure economic, social and political systems to take full advantage of the opportunities the revolution presents.</li>
</ul>
<p>These are lofty goals. They certainly make sense in the face of the technological trends Schwab outlines. </p>
<p>Acting on them, though, will require far more than this book provides readers with. Schwab effectively constructs a strong frame in The Fourth Industrial Revolution and begins to block in the canvas. But he leaves it to others to fill in many of the details.</p>
<p>Fortunately, there are many groups and organizations already working on those details. For instance the <a href="http://cspo.org/">Consortium on Science, Policy & Outcomes</a>, the <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/program/science-and-technology-innovation-program">Wilson Center Science & Technology Program</a> and <a href="http://www.matterforall.org/">Matter</a> (just three groups I’ve worked with in this area – there are many more) are actively bringing academics, civil society, businesses, governments and others together to chart a way forward in today’s increasingly complex technological world. </p>
<p>These and other efforts are building a foundation of responsible innovation around the world. </p>
<p>Yet despite them, and in spite of Schwab’s optimism, Joy’s earlier vision of a socially bankrupt technological future still haunts me. Since penning his article in 2000, the gap between our technological capabilities and our ability to handle them responsibly has continued to widen. Gene editing, autonomous vehicles, the Internet of Things and autonomous weapons, for example, are just four of many, many areas where, despite our best efforts, we are way behind the curve in understanding what could go wrong and how to prevent it.</p>
<p>Closing this gap will be crucial as Schwab’s fourth industrial revolution gathers pace. This will require radical new approaches from governments, businesses and others. But it will also depend on new partnerships being forged between experts and organizations that have insight into the complex dynamic between society and technology, and those that call the shots.</p>
<p>It will also depend on ordinary people – those who stand to bear the brunt or reap the rewards of the coming revolution – being included in defining and helping determine how this next industrial revolution plays out.</p>
<p>Schwab is right: the future could be rosy. But if technology is to serve society rather than dominate it, <em>everyone</em> involved, from businesses, governments and academics, to ordinary people, needs to proactively work together to make this so.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53049/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<h4 class="border">Disclosure</h4><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Maynard is a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Councils, and provided comments to Klaus Schwab while he was writing The Fourth Industrial Revolution. </span></em></p>After steam, electricity and computers come cyber-physical systems: the fourth industrial revolution. A new book by the World Economic Forum’s founder foresees a rosy future – but that’ll take work.Andrew Maynard, Director, Risk Innovation Lab, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.