GZERO hits the Alps in Davos

It’s your favorite time of year again – if you’re a titan of thought leadership or a yodeler, that is. That’s right, the World Economic Forum kicks off in Davos, Switzerland, on Monday.

GZERO will be in the Swiss Alps to bring you the latest from discussions between the world’s government and business leaders, and we will be sending you special editions of the GZERO Daily over the next three Sundays. They will be filled with sparkling analysis of the summit’s main themes and discussions, video interviews, and Q&As.

Here’s a sneak peek:

“Rebuilding Trust” is the overarching theme of the 2024 conference, going beyond usual discussions of solutions to look at ways of boosting transparency, accountability, and hope for a better tomorrow.

It dovetails nicely with the hot new kid on the block: artificial intelligence. OpenAI CEO and vaunted AI guru Sam Altman will participate in a panel on safety and trust in technology (alongside this reporter’s old boss, certified Davos superstar Fareed Zakaria). One of the conference’s pillars is “Artificial intelligence as a driving force for the economy and society,” but the world’s efforts to regulate this dynamic new technology are falling far behind its exponentially growing power.

In world politics, the heaviest hitters will be French President Emmanuel Macron and Chinese Premiere Li Qiang, who will each give a special address. But Macron is the only G7 leader attending — perhaps a sign that palling around in the snow with the rich and famous isn’t winning too many votes these days.

The Biden administration is dispatching top deputies, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan. Sullivan is expected to attend a conference of peer national security advisors from allied states that will focus on a 10-point peace plan originally drafted by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

We’ll be there for you through every step of the action. Tschüss!