St. Gallen Symposium Magazine 46

46th St. Gallen Symposium Magazine

#debategrowth

2

3

EDITORIAL

Dear Reader, One of the main lessons learned from two intense days of debating growth is that it is a phenomenon that can be viewed from as many different angles as the number of raindrops that fell during the symposium.

In order to capture those different views, as well as the atmosphere in which they were discussed, an international team of 13 talented journalists and photographers from around the world travelled to St. Gallen to document the symposium. They asked you, the attendees, about your expectations (page 16), and how you spend your time (page 32). They conducted one-onone interviews with the symposium’s main speakers (like Prof. Tim Jackson (page 24) and Nils Smedegaard Andersen (page 46)). They looked back at history (page 88), analysed challenges the world is facing today (page 56), and glanced into the future (page 96). They gathered information about innovative start-ups (page 48) and interesting philosophies (page 108).

The magazine you are holding in your hands is the result of this journalistic exploration of the symposium. Guided by the questions raised by moderators Priscila Bala and Bree Romuld – “what,” “how,” “when,” “where,” and “why” – the stories reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly sides of growth. Inspired by your insights, the magazine team’s ambitions also grew. By presenting the symposium’s topic in creative and fresh new ways, we hope to continue the conversation and #debategrowth.

On behalf of the magazine team and the 46th International Students’ Committee (ISC), we would like to sincerely thank you for your participation, inspiration and support.

JULIA KRAMER

REBECCA FENCL

EDITOR IN CHIEF

MAGAZINE PROJECT MANAGER

6

7

WHAT

We like to talk about growth using terms like “responsible,” “sustainable,” and “quality,” but growth can also mean “resource depletion” or “inequality.” Growth is not an absolute concept. There is no one-size-fitsall definition; the concept itself is expanding.

18 “WE HAVE A PROBLEM” Why is growth still important? Do we need it? And is there a formula to grow? Global economist Dambisa Moyo analyses the keys to good growth.

24 MORE FUN, LESS STUFF Tim Jackson, Professor of Sustainable Development at the University of Surrey, believes a new approach to economics could ensure a bright future for the planet and help us live happier lives.

28 DO INCOME GAPS SLOW GROWTH? The relationship between growth and income inequality is not as clear as once thought, but economists say equal opportunity is an important goal for developing economies.

72 “THE VALUES WE HAVE DO NOT SHIFT EASILY.” Mathis Wackernagel loves the outdoors. As a sustainability advocate, he travels the world to inform audiences about the global ecological footprint concept. How does he balance his travel schedule with his urgent call for less emissions in the world?

8

9

HOW

Growth is about making choices: Do you want to grow faster or do you need to slow down? What outcomes do you prefer? How do you define successful growth? And who is going to benefit? Different choices lead to different growth processes.

22 THE BEST IDEAS TAKE FLIGHT The essay competition for the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award is one of the world’s most prestigious and competitive.

To defend their ideas on this year’s topic “What are alternatives to economic growth?” the six finalists had to step up on the big stage for the first time in the award’s history.

46 IN ROUGH WATERS In a market plagued by overcapacity, the container shipping giant Maersk aims to defend its position as market leader. To this end, CEO Nils Smedegaard Andersen wants his company to grow – even in times of deteriorating profits.

50 IS BURNING MAN UNDER FIRE? As the Burning Man Festival has grown over the past 30 years, so has criticism of the event. The increasing numbers of wealthier attendees, exclusive desert camps, and other status symbols threaten to disrupt the event’s atmosphere of dusty decommodification and radical inclusion.

76 GETTING TO KNOW YOU Entrepreneur Matteo Achilli knows how to create buzz. After appearing on the cover of the Italian magazine Panorama, his portrait went viral: international media wrote about this “Italian Mark Zuckerberg” and the BBC even featured him in a documentary about the next generation of billionaires.

10

11

WHEN

Growth rises and falls in cycles. It happens under the right circumstances, influenced by decisions made by the people in charge. It is about timing, about ambition, about motivation, and about luck.

32 #TIMELESS #LESSTIME Time is one of the things in life we cannot really save, buy, trade or hold. There is no way to make the number of hours in the day grow. So how do people make use of the time they have?

66 NOT JUST ANOTHER BRIC IN THE WALL For over a decade the perception of the big emerging markets has been oversimplified. The slow-down of their growth shows: The so-called BRICS are very diverse countries – with very diverse problems.

68 DANCING ON THE EDGE? September 2008 has become part of the world’s collective memory: It is the year Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy and the global financial system went into free fall. Eight years later, some fear another financial crisis is about to happen.

86 WHAT WOULD KEYNES DO? Just a few months after the Great Depression of 1929 began, among rising calls for the end of capitalism, John Maynard Keynes imagined an era of abundance a century in the future.

Now, 70 years after the great economist’s death, the world is facing the consequences of another financial crisis. How would Keynes respond to the changes and the challenges we are witnessing today?

12

13

WHERE

Growth takes place visibly and invisibly, personally and professionally, on the macroand micro-level, in different industries, in the developing world and the developed world.

Growth is happening in many contexts, and these different contexts need to be assessed differently.

31 BETTER, FASTER, STRONGER. However sweet the taste of success, the road to the top can get rocky at times. Amid all the growth and unbridled ambition, are symposium participants willing to talk about their struggles?

48 LET’S GET SOMETHING GROWING Start-ups can affect the social and economic growth of a country positively. These three Leaders of Tomorrow founded their own start-ups and try to contribute to their countries in their own way.

104 ALL TOGETHER NOW! Cooperatives are not chasing staggering profits, focusing instead on participation and social responsibility. Yet some still grow up to be major players. Is the concept a meaningful model for sustainable growth?

106 AN AFRICAN ANSWER TO GROWTH The Africapitalism philosophy goes beyond the old concept of capitalism. For the Nigerian banker Tony Elumelu the African private sector can transform the continent through long term investments, simultaneously creating economic prosperity and social wealth.

14

15

WHY

Growth can be a positive trigger for change and for development, something we intrinsically aim for. But it can be not only a blessing, but also a burden. Growth is a deeply human issue, which means there is room for discussion. Let’s #debategrowth.

56 BATTLING OVER BORDERS Fabrice Leggeri, Executive Director of Frontex and Bruno Stagno Ugarte, Deputy Executive Director for Advocacy of Human Rights Watch sound off about an overwhelmed EU, reintroduced border checks and the national movements.

82 HUMANS OF ST. GALLEN Over 1,000 people gathered at this year’s St. Gallen Symposium.

Here are five of their stories.

90 GREEN GOLD Mitsuru Izumo believes in eco-friendly capitalism. He hopes to use a tiny, single-celled creature to make it a reality.

94 WATCH YOUR JOB, HUMAN: THE ROBOTS ARE COMING Martin Ford envisions a near future in which roughly half of the world’s workforce will be replaced by machines.

16

FOLLOW ME – What do participants new to the St. Gallen Symposium expect and what do they hope to take away from the event? We asked an ISC member, a Leader of Tomorrow, and a Leader of Today.

RUBEN DIELEMAN (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

THROUGH THE PARTICIPANTS’ EYES

ISC: MORITZ SCHNORPFEIL 19, BACHELOR STUDENT OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ST. GALLEN AND MEMBER OF THE ORGANISING COMMITTEE. “I have been travelling the world in order to convince people to attend a conference I have never attended myself. But my colleagues made me really enthusiastic, and we are probably the biggest fans of the symposium. Hosting the interesting guests and making them feel at home is the way I contribute right now.

I expect that the symposium is going to be inspiring and insightful. It will not just be about exchanging cards, it will actually be about great debates!”

17

25, COINTELEGRAPH.COM “By providing participants with the perspective of a new world, of the future, for all of society, I will contribute to this symposium. I do think there is the possibility for radical change. The systems existing in the world today need to be broadened.

We need a paradigm shift.

I expect it to be a great event. I expect it to connect people and generations, and I am very much looking forward to debating future growth.”

LEADER OF TODAY: JAMIE TUUTA 39, MAORI TRUSTEE “I want to contribute by giving people an indigenous perspective on growth in New Zealand, in terms of development and what that means for us. Growth is not an end in itself. It is really important to understand what success means for a particular group of people. I want to share our view of the world, our challenges and our opportunities, in the post-growth era.

This is my first time at the symposium.

I came with an open mind. I certainly expect to gain some valuable insights from the keynote speakers in terms of their experiences that I can apply in my own context. It’s a great opportunity to discuss and to network.”

FOLLOW ME

LEADER OF TOMORROW: TONI LANE CASSERLY

18

WHAT IS GROWTH?

19

WHAT IS GROWTH? – Why is growth still important? Do we need it? And is there a formula to grow? Global economist Dambisa Moyo analyses the keys to good growth.

“WE HAVE A PROBLEM”

ELÍAS CAMHAJI & SARA ROSATI (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

When Dambisa Moyo walks into a room she fills it with self confidence. The 47-year-old Zambian economist was named one of the 100 most influential people by Time magazine in 2009. She studied at the American University, Harvard University, and the University of Oxford, moving from chemistry to economics in the hopes of assessing its influence in people’s everyday lives. After working for the World Bank and Goldman Sachs, she became an author and international public speaker.

Moyo is an unconventional thinker. One of her most controversial books is called “Dead Aid,” in which she argues that international assistance to African governments has fostered dependency, encouraged corruption, and perpetuated poverty.

Her controversial ideas put her in high demand. Moyo keeps her calendar in a small tablet that she carries everywhere.

She knows her schedule backwards and forward. Every minute is programmed.

While she talks, she looks at her watch on the sly. In a typically efficient conversation, she explained her concerns about the concept and future of economic growth.

What is economic growth and why do we have to talk about it?

“Economic growth is defined by three key variables: Capital (how much money we have), labour (the quality and the quantity of the labour force) and productivity.

The importance of growth is as a metric to gauge improvements in living standards.

It is not perfect by any means, but it is a very useful metric to be able to compare across countries.”

We have been discussing growth for decades. Why do we still not have a formula to grow?

“We are not entirely sure how to stimulate growth. For example, 60% of why one country grows and another one does not is because of productivity, and yet productivity can be anything: from the rule of law to democracy, to technological advancements and innovation. It is really about how quickly we can convert labour and capital into actual improvements in living standards and, therefore, economic growth.”

So, how can we stimulate growth?

“There have been many different approaches to solve that question. The approach in the developed world is to use market capitalism and base it all on incentives. Non-democratic countries, such as China, have shown that you can actually deliver economic growth very rapidly and move hundreds of millions of people out of poverty using a completely different economic system. That is where the tension arises. We do not have clear evidence of what actually helps to drive economic growth, just a broad sense of things that work.” ↦

20 WHAT IS GROWTH?

We have added so many qualifiers to growth. We aim for sustainable, well-distributed, inclusive growth. Do you think economists have disregarded the social and political dimensions of growth?

“Those taglines are really attempts by the economic profession to broaden the lens through which we define economic growth metrics. Even on a broader perspective, if you think about countries, there is real concern now that having pure market capitalism is actually attached to increased corruption and widening income inequality. It is creating a lot of social costs. It is a pestilence on man and on the environment. What you are touching on is the on-going effort to try and capture a proper assessment of what economic growth should look like. I do not have an a priori objection to those taglines, but I think that what it says is defining growth is a dynamic process with no end-point.”

Is growth a means to an end, or a purpose in itself?

“To my mind, growth has never been defined as an end in itself. The whole purpose is to improve living standards, which comes back to the most fundamental point: growth is not leading to improved

living standards. We have a problem. There has been economic growth over the last 30 years, but we know that real wages, particularly in developed countries, have declined. Even though you saw significant growth, in some cases double digit economic growth, you are seeing worsening living standards. We are not getting the outcomes that we expected. Beyond that, a lot of the gains to economic growth have accrued to those who are holding capital, not to those who labour.”

Many countries have been left behind in the race for growth. Yet you come from the developing world and you believe that we can find answers in growth. Why? “Well, it is necessary. People need to live, to have healthcare and roofs over their heads. That requires improvements in living standards. What is up for debate is not whether we need growth, but how we are going to create that economic growth.

And we do not have an answer. The big risk is that we become ideological. Ideology is an enemy of economic growth. What is really important to understand is that growth is not the problem. The question is how we are going to deliver that growth.

And clearly we do not have an answer.” u

WHAT ARE THE NEW CHALLENGES FOR THE GLOBAL ECONOMY? Technological advances Are they going to create jobs or a jobless underclass?

Productivity 60% of why one country grows and another one does not is individual productivity.

Demographics We have had a significant increase in the global population. It is 7.5 billion people now, and will continue to grow to 11 billion people by 2100. How are we going to manage all those people?

21

Natural resources Supply and demand imbalances are an issue, but so is green growth and environmental concerns. How do we close that circle, given that resources are scarce, finite and running out?

Debt The amount of debt in the world is problematic.

It is fueled by the aftermath of the financial crisis, as developed countries spend in order to stem the tide.

Income inequality Something that nobody cared about 30 years ago is now on top of the global agenda.

22 WINGS OF EXCELLENCE By now, Schima Labitsch’s (AT) friends have probably been treated to a wonderful night out in New York City. The Austrian student, studying at Fordham University in New York, had to invite them: As one of the six finalists of the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award essay competition, she already knew that her essay must have been convincing. But she never thought she would actually make it onto the podium. Just before heading to Switzerland she promised her friends that if she won, she would take them out to one of the nicest restaurants in the Big Apple. She even gave them the choice of where to go.

Labitsch won. The Master’s student in International Political Economy and Development (IPED) convinced the jury with her essay “Deconstructing growth: The why, what and how any alternative to growth must consist of.”

Spending a relaxing evening with her clique sounds about right after winning one of the world’s most prestigious essay competitions. This year, 820 graduate and post graduate students from 92 nations, studying at 350 universities in 68 countries, shared their ideas. But writing a high-quality essay was not enough: For the very first time in the history of the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award, in-

troduced in 1989 to highlight new visions of young minds, the six finalists had to present their ideas on stage. “It was not about judging them. Instead, we wanted to give them a platform to present themselves,” says Prof. Georg van Krogh, Chair of Strategic Management and Innovation at ETH Zurich. “It was about a chance to talk to them and to get to know them.”

For the jury, chaired by van Krogh, four criteria were very important: “How have they been able to argue, how new are their ideas, how did they embed relevant literature and how practical is the implementation of their idea?” According to him, all the finalists did fantastic work, making it tough for the jury to decide which three would share the CHF 20,000 prize purse at the end. “I really enjoyed reading these essays,” he said, admitting that he learned new approaches on other alternatives to growth, too.

For one and a half hours, in front of several hundred people in the auditorium, the glare of the spotlight was on Schima Labitsch and her five rivals, Constantin Aichelburg (AT), David Clough (GB), Alexandra Ettlin (CH), Nicolas Hartmann (DE) and Colin Miller (US). They had to sum up their main ideas in just a few minutes. After their presentation, they had to defend

23

WINGS OF EXCELLENCE – The essay competition for the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award is one of the world’s most prestigious and competitive. To defend their ideas on this year’s topic “What are alternatives to economic growth?” the six finalists had to step up on the big stage for the first time in the award’s history.

THE BEST IDEAS TAKE FLIGHT

SUSANN EBERLEIN (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTOS)

their ideas against the tricky questions posed by an expert panel consisting of Marcela Escobari (US), Executive Director at the Center for International Development at Harvard University, Thebe Ikalafeng (ZA), Group CEO of Brand Leadership and Clare Woodcraft-Scott (GB), CEO of the Emirates Foundation.

“I was very nervous, but I was also glad to have had the opportunity to perform on stage,” Ettlin said. The Ph.D. candidate in business at the University of St. Gallen made it to second place with her thoughts on how cooperatives can foster common growth. “The appeal of the cooperative model lies in its ability to counteract the current market dynamic that the American economist Sherwin Rosen has called the superstar effect: winner takes it all, loser leaves all,” Ettlin explained. For her, cooperatives have many advantages, such as less pressure on managers for shortterm profit optimisation or shifting the approach away from a capitalistic frame.

Having the spotlight on her was a completely different experience. Originally, she just participated in the essay competition to be able to take part in the symposium, next to the 100 hand-picked Leaders of Tomorrow. “But then I got an email

saying that I made it to the top 21,” Ettlin says. “That was unexpected, but the unexpected surprises are the nicest in life.”

Third place went to Colin Miller, a student at New York University, pursuing a Master’s degree in business administration and in public administration. For him, growth with purpose is very important.

“Growth should not be an ultimate goal, but a tool to achieve development outcomes,” he said. Taking that into account, growth could help to reduce poverty and improve life.

For Miller, not only the six finalists on stage, but also the 21 semi-finalists are winners. “I feel proud and humbled to have been able to meet and discuss with them,” he said. “I have very huge respect for all their ideas”. He even considered sharing his prize money.

Treating her friends to a nice restaurant meal was Labitsch’s way to share her welldeserved money. What is left over will help her to finance her second year at university. “That is a very great help,” she said. u

SCHIMA LABITSCH (AT) FORDHAM UNIVERSITY

ALEXANDRA ETTLIN (CH) UNIVERSITY OF ST. GALLEN

COLIN MILLER (US) NEW YORK UNIVERSITY

24

“YOU CAN CHOOSE NOT TO BE EMBEDDED IN THIS DESTRUCTIVE, CONSUMERIST SYSTEM.”

25

GET OVER IT – For decades, growth has been the answer to almost every economic problem. Somewhere along the line, growth lost its lustre – and while we dither over what to do about growth, we are leaving deep scars on the Earth. Tim Jackson, Professor of Sustainable Development at the University of Surrey, believes a new approach to economics could ensure a bright future for the planet and help us live happier lives.

ELÍAS CAMHAJI (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

It was a rainy holiday, typical for the north of England, when Tim Jackson’s kids badgered him into taking them to an animal park. While walking between the tiger cages, the lion enclosures and the screeching bonobo monkeys, among annoyed adults and screaming children, the Jacksons could tell something did not feel right.

On their way out of the park, they had to walk through the gift shop, piled high with stuffed animals and other souvenirs. Despite not really wanting to buy anything, Jackson ended up taking home some of these fluffy toys. It seemed like his children had enjoyed neither the visit to the park nor the toys.

The next day, they spent a day in the wilderness with just their bags on their backs. His children were as happy as they could be. “There is an enormous lesson in that,” Jackson says. “Our needs as human beings are not best satisfied inside the gift shop, but in the open, in the world, interacting with people.”

But in a world where accumulation and consumption are thought to be keys to prosperity and success, can we imagine a future where we worry less about owning

things and care more about personal fulfillment? During the symposium, Jackson argued that in order to do so, we should be thinking of enhancing human development and creating opportunities for people rather than worrying about growing GDP. You have talked about the dilemma of growth: We cannot live with it or without it. Is growth possible without trashing the planet, or do you think we have to trash the concept of growth altogether?

“I think we have to set growth aside, to be honest, because we have been fixated on this idea that we want GDP and we want GDP to grow. Economists, statisticians, and accountants will tell you it is not a very good measure in the first place. GDP is not a measure of wellbeing, nor does it measure many other things very well. What we need to focus on is getting over the dilemma of growth, on having an economy that creates quality of life and provides opportunities for people to flourish. Then you worry about how you make that economy work.”

MORE FUN, LESS STUFF

Which players have to take action to make these changes happen?

“The larger players have to change the infrastructures and the institutions. Enterprises should be asking themselves what the nature of their business is – not just what kind of business they have, but also where it sits in the nature of the world and human potential. Business can improve people’s lives, and there are successful businesses in that space. That does not mean that businesses do not often find themselves in difficult places, just like people. That is why you need to think of a role for governments: regulatory frameworks, social investments, and ultimately having the potential to regulate stability and instability within the system.”

Politically, how do you sell the idea of slowing down growth?

“I do not think you do. What you sell is the idea of full employment, the idea of good health systems, the idea of good education. And you create your economy in a way that makes that work. That does place a strong emphasis on governments and political leadership. But it is not ↦

26 GET OVER IT political leadership to go out and say: 'growth is bad, turn off the switch.' There is no policy that works along those lines.

The policy has to be about creating the conditions for a good quality of life, and making the economics of that work.”

But some critics may say you would need to sacrifice welfare in the short run and that would be very traumatic for many people.

“It is also why you have to have the flexibility in government to do such social investments. You need those to protect people in need and to put them in places where they can be reskilled. It is very clear there would be losers: Very rich people who had it good for so long do not want that to stop. They do not want the party to be over. You have to have strong political leadership to say that the level of inequality is unacceptable and financial markets are dysfunctional. Governments do not really have a lot of weapons in that fight.

The two weapons they do have are enormous public support and the concept of social investments.”

Is this affordable for the developing countries?

“I do not know. It is an argument mainly for the rich economies. It seems very clear to me that the poorest countries in the world do need growth. But if developing countries are embedded in the same eco-

nomic system that relies on materialistic and relentless growth, that is actually not improving conditions. If that is the system the developing countries are relying on, then it, too, has to change. A post-growth economy is as important for developing countries as it is for the richer economies.

It just has to happen in a different way and on a different time scale.”

In 1972, The Club of Rome presented an influential book called “The Limits to Growth” right here at the St. Gallen Symposium. It seems like we haven’t made much progress over the last four decades.

Why are you still optimistic about finding a solution?

“I am partly optimistic, because economic growth in advanced nations is already running out of capacity. I think that realisation gives us hope, because it is not a bunch of people saying ‘Slow down! We are damaging the environment.’ It is actually the economy that says, ‘wait – where is the growth?’ Hence, there is room for a new conversation, and one that was not possible in the same way before.”

You have been very critical about the Western lifestyle and our appetite for consumption. What steps can people take to foster sustainable growth?

“There is always something that individuals can do. There are alternatives, but some of the alternatives have to be

organised at a structural level. Individual people cannot just do the whole task by choosing to be different, because they are locked in a social, economic, and financial system. That is totally outside individual control. That makes people think, 'I cannot do anything, I am just going to go on living my life.' That does not work either. It is possible to do things. Any individual can ask questions, vote with their spending patterns against those companies who create working conditions that are unsustainable, and make choices in their own life about their recreation.”

And how do you practice what you preach?

“By walking from the symposium to the Einstein Hotel. It is absolutely wonderful, far better than waiting for a limousine to carry you through the traffic to go there. Walking is one of those things that is healthy for the individual and better for the planet, and it can be very enjoyable under the right circumstances. You can choose not to be embedded in this destructive consumerist system. But because not everybody has that access, part of the job is to create the infrastructure to enable people to have more fun and less stuff.” u

27

WILD WEST – There are examples of growth everywhere you look. What makes them good or bad? And how can a concept like growth be ugly?

GERMÁN R. PÁEZ (TEXT)

Tanveer Ahmad (IN), Student at the University of Delhi, 26 "Sweden recently started experimenting with reducing working hours. They started with retirement homes, reducing the nurses’ working hours to six. Employees are happy and more efficient; patients are also happy because they are receiving better service."

Christopher Bishop (NZ), Member of the New Zealand Parliament, 32 "We New Zealanders pride ourselves on our clean and green image, which brings a lot of tourists. Coming out of the financial crisis, more people are moving to New Zealand and visiting New Zealand. If Donald Trump wins the [US] presidency, we are expecting a big influx."

GROWTH: DEFINING THE TERMS

Luca Visentini (IT), General Secretary of ETUC (European Trade Union Confederation), 47 "The Baltic countries – Latvia, Lithuania, and bigger countries like Poland – are an example of bad growth in Europe. They have an A level of growth in terms of GDP, but at the same time they increased inequality, precariousness in the labour market and social unrest."

Justine Kolata (US), Founder of The Public Sphere, 26 "I think growth can be bad when the ends of growth are not properly communicated.

So, if we do not define as a society what 'to grow' means, then there is no point to growth. What is necessary, is basic form of communication among citizens."

Cheng Zihao (CN), Student at Beijing Foreign Studies University, 24 "I went to India last year. Although the environmental situation is terrible, the government is promoting smart cities.

At first I thought it was ridiculous. But it makes sense: In Europe, if they want to replace their infrastructures to upgrade the metro stations, it would take them a lot of time. In India, if they want to develop a metro station, they can do it from scratch with the best technology available today."

Hanna Jaff (MX), Founder of the Jaff Foundation for Education, 29 "Cartels in Mexico use people who are just struggling for a better life. They take advantage of vulnerable migrants travelling to the US. They assault them, they rob them, they rape and kidnap them, or they use them as slaves. That would be an ugly case of people getting rich at the expense of others."

28

I DREAM OF GINI – The relationship between growth and income inequality is not as clear as once thought, but economists say equal opportunity is an important goal for developing economies.

DO INCOME GAPS SLOW GROWTH?

DANIELLE KEETON-OLSEN (TEXT)

In 2015, the World Economic Forum declared income inequality the top issue for global policy makers. Though political and business leaders might not worry too much about paying the bills each month, an uneven distribution of wealth has an impact on even the wealthiest business owners and politicians. If a high per centage of a population is scraping by on low wages, there are fewer people fuelling a nation’s economy.

In the 1950s and 1960s, economist Simon Kuznets theorised that as a nation grew its economy, income inequality would grow, peak and eventually decrease as the economy became more advanced.

But the correlation between economic development and income inequality is not so clearly cut, says Danny Leipziger, Managing Director of Growth Dialogue, an organisation aimed at promoting sustainable economic development. The concept of income inequality takes different shapes, depending on the nation’s economic development level, he said.

DEVELOPING WITH EQUALITY IN MIND Emerging economies, such as Brazil and South Africa, generally have the most unequal household incomes, according to a recent report on income inequality by the

OECD. Economies in Mexico, Chile and Turkey – which are still considered emerging markets – have closed some of the gap among citizens’ income, according to Mari Kiviniemi, Deputy Secretary-General for the OECD. However, those countries still have a relatively high Gini coefficient, a statistical method for determining income inequality. (The higher a nation’s Gini coefficient, the more unequal its people’s income.)

Nonetheless, Leipziger argues, a poor nation’s primary focus should be bringing some of the population out of poverty, rather than income equality. Take China, for instance: Income inequality has increased greatly in the nation since the Chinese Communist Party launched reforms to liberalise its economy. “If you were a rural farmer and now you’re a construction worker in Shanghai and your income went up dramatically, the fact that somebody else is doing better than you’re doing is not as disturbing,” Leipziger explains. “Your absolute position has improved a lot.”

INEQUALITY IN ADVANCED ECONOMIES Income inequality is a different matter for the advanced economies of the US and European countries. Inequality in the

29

Illustration: Silvan Borer

I DREAM OF GINI

US has advanced as the middle class has diminished. About 40 years ago, more than two-thirds of Americans fell into the middle class. Today, the country is more polarised: The middle class makes up just half of the US population, while the size of the lower and upper classes have increased, according to a Pew Research study. In European nations, on the other hand, aging populations and high unemployment rates contribute to rising income inequality.

INHIBITING ECONOMIC GROWTH The OECD recently found that on average, increased income inequality correlates with a decrease in GDP growth. Yet among OECD nations, “the overall direction has been increasing inequality,” Kiviniemi says, an issue the organisation is trying to address. Inequality inhibits a nation’s growth prospects because the poorest individuals lose opportunities.

But stratified income rates can stem from different factors, some of which a nation’s government can control. “If income inequality is a function of lack of economic opportunity, a lot of people would say that’s a bad thing,” Leipziger says. Income inequality can also arise from pure luck, which might allow Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg to prosper while thousands of other innovators fall through the cracks.

CLOSING THE INCOME GAP Some governments, such as France and Brazil, have made attempts to redistribute income through taxes and transfers in order to bridge gaps in wealth. But the success of such efforts depends on how much tax revenue a nation is able to collect. “Poor countries don’t have that capacity,” Leipziger says. “They don’t have enough tax revenue. That needs to go into roads, not income redistribution.”

Both Leipziger and Kiviniemi said they believe equal access to education to be one of the best ways to bring the lowest-earning individuals closer to an equal plane.

The most useful education would prepare people for work in industries with new and plentiful middle class jobs. Kiviniemi said the OECD recommends se-veral steps to diminish the wage gap and lower a nation’s Gini coefficient, including increasing education availability, impro-ving gender equality and providing better health care.

All of the organisations’ re-commendations to create income equality are aimed at improving opportunities for all citizens.

“If you want to get the full potential of the resources of a country, equality is needed,” Kiviniemi said. u

30

TO-DO LIST BAROMETER – Dear Leaders of Today, please consider transforming your decision making process – the Leaders of Tomorrow will thank you, and so will your bottom line.

If everybody on your leadership team looks and thinks just like you do, you have a problem!

Involve a diverse group of people, especially your younger employees, in your decision making processes. Mix teams and bring together technically skilled younger employees with more experienced employees to improve decisions in your organisation.

If nobody knocked on your door to disagree with you in the last month, you really need to do something differently!

Be open-minded and actively invite radical and opposing ideas. Being open-minded means not only talking about having an open door for everyone but actively inviting people to challenge your decisions and bring in their ideas and proposals.

You have a responsibility to contribute to an economically, socially and environmentally more sustainable society!

Consider the impact and consequences of your decisions, including the unintended ones.

Mind ethical and social considerations and also care about the long-term consequences of your decisions.

Employees will give their best at a job when they are given ownership of a project!

Reduce hierarchy and be willing to delegate decisions to the next generation. Empower the young people in your organisation, recognise that hierarchy is often the problem, not the solution, and give people more decision-making autonomy.

Forget about past best practices and learn to use technology and analysis tools to handle today’s vast data volumes!

Use data and embrace new technology to make better decisions. Make more informed decisions based on information and sound analysis, instead of past experience.

Do you want to know more about what the Leaders of Tomorrow of the 46th St. Gallen Symposium think? You can download the new “Global Perspectives Barometer 2016” study by GfK Verein and the St. Gallen Symposium at www.symposium.org/barometer.

31

BETTER, FASTER, STRONGER ADMIT IT – However sweet the taste of success, the road to the top can get rocky at times. Amid all the growth and unbridled ambition, are symposium participants willing to talk about their struggles?

JOLIEN DE VRIES (TEXT)

Generation Y, born roughly between 1981 and 2000, is often characterised as a group of confident, highly educated and ambitious people. Focus on achievement is said to be a typical trait of the “millennial” generation, of which the Leaders of Tomorrow (LoTs) are definitely a part.

At the symposium, success stories are everywhere, but it is harder to find frank talk about the other side of the coin. Vulnerability, or tales of dealing with stress or anxiety seem to be taboo.

Some participants felt out of place in this atmosphere at first. On the first day of the symposium, a Ph.D. student talked about how he felt like an outsider in a one-on-one conversation with a journalist. “I don’t really understand why I was invited here,” he said in a soft voice.

‘SOFTEN THE FCK UP’ Is it a sign of weakness to admit feeling insecure at times? Ehon Chan, Executive Director of Social Entrepreneurship at the Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre, thinks not. This LoT from Malaysia is a strong supporter of sharing vulnerabilities in everyday life. He thinks it can prevent a lot of pain and can even save someone’s life.

Chan lived in Australia, where he started a campaign called “Soften the fck up” to get men to open up about their fee-lings.

The leading cause of death in Australia for males between the ages of 14 and 44 is suicide; by opening topics like anxiety or depression up for discussion, Chan hopes to reduce the number of suicides.

At the symposium, Chan noticed a difference in attitude between the speakers.

“It’s been interesting observing some of them. I think most Leaders of Today are okay with vulnerability,” Chan says. “With age comes wisdom, and being frank is maybe a part of that, although a few of the leaders are very polished. They still have the old school mentality that they have to look strong and perfect.”

Chan noticed two groups of people among the LoTs as well. “One part is more anxious and excited; they need to stand out above the crowd,” he says. “The other part of the group is here to meet people and wants to share things. I had great conversations with people who had, for example, struggles while writing their Ph.D.” FAILED ATTEMPTS On the last night of the symposium some of the LoTs talked about the bumps in the road they experienced in their careers.

Maybe it was because the symposium had come to an end, or because alcohol lowered some barriers, but people were opening up as the event wound down.

Still, they were reluctant to share doubts on the record.

A young entrepreneur talked about feeling depressed for weeks as a consequence of a mistake he made at work. Someone else said he felt relieved when, during a work session, the speaker mentioned the hundreds of failed attempts he had experienced before he finally succeeded. “Because of his honesty, it was the most valuable presentation I heard this week,” he said. u

32

LUKAS RAPP (TEXT & PHOTO)

“I think that there is far too much work done in the world, that immense harm is caused by the belief that work is virtuous, and that what needs to be preached in modern industrial countries is quite different from what always has been preached,” wrote philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell in his famous essay “In Praise of Idleness.” That was back in 1932, and his thoughts were about cutting working time from eight to four hours a day.

Today, eight hours is not a maximum but rather the minimum we spend at our work place. Participants at the St. Gallen Symposium explain how they distribute the 24 hours they have each day and how they would judge the time they have already invested looking back on their career.

Sleep

Work

Family

Leisure

#TIMELESS #LESSTIME

TIME – Time is one of the things in life we cannot really save, buy, trade or hold. There is no way to make the number of hours in the day grow. So how do people make use of the time they have?

Eating/Cooking

Other

0.5h “Although holding political office has dominated my life, when I look back years from now, I want to be able to say that my contribution to not only my state and my country, but the world was worth the sacrifices I’ve made.”

1.5h

JERAMEY ANDERSON (US) State Representative, Mississippi House of Representatives

3h

3h

33 6h

10h

2h

34 “Actually, a lot of time I had the wrong focus.

A lot of time I would have been able to spend more wisely.”

MILOŠ MILISAVLJEVIĆ (RS) Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Strawberry Energy

1h

2h 5h

2h

12h

2.5h “I think I made the right decision to take two years off from work to go to study at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. That was quite unconventional for a Japanese woman employed in the media. People said: 'What more do you want than being the presenter? Why do you want to study now?' But as a woman, surviving in the Japanese community, I thought I needed to sort of arm myself with the right knowledge to pursue my goals in the media. Because I felt somebody in the media needs to have a big picture of whats happening in the world today.”

AIKO DODEN

35

2.5h

1h 5h

(JP), Senior Commentator, NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation)

3h

10h

36

13h “As a politician you need to be really involved. I think I cannot keep this up for too long. Maybe 10 or 15 years.”

2h

SARAH TURINE

2h

1.5h

(BE), Deputy Mayor of Molenbeek, Brussels

6h

1h

37

0.5h 10h “I try to have my fun on the weekends. That’s what keeps my mind healthy. My work depends a lot on creativity and being fresh. I do exercise every day and hang out with my friends every weekend. Many of the people here [at the symposium] say they spend too much time working. I think they would be more efficient if they got out of their labs or offices a little bit more.”

2h

VICTOR SERDIO

2.5h

(JP) Co-Founder & Chief Technological Officer, Mursla Nanosensors

3h

6h

38

12h “I think a lot people here at the conference talk about millennials and how the work-life balance merges. There isn’t a balance. You make work your life.”

2h

ADAM BRADFORD

2h

2h

(UK) Managing Director, Adam Bradford Private Consulting Ltd

6h

0h

39 11h “Getting the right balance between work and family is always challenging. I think the biggest challenge is being able to set aside dedicated time for my family. For work I have a diary where I’ve set aside meetings and appointments with certain people or particular tasks, but I haven’t done the same with my family. So if something comes up for work, it is often the family that has to suffer. Moving forward, I want to become much better in dedicating family time.”

2h

JAMIE TUUTA

1h 2h

(NZ) Maori Trustee & Chief Executive Officer, Te Tumu Paeroa

1h 7h

40

9h “I have never been a workaholic. I am not one of these people who focus my life on work. I need to spend time with my family and have time for reading.�

4h

MARTIN FORD

2h

(US), Entrepreneur & Author, Solutionsoft

2h 8h

0h

41

11h “I am about to turn 53, and at 50 you start thinking: 'Ouch, not so much more left.' I wrote my dissertation in my early 30s and had my first job in my mid 30s.

You see yourself at the beginning of life and you think everything is possible; soon you are 50 and just think: 'Wow, what is left?' I spent my time in the past a bit disoriented. More systematic leadership skills and management skills would have helped, rather than learning by trial and error. Because mistakes hurt. But I don’t regret that much. I am looking forward.”

1.5h

MATHIS WACKERNAGEL (CH/US) President, Global Footprint Network

2h 1.5h

1.5h 6h

42

THE HIDDEN COSTS OF STUDENT DEBT PAYING UP – Education is one key to success. But carrying a big student debt load after graduation can have a big impact on personal spending, career choices – and economic growth.

However, free education for all remains a utopian ideal not even Leaders of Today and Tomorrow say they want.

SUSANN EBERLEIN (TEXT)

Jeramey Anderson enjoyed getting together with Leaders of Today and Tomorrow at the St. Gallen Symposium. But on the very last day, he had to rush home: His graduation from Tulane University in New Orleans was just hours after the last panel discussions and Work Sessions in Switzerland were set to wrap up. Anderson is 24 years old, African-American, son of a single mom, successful in college – and has a student loan debt of USD 25,000.

Because they usually pay for college education themselves, most US students start their careers hugely indebted – especially with the increase in tuition fees over the last decades. According to analysis

by Edvisors, a college cost and financial aid consultancy, the class of 2015 has to shoulder the highest student debt load in US history: On average, a student has USD 35,000 in loans.

That is no joke, neither for them nor for the economy. Student loan debt makes it less likely one will buy a car or a house,

start a business or begin a family. This has negative consequences for economic growth, which is mainly based on consumerism. “Students with a large student debt load have much less freedom.

Because of that, they might not go for a Ph.D., for example, or are not willing to try out entrepreneurial work. This leads to further self-reinforcing differentiation between rich and poor,” says Monika Bütler, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the University of St. Gallen. Increasing inequality between social classes may hinder economic growth as well.

So should tuition fees be abolished in order to give everybody the chance to go to college without debt? Anderson, who is not only a new graduate student but also a State Representative in Mississippi, mainly focuses on education in his political career. But even he does not think college should be completely free, “because you might not value it as much as do you when you pay a fee,” he says.

43

Illustration: Silvan Borer

PAYING UP

Bütler also has her doubts when it comes to free education for students. Nothing, after all, is free: Anything students do not pay has to be covered by taxpayers. “Some cost sharing may be required. This is also a psychological factor,” Bütler says. “Firstly, the universities have to compete to attract good students. Secondly, it is also an incentive for students to make an effort.

Making a contribution to their own education pushes their self-esteem.”

However, Bütler is against high, almost unaffordable tuition fees to avoid the increase of inequality between social classes. “You must always be careful that motivated, intelligent people who are less rich are not left behind.”

GLOBAL DEBT Student debt is not just an American or European phenomenon. To protest rising school fees, South African students demonstrated in October 2015, both on the street and on social media. At the same

time, We Think Code was born in Johannesburg to provide equal access to education. It is the first tuition-free programming academy in Africa.

With two online games and a four-week boot camp during the selection period, the academy certainly is not for everyone. “Only one per cent makes it,” admits Co-Founder Arlene Mulder. But by opening the application process up to people up to 35 years old, whether they have a high school diploma or not, We Think Code aims to provide an opportunity to talented programmers-to-be-regardless of previous education or socio-economic background. “The logical thinking and the ability to find solutions is equally distributed, but the ability to attend school and have social mobility is not,” Mulder says.

The academy combines two goals: Making education accessible and affordable, on the one hand, and moving South Africa forward when it comes to coding on the other.

Next to initiatives like We Think Code, scholarships can help to avoid huge debts. “But students don’t apply,” Anderson points out. “They have to take initiative, and their parents do, too. It’s not going to kill you to invest in your kid’s education and future.” Anderson benefited from a scholarship: His first two years in college, at Pearl River Community College in Mississippi, were partly paid for with a soccer scholarship. He could have kept it – but decided to attend Tulane to earn his Bachelor’s degree in Homeland Security instead.

While he plans to pay off USD 50 per month to reduce his student debt step by step – and to tap a US programme that gives relief from student debt for people doing public service work after graduation – Anderson does not feel his debt is holding him back. For him, USD 25,000 does not feel like a burden.

“Not that small amount of money,” he says, laughing. u

44

A SNAPSHOT OF WORLD GROWTH WHERE GROWTH – Growth takes many shapes throughout the world, and most nations are seeing some form of change and expansion.

Though growth and development continuously shift, below is a snapshot of how nations and their people have grown by 2016.

DANIELLE KEETON-OLSEN (TEXT)

More and more people are reading news, watching videos and checking social media, with both

INTERNET AND SMART PHONE

usage increasing, especially in emerging economies, in the past two years.

SOURCE: Pew Research

University students: pack your bags and head for

GERMANY OR MALAYSIA!

The two nations are expected to receive an influx of study abroad students, thanks to their policies, regulations, and the quality of their institutions.

SOURCE: Report by the British Council’s Going Global 2016 conference

2 /3

Asia may represent about 30 per cent of the world’s landmass, but

ASIA PACIFIC

the region alone is expected to account for nearly two-thirds of global economic growth.

SOURCE: International Monetary Fund’s Regional Economic Outlook report

World unemployment rates have generally decreased since 2010, from 6.11 per cent to 5.93 per cent in 2014. But the greatest decline has affected those with high incomes, who have overall seen a

ONE-PER CENTAGE

point drop in unemployment between 2010 and 2014.

SOURCE: World Bank

45 WHERE GROWTH

The rate of inflation is expected to slowly grow from 2.82 per cent in 2016 to 3.17 per cent in 2020. In 2011 inflation rates reached a recent

By 2050, there will be about

24 CENTENARIANS – or those who live to see their 100th birthday – for every 10,000 people aged 65 and older; that is a dramatic increase from the 2015 rate of 7.4 centenarians per 10,000 senior citizens.

PEAK OF 5.05 PER CENT. SOURCE: Statista

SOURCE: Pew Research

GROW SWIFTLY, pollution

As cities

does as well. Outdoor pollution has grown eight per cent in the past five years.

Emerging cities – primarily in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and the western Pacific – are the biggest offenders.

SOURCE: The Guardian

JOB Of the children in primary school today, an estimated

65 PER CENT

will work in jobs that do not yet exist, according to a report by the World Economic Forum.

SOURCE: World Economic Forum

China now leads the world in foreign direct investment by more than

USD 150 BILLION

, outdoing the United States, which in 2013 had been a close competitor to China’s burgeoning international economy.

SOURCE: World Bank

ISLAM

At a 73 per cent increase, will grow at a rate twice as fast as the overall population growth rate between 2010 and 2050, according to predictions by Pew Research. The number of members of almost every major religion, with the exception of

BUDDHISM

, are predicted to increase by 2050 as well.

SOURCE: Pew Research

46

MAERSK – In a market plagued by overcapacity, the container shipping giant Maersk aims to defend its position as market leader. To this end, CEO Nils Smedegaard Andersen wants his company to grow – even in times of deteriorating profits.

RUBEN DIELEMAN & TILL DALDRUP (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

Mr Andersen, even though the container shipping market suffers from overcapacity, your company decided to grow and ordered new vessels in 2015. Why? “Our goal is to grow with the market and that means that we’ll occasionally need new capacity. People are talking a lot about stagnation, but in fact the container market is still growing. So that’s why we ordered new boats.”

A lot of Maersk’s competitors decided to merge with other companies or even downsized.

“None of our competitors decided to shrink, at least not to my knowledge.

There have been mergers, and mergers only shrink if you actually scrap vessels.

In fact, at the moment, there is an order book of around 20 per cent of the global fleet. And the biggest order books are held by the Chinese players.”

IN ROUGH WATERS That seems problematic, given that there is already surplus capacity.

“The biggest problem is that the people who are not making any money keep investing – sometimes with the backing of government loans, because the government wants to fill the shipyards. So there is a tendency of unnecessary capacity flowing into the market from companies that normally would not be able to buy vessels. And we assume that this trend is going to continue.”

CONNECTING THE WORLD Maersk owns roughly three million standard shipping containers. Laid end-to-end, they would stretch 18,000 kilometres, which is three times the distance between Paris and New York.

Source: http://www.alphaliner.com/top100/index.php, own calculations

47 MAERSK

NILS SMEDEGAARD ANDERSEN (57) Being the CEO of the Maersk group, one of the world’s largest container shipping companies, Maersk is involved in a wide range of activities in the shipping, logistics, and the oil and gas industries.

The Maersk Group is a global conglomerate active in more than 130 countries, with its headquarters in Copenhagen. The company was founded by sea captain Peter Mærsk Møller and his son Arnold Peter Møller as the “A/S Dampskibsselskabet Svendborg” (“steamship company Svendborg”). Today, Maersk owns the world’s largest container shipping company and has a workforce of 89,000 people.

You are also involved in oil drilling. Would you still invest in oil at this point?

“In my opinion, oil can still be a profitable investment. But I would not make any adventurous investments.”

As a CEO, you have to make decisions that affect your company years into the future.

Do you sometimes feel like you are on a huge ocean liner that is hard to navigate?

“Of course we have to take decisions that have really long-term consequences.

That is the way the company is built, we think. I would not say that it is difficult to navigate. You just have to understand: Once you set a course you have your assets – and you are going to have them for a long time.” u

Illustration: Silvan Borer

Last year your company had to issue a profit warning. In the first quarter 2016 your net profit was down 95 per cent compared to the year before. What makes you optimistic about the container market?

“The profit warning was a result of a strong deterioration in oil prices and a strong decline in shipping rates. That’s why we did not grow as much as we thought in the beginning of 2015. But these are just things that come to us from the outside. We are optimistic because we think trade will continue to grow, albeit at relatively low rates compared to the past. But we still think it is an interesting growth market.”

48

CATALYSTS – can affect the social and economic growth of a country positively. These three Leaders of Tomorrow founded their own start-ups and try to contribute to their countries in their own way.

ANNA-LENA SACHS (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP & DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTOS)

LET’S GET SOMETHING GROWING What is the start-up about?

Miloš Milisavljevic (1988) Strawberry Energy Based in Serbia Founded in 2011 Eight employees

Fabian Dudek (1992) Nestpick Based in Germany Founded in 2014 Forty employees

Victor Serdio (1984) Mursla Nanosensors Based in France Founded in 2014 Five employees

What is your goal?

Strawberry Energy is trying to make cities smarter and more responsive to the needs of modern generations. For example, they have developed smart street furniture that enables people to recharge their phones with solarpowered energy.

“We are trying to improve cities that did not change much in the last 100 years by providing technologies that will make our outdoor spaces more responsive and more valuable to you in the 21st century.”

Nestpick wants to simplify the process of renting and letting long-term homes entirely online. At first, the booking platform was geared towards international students, but now they also want to be a solution for other people in need of a new home.

“Our goal is really to solve the problem. We measure that with the Net Promoter Score we have: If our NPS is higher than that of any other housing solution, then we are solving the problem.”

Mursla Nanosensors is developing nano chips for the early detection and correct diagnosis of different types of cancer with liquid biopsies that can be as small as one drop of blood.

“We are focusing on the detection of proteins for biomarkers for cancer. We are in a very early stage right now. We are trying to have a consumer product, which would be something small that you can buy in a pharmacy. You would put a drop of blood in this chip and it will be able to tell what type of cancer you have.”

49 CATALYSTS

“THAT CONVICTION IS VERY IMPORTANT.” FELIX ZHANG, SHANGHAI-BASED TECHNOLOGY START-UP INVESTOR AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF ENVISION ENERGY

“The number one question an entrepreneur needs to ask himself or herself is: Are you creating value? Are you solving a real problem? If not, if you are just a copycat, then I think you are probably doing the wrong thing. That conviction is very important.”

Where are you now?

How are you contributing to the growth of your country?

“THE START-UP MOVEMENT CREATES NEW JOBS”

GRACE SAI, FOUNDER OF THE ENTREPRENEURIAL CO-WORKING SPACE HUB SINGAPORE “If we look at the economy, the start-up movement creates new jobs, it increases taxes, it also applies pressure to policy and to educational systems to upgrade the skills of the current generation and the future workforce for the future economy. With robotics and artificial intelligence, the skills that are in today’s workforce are not going to be sufficient for the next economy.”

What are some advantages/ disadvantages you encountered creating a start-up in your country?

“We are now in eight countries across Europe and 16 different cities.

We are partially self-funded and partially funded by investors.”

“In terms of numbers we are small, but I think in terms of image and innovation we are helping.”

“There are a lot of disadvantages because the start-up ecosystem is relatively young. So there are not too many investors, not too many mentors, and not too much experience in the area.

The advantage may be that you have really talented people that can work with you.”

“We received USD 14 million. We want to be able to help when you are looking locally for a new place.

Right now it happens entirely online. We are integrating some viewing that still makes the process efficient.”

“I would like to show and give a German example of not being driven by profit but by something bigger and therefore actually achieving bigger profits. When you think about the greatest companies that you know, at least when I think about them, they all have this bigger goal and profit is always just a consequence.”

“There is not yet enough experience and the right mind-set among investors, as well as people who can tell you how they did it.”

“Our budget is very low and we want to stay like that until we finalise the proof of concept. We have some investors that want to chip in with high-risk investments, but of course high-risk means high equity and we do not want that.

We prefer to operate with a low profile.”

“Ever since I started my company, I have been in talks with the university where I did my Bachelor in Mexico. I am trying to establish an exchange programme to bring students to work with us and also get a Masters or Ph.D.”

“I am working with my university in Japan as a private research fellow. In Japan the infrastructure for developing technologies is amazing. They have the best equipment.”

50

LIGHT IT UP

51

LIGHT IT UP – As the Burning Man Festival has grown over the past 30 years, so has criticism of the event.

The increasing numbers of wealthier attendees, exclusive desert camps, and other status symbols threaten to disrupt the event’s atmosphere of dusty decommodification and radical inclusion.

IS BURNING MAN UNDER FIRE?

ANNA-LENA SACHS (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

Larry Harvey likes to tell the story of the Burning Man attendee who set up his newly-purchased gear neatly, hoping to impress his wife with the perfect campsite for the week-long festival. Moments after his spot was ready, the strong wind that is typical for the Black Rock Desert in Nevada began to rage.

As his tent blew away, “he collapsed on his knees,” recalls Harvey, the Burning Man Festival’s Co-Founder. The man thought he had lost everything and could not attend the festival in the way he had hoped.

Other Burning Man participants, socalled burners, watched this debacle take place and quickly asked around for replacements. Soon they were able to reassemble his equipment with the help and gifts of other burners. “He went from despair to feeling very moved,” says the 68-year-old Harvey.

This is an example of the gifting that is one of the ten principles Harvey set up to guide and reflect the communal philosophy of Burning Man. Other principles are focused on radical inclusion, radical self-

reliance, and leaving no trace of waste in the desert. The first traits of this ethos were developed in 1986, when Harvey and a friend first burned a figure made out of wood on a San Francisco beach. What started in San Francisco would develop into an annual art and community festival with 70,000 participants.

After almost 30 years, the non-profit Burning Man project still generates a temporary community in the desert. In recent years, however, the festival’s philosophy – based on gift giving, decommodification and communal effort – has come under fire.

POPULAR AMONG THE RICH According to a 2014 New York Times article, Burning Man has become increasingly popular among the rich and especially among Silicon Valley’s tech elite. In recent years, several articles have reported incidents where these wealthier attendees have created exclusive camps without engaging with other burners, which contradicts the Burning Man ethos.

“People accused us of giving these people special privileges,” says Harvey. But the main problem seems to be their lack of participation – by creating select communities, these festival attendees apparently do not actively contribute to the community itself.

“Mostly I feel sorry for them, because they have missed the whole point of the experience – it cannot be very rewarding,” Harvey says. To circumvent the creation of exclusive camps, organisers have set up a regulation that obliges burners who want a fixed spot to be a theme camp. “They have to go through us and in fact the people that supply them have to go through us,” says Harvey.

Theme camps have to offer a communal area and be visually inspiring. “You have to interact with people who come by, you have to give something to anyone who comes by – that is radical inclusion,” Harvey says of the theme camps. While they are not required to actively invite burners to come to their camp, they have to be open to the public. ↦

52 LIGHT IT UP

GOBI BURNERS The idea of Burning Man is gaining popularity worldwide, which is why similar events are on the increase.

Leader of Tomorrow Yanjaa Altansuh plans to set up a similar Burning Man event on a small scale in Mongolia’s Gobi Desert in July. “We just want to experience the radical self-expression movement in a country like Mongolia,” she says. With a maximum of 100 attendees, Altansuh’s event is a test run – but if it all works out, she can imagine organising it annually.

The event still seems to attract primarily people with money. The Burning Man census of 2015, which is a research project that provides data on the event’s participants, shows that 17 per cent of burners make USD 50,000 to USD 74,999; 8.1 per cent earn between USD 150,000 and USD 299,999.

Indeed, the census suggests not everyone can afford a week in the desert: “Burners on average spent USD 1,973.03 on all expenses.” Since nothing except ice and coffee can be bought or sold at the event, participants have to buy equipment and supplies to last a whole week, as well as a USD 390 Burning Man ticket. (To make the event more affordable, the organisers provide 4,000 low-income tickets for USD 190, according to the Burning Man website.)

The sale of coffee and ice in a community based on gift giving and anti-commercialism has also been questioned. Harvey explains that Burning Man does not forbid the sale of commodities because they hate money. “Our critique of commerce is not that selling things is bad,” he says.

“We are saying consumerism that pushes aside community and culture is a bad thing.”

Specifically, the café is supposed to bring people together and get them to socialise over a cup of coffee, according to Harvey. It is a way for Burning Man to create social capital.

LACK OF DIVERSITY In spite of the Burning Man’s first principle of “radical inclusion,” the 2015 census reveals that the majority of the participants were white. Harvey argues that it is not their task to create a more racially diverse festival. “Radical inclusion does not say that we police for diversity,” says Harvey. “It was always mostly white people and white people tend to know other white people.” He explains further that radical inclusion implies that one has to accept and welcome strangers – not actively recruit them.

Nevertheless, Harvey believes racial diversity among the burners is undergoing a change at the moment. The census data confirms his perception: In 2014, 87 per cent of burners were white. That number has dropped to 80.2 per cent in 2015, according to the census.

Despite criticism, the popularity of the festival continues to increase. “We want to see it grow so that it can support socialisation on a larger scale,” says Harvey who still attends the festival every year. u

ZUCKERBERG ON THE PLAYA KEITH SPENCER, A BAY-AREA-BASED JOURNALIST, ATTENDED BURNING MAN IN 2010. LAST YEAR, HE WROTE AN ARTICLE FOR JACOBIN MAGAZINE CALLED “WHY THE RICH LOVE BURNING MAN,” WHICH WENT VIRAL. Spencer noticed that the exclusive camps created by the wealthier festival participants upset many of the regular burners. He explains that burners usually go to the desert, look out for themselves, build their own artwork and embrace the festival’s principle of radical self-reliance. “But now you start seeing in the Bay Area around that time of the year advertisements where people want to hire help,” says Spencer, “so they do not have to do any work.”

Although festival organisers try to prevent exclusive camps of wealthier burners, Spencer believes that “there is this economic interest for the non-profit to have millionaires there because if they like it, they donate a lot of money to Burning Man.” This can partly explain why the event tolerates them. But why do the rich love Burning Man? “Even though it is supposedly non-commercial, it has become a PR tactic,” explains Spencer. After last year’s festival, reporters covered Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s appearance at the event, where he handed out free food. Though the gift giving that Spencer experienced in 2010 among regular burners seemed genuine, he says this gifting can be used for branding, too.

Burning Man seems to be so popular among the Silicon Valley elite that they have created their own festival called “Further Future.” “It is just like Burning Man but with really rich people,” explains Spencer; a recent Guardian article referred to the festival as “Burning Man for the 1%.”

53

THE BATTLE OF A LIFETIME GET INVOLVED – Kenyan social activist Boniface Mwangi is restless when it comes to his fight for real democracy and putting power in the hands of young people.

NATASHA R. SILVA (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

Boniface Mwangi’s path towards social activism was bumpy. After working as a photojournalist for four years and winning several awards, he suddenly decided to give it all up.

It was December 2008, and the timing was far from perfect: Mwangi was recently married and did not have any savings in the bank. However, the change was imperative. Just a year before, between December 2007 and February 2008, a wave of violence spread across Kenya after a disputed presidential election. Mwangi reported on the clashes for The Standard newspaper.

The conflict was finally solved, leaving more than 1,000 people dead and about 600,000 displaced. Mwangi went back to his regular work, but was haunted by the pictures he had taken. “I could not stand politicians at that particular time, and my job was to go and take pictures of them,” he recalls. Feeling like he could not take it anymore, he turned to social activism to transform his country.

“As a journalist you inform. But as an activist you can do more than talk, you can try and change the problem you talk about. That is what I am trying to do,” Mwangi says.

Since 2011, he has led Pawa 254, a creative hub in Nairobi that connects young people from different backgrounds to promote social change through art. “It is not only about using your art to make money. Money is good to make, but it is also about speaking out against poverty and inequality,” Mwangi says.

However, it is not that simple to make those changes happen. Mwangi admits that, like many young people, when he started to be an activist he was very anxious to see the results of his work. Now he knows that meaningful changes take a while to happen. “Those are battles of a lifetime. I was a little naïve then. I thought everything was going to happen like this [snaps his fingers]. But it doesn’t happen that fast. Change is a very slow, painful process. I learned how to be patient the hard way,” he says with a smile.

Mwangi still has a lot of patience left. The former photojournalist turned social activist feels like his battle to change Kenya is far from over. The same goes for his career changes. First photojournalist, then activist, next – politician? “I think there is a need to find ways to work from within the system,” he says. “So maybe in a few years I will be working as a lawmaker. It’s something I am still thinking about.”

For Mwangi, everything is part of a personal struggle. Having grown up in a poor family, he says that he has seen and felt the consequences of bad government up close.

Now that he has fought for himself, Mwangi feels it is time to make a better life for his three children. “I feel that if I don’t fight my battles right now, my kids will be forced to fight. So I have to pay the price for them,” he says. That is why he is urging the youth of Kenya to join him: “We should stop leaving politics to the old men. And it is especially the old men,” he says Those men are not worried about the future. So let’s not leave politics to them, let’s get involved!” u

54

THE HIDDEN COST OF VIOLENCE WAGES OF WAR – Violence is present worldwide, in the form of crime, terrorism and war. But can we assess its influence on the global economy? Four participants at the St. Gallen Symposium explain the repercussions of conflict.

ELÍAS CAMHAJI & DANIELLE KEETON-OLSEN (TEXT)

Images of conflicts emerge on our screens day after day, depicting the remains of bombed buildings, people screaming as they cradle a blood-soaked relative or friend, or others, reduced to skin-covered skeletons, searching through the dust and debris of the street that once held shops and businesses. The images are evocative, but it still can be difficult to understand the gravity and impact of violence in another nation, especially when you see these images from a laptop or newspaper in a peaceful country.

Sometimes numbers speak louder than words. In 2014, violence cost the world’s economy USD 14.3 trillion, according to the Global Peace Index. That was approximately 15.3 per cent of the global GDP. Conversely, the most relevant costs can sometimes not be expressed in numbers.

Violence and conflicts have economic and political repercussions that are eventually felt by almost every nation, taking the form of border and military security, human life and social costs, loss of trade and business, and the impact on international relations.

BORDER SECURITY AND MILITARY EXPENDITURES “When I started in 2010–2011 and we were talking about terror, we understood it as a theoretical concept,” says Markus Seiler, Head of the Swiss Federal Intelli-

gence Service. “Terrorism was something that happened elsewhere.”

For Seiler, the 2011 terrorist attack at a youth summer camp in Norway shifted his thinking on terrorism in Europe. “Terrorism can happen even though you think it never can happen,” he says. As terrorist activity heightens throughout Europe, most governments are taking preventative measures in case of possible attacks within their borders. By the end of January 2016, France was spending nearly EUR 1 million per day on heightened security.

And Switzerland, a historically neutral country, has added terrorism response and prevention to its national policies.

“We have to accept that this very challenging strategic environment around Europe is not going to go away,” Seiler says.

HUMAN AND SOCIAL COSTS Recent international and domestic conflicts have yielded the highest number of forcibly displaced people since the Second World War. The UN estimated last year that nearly 60 million people have had to flee their homes due to violence. This translates to grief, human rights violations, loss of opportunities at education for migrants, and decline of human capital that is critical for the reconstruction of the conflict areas. “The social cost of war should be the very first costs that people factor in, just because these civilians are

55 WAGES OF WAR

trapped in the frontlines. It is very important to bring this reality to the forefront,” says Bruno Stagno Ugarte, Deputy Executive Director for Advocacy of Human Rights Watch.

LOSS OF TRADE AND BUSINESS When it comes to business, violence endangers many investments and trade prospects. War has been seen historically as a factor that triggers economic activity and its benefits, supposedly stimulating the development of technology, industrial production and employment. However, recent studies show that the lack of social and political stability discourages both foreign and local entrepreneurs. It also reduces the redistributive gains of trade, affecting employment and stagnating the economy. In 2010, a year after the terrorist group Boko Haram started military operations, foreign direct investment flows to Nigeria plummeted by 21 per cent – a loss of almost two billion dollars, according to the World Investment Report. “Violence implies a danger for your assets. You can never know if one day there might be a revolution or political turbulence and your

investment will be gone,” says impact investor and speaker at the symposium, Antonis Schwarz.

IMPACT ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Even a civil war leaves repercussions felt by surrounding regions, if not the entire world. Refugees become a very noticeable indicator that an insular conflict has made a multinational impact. Violent conflicts are a unifying force among nations, causing nations to come together and create multinational organisations such as the United Nations. However, countries not party to the conflict often do not have the tools or knowledge necessary to adequately address the nature of the problem, according to Charles Thépaut, Political Advisor of the North Africa and Middle East Directorate for the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development. “Everybody talks about the root cause of a crisis, but the problem in the international conversation is that it is often so far away and the consequences are so close to you that you can only target the end results and not the source of the problem,” Thépaut explained. u

13.4% GDP lost due to violence

86.6%

Global GDP

VIOLENCE HINDERS GROWTH The impact of violence on the global economy is estimated at USD 14.3 trillion, or 13.4 per cent of global GDP. This is equivalent to the combined economies of Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom.

Cost of violence in % (spending for security, military, cost of crime and violence), data for 2014 Source: Global Peace Index Report 2015

56

BATTLING OVER BORDERS FRONTEX FACE-OFF – Fabrice Leggeri, Executive Director of Frontex and Bruno Stagno Ugarte, Deputy Executive Director for Advocacy of Human Rights Watch, sound off about an overwhelmed EU, reintroduced border checks and the national movements.

SUSANN EBERLEIN & NATASHA R. SILVA (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTOS)

FABRICE LEGGERI

Mr Leggeri, if you could swap jobs with Bruno Stagno Ugarte for one week, what would you like to do in his position?

Fabrice Leggeri: “I would like to ask if I can visit operations organised by the European Union. I would probably seek to meet the managers of these operations and take a look at the situation at the migrant reception centres.”

Is that because you think the criticisms of organisations like Human Rights Watch are too harsh?

Fabrice Leggeri: “The perspective of NGOs is fully justified. In a democratic system, we need to have people who criticise and raise questions. It is an incentive to do our job better. But the law enforcement perspective is also important because behind irregular migration flows we have criminal networks. It is extremely important

that NGOs understand that we have to be careful and need to act in order to not feed the crime business.”

Mr Ugarte, how about you? What would you like to do in the position of Frontex?

Bruno Stagno Ugarte: “What I would do is try to have Frontex mimic as much as possible what the Mare Nostrum operation was – a year-long programme to save refugees on the high seas that was pretty much operated by Italy alone. Frontex is a pan-European operation and has more resources than Mare Nostrum ever had.

So it should again be doing more search and rescue. And I would ensure that the registration process of refugees and asylum seekers is done in absolute coherence with the refugee convention, European law, and international obligations.”

57

FABRICE LEGGERI

BRUNO STAGNO UGARTE

So you think Frontex is not doing enough at the moment?

Bruno Stagno Ugarte: “Frontex is an operational body and operates according to the mandate that it was given. It has a legitimate role but, as it is conceived today, it is strengthening the concept of “Fortress Europe.” Mare Nostrum was about search and rescue first and foremost. Now, what we basically have is a maritime wall. And I think that it puts Europe in a shameful place. It doesn't really speak highly of a continent that is committed to integration, peace and tolerance.”

Mr Leggeri, does Frontex take the experience of Mare Nostrum into account?

Fabrice Leggeri: “Maybe the data is not up to date. We have tripled the budget for the Triton operation, which operates in the area between Italy and Libya. Last

year, we saved 60,000 migrants at sea.

We also contributed to more rescue operations with the help of satellite pictures to identify migrants at risk, for example.

The operational area has been extended to the southern boundary of the Maltese search and rescue area. That means that we now save people who are 250 kilometres away from the Italian coast. That is also risky for Frontex boats, because we face threats like organised crime and armed gangs.”

Some EU members are reintroducing border checks because of the numbers of refugees that want to enter their countries.

Is this the start of the collapse of the EU project?

Bruno Stagno Ugarte: “The fact that there are walls being built up both on land and sea is certainly not a good example ↦

FRONTEX FACE-OFF

“THE DUTY OF GOVERNMENTS IS TO SHOW THEIR CITIZENS THEY DELIVER.”

58 FRONTEX FACE-OFF

“THERE ARE TOO MANY POLITICIANS IN EUROPE WILLING TO USE THE POLITICS OF FEAR.” BRUNO STAGNO UGARTE

of what Europe stands for. No wall will provide so-called peace and safety. There were about 5,000 refugees that made the Arctic trek, going from Russia to Norway, in mid-winter. Are you going to build a wall all the way up to the Arctic Circle? Are you going to block the Strait of Gibraltar?

It is physically not doable, and it undermines the entire European project.”

Fabrice Leggeri: “The reintroduction of border checks slows down traffic. If trucks need two hours to cross the border between Italy and Austria and then again two hours from Austria to Germany, the economy and the European market cannot function properly. And this free market is one of the best achievements of the European Union. For Schengen countries it is extremely important to have free movement again. Next to the business consequences, there is also a consequence on the feelings citizens may have.

For example, if they travel less than they used to, step by step there is a kind of dismantling of the EU achievement and the feeling that we are all Europeans.”

Is Europe overwhelmed by the migration flow?

Bruno Stagno Ugarte: “The problem here is that Europe, and the world in general, were totally unprepared for this refugee flow coming from the Middle East and North Africa. We saw a failure of the mechanisms that were available. Little by

little, the EU has its mechanisms working again, but with very, very serious limitations and restrictions.”

Fabrice Leggeri: “One could say one million migrants in the EU is not that much compared to a population of more than 500 million. But we are not one single country. Each country has different needs and policies. We have to address the problems faced by some of the member states, but we also have to take into consideration that we have one single external border.

All these questions must be settled in a more harmonised and integrated way. My message is that we need more Europe.”

The rising popularity of nationalistic movements proves that a lot of Europeans do not agree with this message.

Fabrice Leggeri: “The problem is that, when the crisis started last year, people got the feeling that the system was no longer under control. The duty of national go-vernments is to show to their citizens that they deliver, that they are doing something in order to get this under control. That’s why national solutions sometimes seemed to be a more interesting option than European Union actions.”

What needs to be done in order to emphasise the positive impact refugees might have?

Bruno Stagno Ugarte: “What is fascinating and also depressing about the cur-

rent situation is that you have a number of people forgetting what happened in Hungary in 1956 or after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. People forget the fact that Western Europe opened its arms to receive Eastern Europeans, not worrying about if they were communist infiltrators.

So politicians – many of whom benefited from that European solidarity in the past – forget their own history, which is tragic.

Secondly, there are too many politicians in some European countries willing to use the politics of fear, thinking that way they can somehow outmanoeuvre the populist, nationalistic, and racist voices. That is a losing battle. Instead of holding to the values of the European project, they become hostages to right-wing views. It is a failed response. ” Fabrice Leggeri: “We cannot feed this populist approach. We now see in many member states that citizens do not trust the system anymore. We should be careful and deliver the right message. For me, the right message is that, in an organisation like Frontex, our job is to contribute to have a credible external border for the Schengen area. If we do not, the result is that member states reintroduce national border checks. Then, they encourage some citizens to believe that only national solutions are good options. But no single state in the EU can solve this problem alone.” u

59 FRONTEX FACE-OFF Asylum applicants per 10,000 inhabitants in the destination country <1 1–3 3–5 5–10

FI

10–20 >20

NO

SE

EE

Migratory Routes 10,000 25,000

LV DK

50,000

LT

100,000 IE

UK

PL

NL BE

Eastern Borders Route

DE LU

CZ

Illegal border crossings between 1 January and 30 June 2015 with border sections according to the migratory routes.

SK LI FR

AT

CH

SI

HU RO

HR

Black Sea Route IT

BG

ES

Western Mediterranean Route Source: Maximilian Dörrbecker (Chumwa) CC BY-SA2.0

Eastern Mediterranean Route

GR

PT

Apukia and Calabria Route

Central Mediterranean Route

CY Circular Route from Albania to Greece

60

DRIP, DRIP, DRIP – Politicians from Panama, Luxembourg and Switzerland reflect on the consequences of leaks in the last years, including laws providing for the automatic exchange of financial information and enhanced whistleblower’s rights.

GERMÁN R. PÁEZ & SARA ROSATI (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

HAVE THE PANAMA PAPERS TAUGHT US ANYTHING?

By the time the 46th St. Gallen Symposium took place, everyone had heard about the Panama Papers. The biggest leak of confidential information ever, with a total of 11.5 million documents, focused on the possible illegal activities of people using tax havens to stash cash. Over 300 journalists in 80 countries analysed documents detailing the operations of the Panamanian law firm and corporate service provider Mossack Fonseca.

“Why was Mossack Fonseca so keen about operating in Panama?” BBC journalist Stephen Sackur asked Panamanian Vice Minister of Finance Eyda Varela de Chinchilla. To Sackur, the answer is clear: “Panama’s system was so secretive and allowed money laundering to happen so easily that for them it was an extraordinary place to be.” “We are not a tax haven!” Varela said repeatedly, but she did not manage to convince Sackur. “Panama has become the home of thousands of secretive firms. It is in fact a heaven for financial ne’er-do-wells,” he concluded.

The Panama Papers might be the biggest leak ever; it is definitely not the first.

In 2010, WikiLeaks came out with 1.7 GB

of information about various political topics, from the Iraq War Logs to the US diplomatic cables. WikiLeaks was an inflection point. In 2013, the Offshore Leaks, the biggest hit against international tax fraud until that moment, were made public.

In 2014, the Luxembourg Leaks revealed confidential information about Luxembourg’s tax rulings. The Swiss Leaks spotlit a giant tax evasion scheme operated with the knowledge and encouragement of the HSBC Private Bank. The scale of the leaks and the increasing frequency with which they are published, have shaken global public opinion regarding tax havens.

But, what consequences did these massive information leaks have for the tax havens themselves? The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) implemented the Automatic Exchange of Information, which reduces the possibility of tax evasion. It provides for the exchange of non-resident financial account information with the tax authorities in the account holders’ country of residence, without having to send a specific request. Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and Luxembourg signed up for

61 DRIP, DRIP, DRIP

it. Last fall, Switzerland began the process of revising the Tax Administrative Assistance Act, which would implement some of the reforms the OECD is asking for.

Panama still refuses to sign. Varela claims: “We were committed to the bilateral exchange of information. But for security reasons we do not share information with all the countries.”

The Tax Justice Network said that Panama’s attitude represents a middle finger salute to the international community and the rule of law.

Banking secrecy disappeared in Switzerland in 2009 when – along with Luxembourg, Austria, Jersey, Guernsey, Singapore and Hong Kong – they decided to treat tax fraud and tax evasion the same way, under pressure from the G20 and the OECD. However, any bank employee violating a client's privacy could be punished quite severely by law.

“It is very difficult to open a bank account in Panama,” Varela argues. “Only 20% of the offshore companies in the Panama Papers were actually Panamanians.”

Sackur was not buying it. “What matters is not where the money is. What matters

is how the system works,” he replied. “And you have a system of financial regulation, of laws which facilitates this sort of international financial secrecy.”

NO COUNTRY FOR WHISTLEBLOWERS “I have watched as one after another, whistleblowers and activists in the United States and Europe have had their lives destroyed by the circumstances they find themselves in after shining a light on obvious wrongdoing,” reads a fragment from John Doe’s Manifesto, a letter published in the Süddeutsche Zeitung on May 6th where the Panama Papers’ anonymous whistleblower explained, under a pseudonym, why he/she leaked documents. Aware of the long list of whistleblowers forced to flee their countries in order to avoid prison – Julian Assange, Edward Snowden, Hervé Falciani – John Doe decided to remain in the shadows. In the manifesto he argues for worldwide protection of whistleblowers who help expose wrongdoing to the public.

It is an approach that Panama’s ViceMinister of Finance disagrees with. “It was private information from a private ↦

62 DRIP, DRIP, DRIP prosecutors called for them to spend 18 months in prison.

Bettel did push back against the idea that Luxembourg was hostile to whistleblowers. “Can you tell me how many countries have protection for whistleblowers in Europe? 5 out of 28. I would love it if we protect whistleblowers, other countries would go also in that direction,” said Bettel. (The law protects whistleblowers that help uncover money laundering, influence peddling and corruption, but it does not mention tax avoidance schemes.)

Jacques de Watteville, the State Secretary in the Swiss Federal Department of Finance, says whistleblowers’ protection is “an important topic.” Because it is being debated in the Swiss Parliament and under the jurisdiction of the Department of Justice, de Watteville had no official comment on the matter.

But Swiss prosecutors made clear that the Swiss Leaks case might not make a good foundation for a whistleblower’s law. During Falciani’s trial, they distinguished between cases where people leak

G B

IK

/W

1.7

S

11 20

EA KS

IL

20

10

documents for ethical reasons and cases where people steal documents to make money. Falciani, a former HSBC employee who leaked information about 130,000 tax evaders with accounts at the bank, peddled information to different banks before cooperating with the French government.

Swiss judges found the argument convincing: Falciani, who lives in exile in France, was given a five-year prison sentence by a Swiss court in 2015. The case has pushed Switzerland to grapple with the issue. “There is a project to implement new rules with the object to better protect whistleblowers which is currently being debated by parliament,” de Watteville says. u

GA TE

Source: ICIJ

LE

THE SCALE OF THE LEAK The Panama Papers include approximately 11.5 million documents – more than the combined total of Wikileaks, Offshore Leaks, LuxLeaks, and SwissLeaks.

Volume of data compared to previous leaks

CA B

company which should not have been released,” Varela said, right before saying that the Panamanian government may sue the whistleblower if his name eventually comes to light. “We have laws to protect those who denounce corruption. It is a different case if it is someone who steals information in order to sell it to everyone.”

It is a stand echoed by other politicians at the symposium when questioned about other leak cases, such as the socalled LuxLeaks and SwissLeaks, disclosed by whistleblowers in Luxembourg and Switzerland. “I was a criminal lawyer for eleven years and I personally believe there is a principle of personal secrecy. I think my customers would not be happy if I speak about their cases in public,” said Prime Minister of Luxembourg Xavier Bettel. Bettel did not want to comment on the LuxLeaks trial against Antoine Deltour and Raphaël Halet, the two whistlebowers who revealed sweetheart tax rulings offered by Luxembourg’s previous government to over 300 multinational companies based in the country. The LuxLeaks

SH

FF

≈

IS

SL

2.

PA P

CI

20

/I

J

15

ER 1 6 T S / ICIJ 6 B

AM A

B

EA KS

20

20

LE AK S

3 G

SW

RG

4 G / ICI14 B J

BU

3.

M

PA N

LU XE

O 26 RE LEAK201 0 S / IC I 3 GB J

O

12

DRIP, DRIP, DRIP

20

63

64

#DEBATEGROWTH TWEETS â&#x20AC;&#x201C; COMPILED BY JESSICA WILLIAMS

65 TWEETS

66

BLAME GOLDMAN – For over a decade the perception of the big emerging markets has been oversimplified. The slow-down of their growth shows: The so-called BRICS are very diverse countries – with very diverse problems.

NOT JUST ANOTHER BRIC IN THE WALL

TILL DALDRUP (TEXT)

BRICS is probably one of the biggest buzzwords of this millennium. The acronym stands for the emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – and for growing economies with a lot of potential. Analysts and investors alike were excited about these up-and-coming countries and the opportunities they offered: High growth rates and high returns.

Goldman Sachs predicted in 2012 that the BRICS were standing at the brink of a new economic order and would surpass the leading industrial states by 2050. (Mind you, Goldman Sachs analysts coined the term BRICS in a 2001 report.)

Now that BRICS growth has cooled, market experts are not that optimistic anymore. The emerging economies have kept traders in suspense in the last months, as more and more problems emerged. This shows the term BRICS implies a political, cultural and economic connection that is simply not there. These emerging countries are not a monolith, but in fact very diverse.

Take South Africa, for example. It is the latest member of this emerging markets club, only lifted into this position to represent the up-and-coming economies of Africa. Nonetheless it never had the economic potential of India or China. “Afri-

can, Asian, South American and Eastern European countries do not necessarily have the same fundamentals,” says Thebe Ikalafeng, a South African marketing expert and Group CEO of Brand Leadership.

“South Africa has profited from BRICS from a branding side, by getting more attention from investors. But from the viewpoint of real impact, nothing has happened yet.”

In fact, South Africa had to give up its position as Africa’s strongest economy. In 2014, the country was surpassed by Nigeria. The economy is hurting from a sluggish manufacturing and commodity sector. And South Africa is not the only BRICS country in a downward economic spiral.

Russia and Brazil were both profiting off of rising commodity prices in the early 2000s. Now that market prices are in a slump, they both have to deal with recession. Brazil seems to be hit hard, as it also faces a political crisis: Corruption scandals and the lawsuit against President Dilma Rousseff have led to inner turmoil.

Brazil spent a lot of its oil money for the benefit of its impoverished population, but should also have re-invested some into economic development. “Many of the solutions were short-term fixes to very serious problems,” says Priscila Bala, a Brazilian entrepreneur and Director of the

67

cutive Director of the Chinese wind turbine manufacturer Envision Energy, points out just how huge these challenges are: “The financial system is not working, there is a credit and property market bubble and the debt level is too high.” The other BRICS states will look very closely at these deve-lopments in the Far East. A stumbling China might yank down other emerging markets as well.

So are the BRICS countries going to accomplish the turnaround? Recent economic data indicates that these emerging markets are slowly going to recover from their current crisis. What is for sure is all of these countries will do this in their own manner and at their own speed. Even Goldman Sachs seems to have understood that. After assets dropped by 88 per cent from a 2010 peak, the investment bank finally shut down its BRICS fund last year. u

Illustration: Alexandra Stark, Source: GDJ

BLAME GOLDMAN

Mentor Network at the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute. “But none of them took into account sustainable maintenance over time, so we would invest in education, the health system or infrastructure.”

Brazil’s loss in oil revenue is actually India’s gain. For the last decade the subcontinent poor in natural resources had to import oil and other commodities into the country. This burden is now lifted by falling prices – and they work better than any economic stimulus plan. In the last year, India’s GDP grew by eight per cent, making it the fastest growing economy in the world.

This position once belonged to China, the only BRICS country that really lived up to the expectations market analysts had for it 15 years ago. But now that growth rates are deteriorating, experts worry that the challenges ahead might be too big for Asia’s biggest economy. Felix Zhang, Exe-

68

COURTING DISASTER – September 2008 has become part of the world’s collective memory: It is the month Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy and the global financial system went into free fall. Eight years later, some fear another financial crisis is about to happen.

DANCING ON THE EDGE?

JOLIEN DE VRIES (TEXT)

We asked Luca Visentini, General Secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation, Mari Kiviniemi, Deputy Secretary-General of the OECD, and Kathy Matsui, Co-Head of Global Investment Research at Goldman Sachs Japan, for their views on some of the most important risks facing the world today.

OIL PRICES

Oil prices have not been this low since 2003. What are the consequences of the falling oil price for the global economy?

Kathy Matsui: “Of course it is a problem if oil prices go to a level that will make it very difficult for oil-exporting countries to survive. Our view at Goldman Sachs is that oil prices are not going to collapse. At the same time, they may not rise quickly as long as global growth is sluggish.”

Luca Visentini: “There are a lot of developed economies that are based on the use and the protection of oil. Low oil prices create incredible shocks in some economies. It is an ambivalent situation; there are advantages but also incredible risks. The oil crisis is creating problems in countries like Russia, China, and even the United States, not to mention the Middle East. It also increases the tensions in the markets at a political level. This is really a big problem.”

THE OUTCOME OF THE US ELECTIONS

What happens if Donald Trump gets elected as president of the United States? Will his controversial ideas be damaging for the global economy?

Luca Visentini: “Donald Trump says one thing today, and a completely opposite thing tomorrow. He went bankrupt three times, maybe to pay fewer taxes. He was a neo-liberal and now he is a populist, speaking against any trade agreement. So it is very difficult to say what his macroeconomic policy will be, if any. It is like a lotto.”

Mari Kiviniemi: “I do not want to go into the details of certain countries or elections. But at the OECD we have noticed that all the candidates are now more against free trade than a couple of years ago. That is of course alarming. In the world we still need trade liberalisation.

The mood in Europe and the United States seems to be more reluctant than before.

This is not good for global growth.”

69 COURTING DISASTER

THE SITUATION IN EUROPE

What would be the consequences of a Brexit? And what other risks could contribute to a destabilising financial situation?

Luca Visentini: “It is likely that if Britain gets out of the European Union, there will be a domino effect on other European countries. It is very unpredictable.

Of course, the refugee crisis is also an element in this scenario. But if Europe collapses, everything is finished. You could have an incredible economic war taking place on a global level, if not even a real war.”

Mari Kiviniemi: “When you think of political risks, Brexit is one of them. In the whole of Europe you can feel that Greece is still a challenge. In many EU countries it is difficult to form a government that has a stable majority. What is needed in Europe is a deepening of the single market and I don’t see a lot of support for that.

That makes the situation in Europe very challenging.”

CHINA

One of the fastest-growing economies in the world is showing signs of weakness.

Will the situation in China spiral out of control?

Mari Kiviniemi: “We can see that China is making the shift from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, and it’s taking some time. That is a challenge for them and there is still this fear that this transition will cause turmoil not only in their area but also in the global situation.”

Kathy Matsui: "The Chinese government has to balance competing interests: on the one hand they know that the debt burden is too high, but on the other hand, the economy is naturally transitioning from an export and investment-led economy to a more domestic, demand-led one. That transition means growth will slow, so you have high debt and slower growth. If they reduce debt too quickly, it could slow growth even further, which could be destabilising. Managing this transition is the challenge. We believe, however, that China will be able to manage the process through a bumpy deceleration, rather than cause a hard landing.”

70

Irene Quarcoo, 30 (Canada) Journey: Toronto – St. Gallen Total Distance: 6,476 km Born in Ghana and raised in Kenya, South Africa and the United Kingdom, Quarcoo is a Canadian who works at the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General in communications during the day. By night, she is a member of a civil hacking group that works with open data, websites and wireless networks.

Beat Furger, 24 (Switzerland) Yanjaa Altansuh, 23 (Sweden) Journey: Texas – St. Gallen Total Distance: 8,669 km Altansuh’s life is all about travelling. She won the Memory Championships in 2014 in China. She has a goal: to organise a Burning Man festival in Mongolia. “I met Larry Harvey, the Co-Founder of Burning Man, and he liked the idea. Now I have to figure out if we want a 10 person or a 10,000 person festival.”

LONG DISTANCE – 200 young Leaders of Tomorrow packed their bags to be part of the 46th St. Gallen Symposium. These millennials came from all over the world.

Who had the longest trip? And who could just walk down the street?

SARA ROSATI (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

Journey: St. Gallen Total Distance: 2 km Furger lives only 20 minutes away from the university. Every year since he began studying at the University of St. Gallen, he has volunteered for the symposium.

He has been a driver, a host, and a helper. This is his last time: he will graduate in June. “I like the experience of meeting new people every year with different mindsets.

Otherwise it would be impossible to meet such people,” he says.

TRAVELLING TO ST. GALLEN

71 LONG DISTANCE

Andrey Aliasov, 27 (Russia) Journey: Moscow – St. Gallen Total Distance: 2,549 km “I am an international guy who wants to meet people. In Russia it is difficult to meet foreigners. The winter does not help,” Aliasov says.

He is the CEO of Changellenge, a recruitment company for graduate students. “I’ve had an amazing networking experience. I love the international spirit of the symposium.”

Christopher Bishop, 32 (New Zealand) Journey: Wellington – Auckland – Shanghai – Zurich – St. Gallen Total Distance: 19,104 km Bishop works as a member of Parliament for New Zealand’s National Party. He heard about the symposium through a friend and when he got the invitation he did not hesitate: “I want to be challenged, get out of my comfort zone and change my preconceived ideas.” As a member of New Zealand’s government, he is interested in sustainable growth.

72

OVER BUDGET

73

OVER BUDGET – Mathis Wackernagel loves the outdoors. As a sustainability advocate, he travels the world to inform audiences about the global ecological footprint concept. How does he balance his travel schedule with his urgent call for less emissions in the world?

RUBEN DIELEMAN (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTOS)

Mathis Wackernagel, President of the Global Footprint Network, has been preaching his message about humanity’s ecological footprint and what he calls “ecological overshoot” for more than a decade. These concepts both relate to the consequences and effects of economic growth worldwide. The ecological footprint, conceived by Wackernagel, is a tool that measures economic supply and its demand on nature.

Humanity’s demands have been exceeding the biosphere’s supply since the 1970s, a phenomenon called ecological overshoot. Each year, the day on which humanity’s resource consumption for the year exceeds the planet’s capacity to regenerate those resources that year moves earlier on the calendar. In 2015, it was August 13. This year, it is August 8.

What does this mean? “It means that overshoot is structural. It now takes the Earth more than a year and a half to regenerate what humanity uses in a year,” Wackernagel says. “Even if the date of Earth Overshoot Day stayed the same, that would not be helpful. That it keeps coming earlier means that we have not bucked the trend yet,” Wackernagel says.

“THE VALUES WE HAVE DO NOT SHIFT EASILY.”

This trend cannot go on for ever. “Will we get out of overshoot by design or by disaster? That is the big question,” Wackernagel says. According to him, humanity still has a choice. “But we are not choosing wisely.

I think we can still take fate into our own hands. It is like with money: why we cannot choose the same way we do about resources? Why can we work with budgets for money, but not for natural resources?”

Can humanity as a whole really decide to take natural resources into account?

Even Wackernagel admits we cannot afford to stop expanding, but unrestrained consumption of natural resources is not the way to do it. “We do not produce anything when we extract natural resources,” Wackernagel says. “It is like moving money from your savings account to your checking account, and considering it to be newly earned money. Of course, it is not.”

Still, Wackernagel is no pessimist. “I have total faith in humanity’s ability to deal with it. It is not like an asteroid that will hit us. We can transform our systems.

It is technically and financially possible.”

The Swiss-born scientist proclaims that he is a technological optimist, but technology on its own will not change the ↦

74 OVER BUDGET trend yet. “What holds us back – despite urgent warnings from the UN, for instance – is that we do not see it for the true challenge it is. We cannot see beyond growth, even though we cannot go on forever like this. What happens if we cannot have growth? We are not thinking imaginatively enough about it.”

Many initiatives surrounding sustainability nowadays are about “awareness.”

“I still do not entirely understand what this means,” Wackernagel says. “I wonder if it really changes our fundamental behaviour. The values we have, about growth for example, do not shift easily, even if they are not based in reality anymore.”

Wackernagel hopes that his Work Session at the 46th St. Gallen Symposium may have contributed to the shift. “I hope that people have been a little bit disturbed, but not so much that they have been disgusted. And intrigued enough that my talk stuck with them, that it kind of nags and

makes them ask themselves: what shall we do? What are the possibilities now?”

Even for someone like Wackernagel, making a real difference feels like a challenge. Take travel: A rough calculation by the magazine suggests the cumulative distance travelled by all the symposium’s visitors amounted to flying around the world 50 times over.

Wackernagel flew from his home in California to be at the symposium. “I have solar panels at home. We have LED lights.

We separate trash. I try not to waste any food. But I should have 6 times more solar panels just for my flight to Zurich, to compensate for my impact on the environment,” he admits. “Let’s be honest: I am adding to the problem. We could do so much better, we could achieve so much more.”

The sustainability advocate is suddenly pensive. “That is why I ask myself every day: am I adding value?” u

75 OVER BUDGET

LAUREN SINGER, 24, LEADER OF TOMORROW, LIVES A “TRASH-FREE LIFESTYLE”.

Lauren Singer focuses on how people can reduce their individual waste output, through going “zero waste”, composting and finding alternatives to single-use plastic items. Where Wackernagel ends, Singer begins. “I try to show people, using myself as an example, that anyone can reduce their impact, even if it is just a little bit. We can all do something. We should!”

The symposium could do something as well, according to Singer. “There are very few plastic things here – the symposium does a great job with that! But from a food perspective, it is not entirely clear to me if the symposium is composting its waste. All the excess food may be going to landfill. And for the visitors to just carry one spoon around would be great.”

Like Wackernagel, Singer wonders about the ambiguity of talking about reducing one’s impact while actively contributing to emissions. “You are making a negative impact by producing a product, but if that product is doing a larger social good, than that positive impact should not cease to exist. It is the same with the symposium: should we not bring these people together because of an impact?

If there is an impact, let’s acknowledge that and find out what we can do to remediate that in other ways. Like planting trees to compensate. The symposium’s aim for next year should be a zero impact conference.”

76

GETTING TO KNOW YOU

CARD SHARK – Entrepreneur Matteo Achilli knows how to create buzz. After appearing on the cover of the Italian magazine Panorama, his portrait went viral: international media wrote about this “Italian Mark Zuckerberg” and the BBC even featured him in a documentary about the next generation of billionaires.

JOLIEN DE VRIES (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

At age 19, Matteo Achilli started one of the most successful tech start-ups in Italy, the professional networking platform Egomnia. Egomnia ranks jobseekers based on quantitative data like education, job experience or language certificates. Its customers are companies looking for the perfect candidate.

EGO OMNIA The name Egomnia was born on Google Translate. Achilli, searching for a neologism, started translating Italian to Latin.

“I wrote something like: ‘me against everyone,’ because this is the goal of my website; to create a ranking of people.” Google translated it the wrong way: Ego Omnia.

Achilli liked the sound of it: ‘‘Ego’ means ‘me’, ‘Omnia’ means ‘everything’, so ‘me everything.’’

Talented people are the real target of the platform. “Egomnia is not good and it’s not bad,” says Achilli. “It’s meritocratic.

It all depends on what the customer is looking for.”

NETWORKING IN SILICON VALLEY Achilli started Egomnia without investors. (His family loaned him EUR 10,000) In 2013, he visited Silicon Valley, looking for opportunities to grow his network. But

the business culture was different from the one in Italy. “In Silicon Valley I spoke to a lot of people, but without any result.

I wanted to start a partnership from the bottom.” To achieve that, Achilli realised he needed to change his networking strategy: “It’s better if there is someone else that introduces me and says: ‘He’s the best.’ You have to be able to draw attention to yourself,” he explains.

By founding a high tech start-up in Italy, a country mostly known for fashion, luxury goods and pasta, Achilli received that attention. The nickname “the Italian Mark Zuckerberg” was born, which brought him a lot of publicity from international media. At the end of this year, Achilli will sell one per cent of Egomnia. With the money, he will invest in apps and expand his business to countries like Brazil, Germany and Singapore. In March 2017, a film about his life will debut in Italy. “Probably I’m going to receive a lot of attention. That is good for the business,” he says.

Yes, Matteo Achilli knows how to get attention. Because of that, the right people will come to him instead of the other way around. His advice: “The best way to network is to create a situation where the people who you are speaking to already know who you are.” u

77 CARD SHARK

MATTEO ACHILLI’S ADVICE FOR GROWING YOUR NETWORK 1. GET INTRODUCED

BY SOMEONE ELSE “If I want to speak with someone, I prefer to speak with someone who knows that person and who can introduce me.”

2. INVEST IN THE RIGHT PEOPLE Better to speak a lot with ten people than briefly to a hundred. “In Italy we have a saying – ‘friend of everyone, friend of no one.’ This is my view on networking.”

3. DRESS FOR SUCCESS “When you have to speak about business or something serious, you have to look serious. It’s like Superman: If he has to save people, he has to dress like Superman, not like Clark Kent.”

4. PAY ATTENTION “Pay close attention to the person you are speaking with, even if you don’t care what the other person is saying.”

5. ALWAYS HAND OUT YOUR BUSINESS CARD “If I spoke to a person and I don’t get a business card afterwards, I have lost him.”

6. DON’T EAT DURING A MEETING “Of course, it depends on the culture. But I have seen a lot of people who are eating with an open mouth.”

78

NEXT BIG THING â&#x20AC;&#x201C; If you listen to the experts, blockchain technology is going to change the world. Toni Lane Casserly, CEO of CoinTelegraph.com, is one of the believers.

JOLIEN DE VRIES (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

IS BLOCKCHAIN BITCOIN FOR EVERYTHING?

79 NEXT BIG THING BLOCKCHAIN

While you have probably heard of the disruptive digital currency Bitcoin, you might not be familiar with the term blockchain. Blockchain is an information technology used for recording and verifying transactions, which are divided into batches of digits called “blocks” and stored in a decentralised, public ledger.

While blockchain technology is the basis for digital currencies like Bitcoin, it can be used for many forms of digital record keeping. Or, as Toni Lane Casserly explains it, “Bitcoin is to blockchain, as e-mail is to the Internet. It’s an application.” Bitcoin is just blockchain technology for finance.

There is a lot of hyperbole around these technologies. People describe bitcoin as the “internet of money” and blockchain as “the next generation of the Internet.”

But Casserly is sold on their potential. “As far as global political reform, I think it’s truly the most fascinating invention that is going to happen within the next fifty years,” she says.

How will blockchain technology change our financial system?

“It’s completely redefining the perception of value and of economy. For so long we’ve had finance that was structured by governments and major banks. All of these currencies have had value relative to a force that is outside of our control completely. Blockchain technology allows any person or institution in the world to create his or her own form of value. And private companies will have the ability to make their own currency.”

Will blockchain technology replace banks and other financial institutions?

“The reason many people think the technology is going to destroy financial institutions is because there were people in finance in 2008 that behaved more unethically than anyone in the history of finance. People lost confidence in the financial system. They saw this new technology as a replacement.

But there are a lot of highly ethical bankers as well. It’s because of them that change will happen over time. At the moment, a lot of banks are integrating blockchain technology into their systems.

I think we will see prescient banks gradu-

ally adapt. But even if bitcoin and blockchain technology are going to fundamentally change the way we think about the infrastructure of finance, it is not going to dissolve overnight.”

Is it possible to hack blockchain technology?

“It’s like someone saying “we’re going to hack the Internet.” You can hack a website, but you can’t hack the Internet. With blockchain it’s the same. You can hack insecure systems that are built on bitcoin, for example a bitcoin wallet, but you can’t hack the system.”

So what are some possible risks?

“Probably the biggest risk would be people overhyping and using the technology for things you don’t need a blockchain for.

For example, it’s a good idea to put your car on the blockchain and register the asset title, because blockchain is great for trading assets. But you don’t need to put the hedge in front of your house on the blockchain and start trading it like a financial instrument. Smart investors get that.

And anyone who invests in hype, that’s their own folly.” u

80

LISTEN & LEARN – The next time you are in need of a new perspective or fresh ideas just consult one of the following books or podcasts. This list of recommendations from participants was inspired by the political and economical discussion at the symposium.

ANNA-LENA SACHS (TEXT)

WHAT INSPIRES YOU?

MUST LISTEN Freakonomics Radio Podcast – Dubner Productions and WNYC Studios In weekly episodes, the Freakonomics podcast discusses everyday phenomena of human nature by having conversations with businesspersons, social scientists or provocateurs.

The StartUp Podcast – Gimlet The StartUp Podcast is a regular show on the ups and downs of starting and running your own business.

Planet Money Podcast – NPR Planet Money explains the economy through stories in a twiceweekly podcast.

Hardtalk Podcast – BBC World Service The BBC Hardtalk Podcast conducts in-depth interviews with personalities and news creators from all over the world.

More or Less: Behind the Stats Podcast – BBC Radio 4 The More or Less Podcast discusses and explains statistics that confront us in everyday life.

81 LISTEN & LEARN

MUST READ Tony Hsieh – Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose, 2010 The CEO of the online business Zappos explains his entrepreneurial story and how he tried to improve the lives of his employees in Delivering Happiness.

E.F. Schumacher – Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered, 1973 In Small is Beautiful Schumacher studies modern economics and its effects on the lives of people.

James Rickards – The Currency Wars, 2011 Rickards elaborates on the dangers of currency wars, which are one of the negative consequences of international economics.

Ben Horowitz – The Hard Thing about Hard Things, 2014 The founder of Andreessen Horowitz provides advice on founding a start-up and he addresses difficulties of running businesses in The Hard Thing about Hard Things.

Robert Skidelsky and Edward Skidelsky – How much is Enough?: Money and the Good Life, 2012 How much is Enough? focuses on what a good life entails and what really matters in life.

Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson – Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty, 2012 While including contemporary and historical examples, Why Nations Fail discusses why certain nations are more thriving and successful than others.

Paul Mason – Postcapitalism: A Guide to the Future, 2015 In Postcapitalism Paul Mason examines the changes capitalism is undergoing currently and he suggests how a more equal society could be created.

82

HUMANS OF ST. GALLEN

HUMANS OF SG – Over 1,000 people gathered at this year’s St. Gallen Symposium. Here are five of their stories.

NATASHA R. SILVA & GERMÁN R. PÁEZ (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP & DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTOS)

RIZ KHAN, 54 INTERNATIONAL JOURNALIST “Starting when I was six years old, I wanted to be a doctor. I grew up studying everything possible about the human body. By the time I was 8, I could name the major bones of the body. I got my degree in medical physiology, but I couldn’t get a grant to do the clinical years. I had to do something to raise money to go back into medicine and suddenly found myself in journalism.

I never went back to medicine and ended up doing international TV shows. Years ago, I did an interview with an educator called Ken Robinson, who wrote a book called “The Element”. He talked about people finding their element: there are people who say they want to be engineers or lawyers or doctors, and that may not be really what they are best suited to. So if a person finds their element that is kind of a blessing in a way. And I think by accident I found mine.”

HANNA JAFF, 29 FOUNDER OF THE JAFF FOUNDATION FOR EDUCATION “I grew up between three cultures: Kurdish, on my dad’s side; Mexican, on my mother’s; and American, from the United States, where I was born and raised. Because of that my identity, the idea of who I was, always depended on who I was talking to. If I was talking to an American, then I was American. If I was talking to a Mexican, I was Mexican. In the Middle East, I was Kurdish. I was a very confused child. In addition to that, I went to the Middle East with my father’s family every year. When I went there with my dad, I helped in refugee camps. I got to see many things, travelling from a country that was prosperous and peaceful to a region suffering from wars, insecurity, and injustice to women.

That kind of cultural shock is very difficult to see, especially when you're young. I think those blows have made me the woman I am today. I accepted who I was. I decided to grab the best of those three cultures and I became proud of who I am.”

83 HUMANS OF SG

MAHESHMURTI LENI SAHEBRAO JADHAV, 29 GENERAL SECRETARY OF THE NATIONAL STUDENT’S UNION OF INDIA “As a child, I read the index of a book called “Yashwantrao Chavan To Vilasrao Deshmukh,” a list of politicians from Maharashtra, my state. There were biographies of all these chief ministers and there was not a single lady’s name on the list. Maharashtra is one of the most flourishing states of India and, if there was not a single name of a woman there, I started to think about how it was probably worse in other states. I asked my dad why we never had a lady chief minister in Maharashtra. He told me it was because of two things: lack of opportunity and lack of proper exposure.

Since then, being in politics has been my passion.”

ANNE-SOPHIE SCHRATZ, 25 BUSINESS INTERN AND FORMER MEMBER OF THE ISC TEAM “I think the most interesting person here is not a sole character, but rather the mixture of them. At my first symposium, I was at an Indonesian dinner night at the table with Dr Josef Ackermann and the Prime Minister of Indonesia. It was so interesting to see everyone come together and talk about the same problems. In comparison with four years ago, when I had never heard about the symposium before, I actually wonder: ‘How could you not hear about it?’ It is an immense connected community.”

JOHANNES BERCHTOLD, 42 CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER OF THE ST. GALLEN FOUNDATION FOR INTERNATIONAL STUDIES “I lived in the United Kingdom for a couple of years and I am still very emotionally attached to many things there. Particularly, the eccentric humour they have. I am far from an eccentric person, but I love some elements of it. So, I made a deal with two friends that I would never wear black socks again. Since then, even at very formal events, I wear colourful socks. Some are more discreet and sometimes they have funny patterns. It depends on my mood. When I get up in the morning I ask myself: ‘Is today a fighting day or a normal workday?’ and then I choose. It has a good effect because it is kind of hidden, but sometimes it pops up when I walk and catches people’s attention. In some conversations, I see how the eyes shift from my face to my feet. In those moments I can say whatever I want because all the attention is on the socks.”

84

Boat Trip

Boat trip LoT In a world, where many people continue to struggle with the geography of Africa, Hanna Tetteh puts Ghana firmly on the map. As Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration of Ghana and Chair of the Council of Ministers of ECOWAS, Tetteh embodies the successes and challenges of her country and gives a voice to the West African region.

DANIEL (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

85

IN A ST. GALLEN SYMPOSIUM FIRST, LEADERS OF TOMORROW CONVENED ON A CRUISE SHIP ON LAKE CONSTANCE FOR A DAY OF WORKSHOPS AND DISCUSSIONS â&#x20AC;&#x201C; AND A SPECTACULAR SUNSET CRUISE ALONG EUROPE'S THIRD LARGEST BODY OF FRESH WATER. DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

86

WHAT WOULD KEYNES DO?

IMPOVERISHED SAINTS – Just a few months after the Great Depression of 1929 began, among rising calls for the end of capitalism, John Maynard Keynes imagined an era of abundance a century in the future. Now, 70 years after the great economist’s death, the world is facing the consequences of another financial crisis. How would Keynes respond to the changes and the challenges we are witnessing today?

ELÍAS CAMHAJI (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

In 2030, the standard of living will be “between four and eight times as high as it is today.” There will be so much wealth and the technology will be so advanced that we will only have to work “fifteen hours” every week.

These were some of the predictions formulated by John Maynard Keynes (1883– 1946) in the “Economic Possibilities of our Grandchildren.” Keynes, one of the most influential economists of the 20th century, published the short essay in 1930, a few months after the Wall Street Crash of 1929. “We are suffering just now from a bad attack of economic pessimism,” he wrote.

What would Keynes have written about the latest financial crisis? “It would be very difficult to write an optimistic essay as Keynes did,” says Lord Robert Skidelsky, one of his most acclaimed biographers.

“Getting out of this into a better future will require big changes of policy. Keynes thought it would happen more or less naturally.”

Skidelsky is also the co-author of the popular book “How much is enough?,” which follows the traces of Keynes’ idea

of free time as the core of human existence. Keynes’ biographer says that the British economist would be “pretty disappointed” with the status quo, since the industrialised economies have missed many opportunities to take advantage of the fact that they have become between four or five times richer than they were seven decades ago.

In other words, we might be richer, but our quality of life has not increased proportionally. So, what did Keynes miss?

“One of the things Keynes underestimated was the growth of income inequality,” Skidelsky says. “He was living in a period when incomes were becoming more equal.” The author explains that in Keynes’ time the gap between a lawyer or a doctor and an average worker was a ratio of about 1:5. In contrast, the current differentials are 1:100. “Society has progressed, but at a very unequal rate,” he adds.

Although Skidelsky calls Keynes “an intellectual snob,” he thinks they both would get along very well. “I think we would be very much in favour of the things I proposed in “How much is enough?” says Skidelsky: The establishment of a basic in-

87 IMPOVERISHED SAINTS

Lord Robert Skidelsky, left, has spent his career studying the life and ideas of John Maynard Keynes, right. come, the shortening of hours of work by legislative means, and some suppression of advertising.

According to his biographer, Keynes did not want us to be impoverished saints, but rather believed that after acquiring enough goods to have a healthy life, the human spirit would flourish through leisure and a new understanding of economics and, ultimately, life. “Keynes thought of economics as a means to a good life,”

Skidelsky says. “A good life to him was not just more goods. He pursued good as an ethical principle, he sought a life devoted to a quest for knowledge, beauty, love… of non-measurable things.”

One of the most famous phrases coined

by Keynes points out that “in the long run we are all dead.” Yet even though Keynes died 70 years ago, Skidelsky believes a part of him is still alive, since his ideas still have great influence on economics. “We will go

on talking about him if we need to, and I think we will need to,” says Skidelsky.

Skidelsky hopes that Keynes’ humanistic outlook of economics resonates for a younger generations of professionals. “He said economics must be done in a different way. It must be connected to the real world and it must be much broader than just the study of models,” Skidelsky says.

“Economists have to become citizens and take part in society.” u

88

LEADERS IN INNOVATION

SCIENCE INNOVATIONS – As advanced economies age, innovative design and pioneering technology might be the key to global growth. The St. Gallen Symposium’s Leaders of Tomorrow brought innovative ideas and creations to the symposium. Below is a roundup of some of the ideas changing society today. Match the Leader of Tomorrow to the exciting and innovative products they created, designed or marketed.

DANIELLE KEETON-OLSEN (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP & DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTOS)

HOMEBIOGAS

As soon as you toss food and animal waste into Homebiogas, it begins producing gas that will eventually transform into liquid fertiliser or cooking fuel. “Waste is an asset,” Homebiogas’ chief scientist said. “We paid for it, it’s ours, so why shouldn’t we use it?” The scientist also hopes to see Homebiogas used in developing countries, where many people primarily use coal and charcoal for heating.

VOLTERA

is a printer that allows researchers to prototype the circuit board they need to conduct experiments. Researchers must often wait weeks for custom circuit boards; when they finally arrive, the boards must often be modified or completely redesigned to work for their experiments. “Building hardware is not like building software, where it has a run button and you can see if it works right away,” the designer said.

VETIGEL It generally takes the hu-

man body about five minutes to stop traumatic bleeding. Vetigel, a product made from algae, stops a wound from bleeding in about 10 seconds, acting as “Lego blocks for the body” by assembling a mechanical plug to allow the body to naturally heal. Since the product's conception in 2010, Vetigel has grown in international popularity, and 4,000 of the United States’ 36,000 veterans have tried to purchase the product.

REEF DESIGN LAB This syn-

thetic reef design, made of a calcium carbonate replication of the actual composition of coral reefs, is being used to restore coral reefs around the Philippines, where most of the natural reefs have been decimated, the designer said. The reef structures can be installed at sites where natural reefs have been nearly or completely destroyed. The designer has also created artificial reefs using large-scale 3D printers, as well as eco-engineering projects, such as creating sea walls that could allow space for young oysters and mussels to grow.

FLYABILITY

The design concept of this robot is inspired by insects. Insects collide with walls, objects and larger organisms to explore their terrain and find their way, so a robot that needs to navigate difficult environments would be successful if it operated in a similar way, the designer thought. The spherical cage surrounds the drone and rotates around the machine so the drone can collide with another object mid-flight and navigate around the obstacle, while protecting the camera and mechanisms inside. The product’s creator is first marketing the drone as a way to visually inspect industrial sites that are difficult to reach or dangerous to view in person, such as internal tanks, power plants or sewers.

SOLUTION Yair Teller = Homebiogas / Joe Landolina = Vetigel / Adrien Briod = Flyability Alex Goad = Reef Design Lab / Katarina Ilic = Voltera

89 SCIENCE INNOVATIONS

YAIR TELLER (Israel) VETIGEL

KATARINA ILIC (Canada) HOMEBIOGAS ALEX GOAD (Australia) FLYABILITY ADRIEN BRIOD (Switzerland)

JOE LANDOLINA (USA) VOLTERA

GUESS WHO MADE WHAT

ALL PRODUCT PHOTOS PROVIDED BY THEIR CREATORS AND INVENTORS.

REEF DESIGN LAB

90

EUGLENA WHO? – Mitsuru Izumo believes in eco-friendly capitalism. He hopes to use a tiny, single-celled creature to make it a reality.

GREEN GOLD

NATASHA R. SILVA (TEXT), ANDREW CURRY (PHOTO)

Can something smaller than the thickness of a human hair be the answer to a problem as big as hunger? In Mitsuru Izumo’s opinion, yes. The Founder and President of Euglena Co saw the horrible effects of malnutrition during a trip to Bangladesh in 1998. Izumo was just 18 at the time, a student focusing on international development at the University of Tokyo. He was touched by the poverty he saw in the South Asian country. “In Bangladesh there was food. People ate a lot of rice and carbohydrates. But they didn’t have access to any food that was really nutritional,” he says. “The problem there was not starvation, it was malnutrition.”

Two years later, when he was home in Japan again, Izumo was introduced to the health benefits of euglena: a type of tiny microorganism that contains a lot of potential. Euglena is an algae that has characteristics of both plants and animals. It can be found in fresh water and is a source of nutrients for many other microorganisms.

Realising its great nutritional and carbon capture capabilities, Izumo immediately saw his opportunity to help the mal-

nourished children he saw in Bangladesh and started his own business at the same time. “I joined a special research and development programme at my university to try and cultivate euglena massively,” Izumo says. His main goal was to find a way to produce this kind of microalgae at an industrial scale and make it available – in the form of a powder that can be used as a supplement – for people who truly needed it.

It was not an easy path, though. It was only in 2005 that Izumo successfully developed a technology that allowed him to cultivate euglena cheaply enough to make the final product accessible. In August 2005, Euglena Co was born. Research continued, but it took a while for the founder of the company to get clients that believed in his project. “There’s one thing I said from the start: ‘This is a business.

I want to make profit in Japan and Europe, but, I want to invest most of that profit in doing social business in developing countries,’” says Izumo.

In time, Euglena Co caught the eye of investors, going from a struggling business to a huge hit. In 2012, the company went

91 EUGLENA WHO?

public in a JPY 10 billion (USD 81 million) stock market launch and has been growing around 30 per cent each year since.

However, the success of the company did not distract its founder from his initial goals. The ideology that was born during that trip in 1998 is still with Izumo and affects every decision he makes.

Right now, he continues making a profit, but invests a lot of it in charity programmes that offer school lunches – euglena cookies included, of course – for kids in Bangladesh. “In these times of greedy capitalism, almost all my shareholders push me to make more profit,” says Izumo.

That fact does not seem to make Izumo nervous, though. For him, there is no need to draw a line between business and his beliefs. “I have a special technology to cultivate euglena and no one else has it,” he says. “So I can decide what the priorities are. If young social entrepreneurs develop proper and innovative technology, we can make eco-friendly, social and public interest capitalism really happen.” u Euglena are single-celled organisms that combine characteristics of plants and animals. They're also nutritious.

92

TIME OF TRANSITION

CHINA – Since the Chinese Communist Party opened the nation’s economy in the 1970s, private enterprise in China has flourished. As the government continues to loosen its regulations, executives say it is one of the most strategic locations in the world to operate a private business.

DANIELLE KEETON-OLSEN (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

ELI MORGAN HARRIS

DANNY ZHENG

By some measures, business is booming in China. Between 2002 and 2012, more than 8 million private businesses were founded in China, and the number of employees working for private businesses has increased from 32.5 million to 113 million, according to data from the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce.

Yet times are getting tougher for Chinese entrepreneurs. The nation's economy is experiencing a dramatic slowdown: Officials recently announced that China’s grew 6.9 per cent in the fourth

quarter of 2015, the slowest rate in 25 years. China's debt has been piling higher, and the nation has a surplus of housing and factory space.

Slowing growth in China has been felt elsewhere as well. As China slows its imports and exports, other nations have seen subdued trade and weaker commodity prices, according to the International Monetary Fund's 2016 World Economic Outlook report.

THE GOVERNMENT’S ROLE IN PRIVATE ENTERPRISE Partly in an effort to keep growth on track, the Chinese government has been loosening existing regulations to allow private enterprise to flourish. Foreign investors are taking notice. At the end of 2014, President Xi Jinping opened the Shanghai Stock Exchange to allow foreign investors to buy

93 CHINA

PRIVATE ENTERPRISES (IN BILLIONS)

GROWTH OF PRIVATE ENTERPRISE IN CHINA More than 8 million private businesses were founded in China between 2002 and 2012. The number of employees working for private businesses has increased from 32.5 million to 113 million.

10 10 8

Source: Markets over Mao: The Rise of Private Business in China by Nicholas R. Lardy (2014).

8 6

PRIVATE EMPLOYEES (IN BILLIONS)

6

110

4

90 4 2002

2003

70 2004 2002

2005 2003

2006 2004

2007 2005

shares in chinese companies in efforts to liberalise the nation’s economy. Danny Zheng, Vice President of the drone manufacturer DJI Innovations, says the Chinese government has incentivised private enterprise for DJI and other companies alike via subsidies and regulatory policy.

Still, China is no paradise of laissez faire capitalism just yet. According to Shanghai-based Felix Zhang, Executive Director of Envision Energy, a venture capital firm specialising in green tech, private businesses in China often have to contend with government regulation. Though the government is making more efforts to liberalise China’s economy, it still plays a role in regulating certain industries.

Zhang says private business owners have become adept at manoeuvering around government-created obstacles by following the path of peers in their industry.

“A lot of them do very well because they learn how to navigate in this kind of situation,” Zhang said.

POPULATION China’s sheer number of businesses and velocity of their growth leads to fierce competition to create new products and industries – competition that sometimes oversteps the bounds of copyrights and patents. For example, Zhang cites Groupon, a US company that sells coupons

2008 2006

2009 2007

2010 2008

2011 2009

50

2012 2010

2011

2012

for discounts at restaurants, resorts and events. Before the company had the chance to open in China, hundreds of “copycats” had already flooded the market. Today two Chinese companies dominate the discount coupon market.

“It’s a very dynamic country, and if someone has a new idea, you can have hundreds of thousands of copycats right away, so you have to move fast,” he said.

China’s intellectual property protection laws remain weak. While the laws are swiftly adapting, Zhang says the nation still has some progress to make in order to truly protect the influx of innovators working in China.

Still, new financial support and policies designed to facilitate entrepreneurship and innovation have followed the rising number of private enterprises in China, Investors like Zhang have stepped in to assist. “Similar to what’s happening in Silicon Valley, if you are an entrepreneur in Beijing you have tens of thousands of [venture capital] funds, you have a lot of incubation centers, you have a lot of accelerators, you have a lot of municipalities offering a variety of different funding and offices, so you have a lot of companies.”

“STRONG ENTREPRENEURIAL CULTURE” The main driver behind China’s booming private sector is the Chinese entrepre-

neurial spirit, Zhang said. “By nature, a lot of Chinese people have been taking risks for a long time, so there is a strong entrepreneurial culture in China,” Zhang says.

Many Chinese also aspire to be their own bosses.

The road to the top is often short, too.

Young entrepreneurs in China find they do not need to work in their industry for years before taking the lead. Throughout his time at Amherst College in Massachussetts, Eli Morgan Harris studied Mandarin Chinese with a focus in International Business and Development, learning about the nation’s political and cultural history in order to enter the business world in China. Barely 23, Harris has been working at DJI Innovations as its Business Development Director for nine months, leading his own projects and visiting 10 countries to promote and discuss DJI’s technology. “China was very fascinating to me, it’s changing so fast,” Harris mentioned. “I feel like a pioneer of sorts, that I could really play a part in that change.”

Harris said he enjoys having the chance to interact with engineers, lawyers and public relations teams, all opportunities he did not expect at this age. “That exposure I’m getting, and the experience I’m developing, I just could never attain working in the US this young,” he says. “That’s what makes me really excited.” u

94

ALGORITHM BLUES – Martin Ford envisions a near future in which roughly half of the world’s workforce will be replaced by machines.

GERMÁN R. PÁEZ (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

WATCH YOUR JOB, HUMAN: THE ROBOTS ARE COMING

When the American author and entrepreneur Martin Ford started running a software company back in the mid-90s, it was labour-intensive work. He needed to store software programmes on floppy disks and other storage devices, package them and have them sent over to his customers. He ended up outsourcing these routine tasks to machines and realised that “all those jobs would eventually evaporate.” He witnessed a “preview” of what, according to him, is going to happen in the world's economy: automation is ultimately going to take over most jobs.

This is the main thesis of “Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future” (2015), in which Ford boldly explores a dystopian future where most of the blue and white-collar jobs have been replaced by algorithms perfectly capable of performing the routines once executed by humans. Ford’s not the only one: According to Oxford University scholars Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne, the jobs held by 47 per cent of the workforce in the US could be automated within the

next two decades. During the symposium, Ford eloquently raised awareness of this issue and repeatedly pointed out a controversial solution: a basic income floor.

If technology will take the jobs of a large part of the population within the next two decades, it will lead to massive unemployment. Are the robots a threat to economic growth in the future?

“The issue I focus on is that you need consumers in order to have a thriving market economy and, right now, the mechanism to get purchasing power into the hands of consumers – so they can buy the products and services produced – is jobs! That is what economic growth essentially is: selling more. So, if we cannot sell more in the future, then how can we have economic growth? There is a point at which inequality undermines economic growth.

But people do not focus on that. They just think: well, we can produce more. But that is not growth. Are you going to produce and have it just in warehouses? I mean, someone has to buy it, right?”

95

You defend a public guaranteed income floor to keep the unemployed consuming. That would require a great amount of tax collection. But what happens when robots that do not have a salary and, therefore, do not pay taxes do most of the work?

“That is the problem. Right now, countries tax labour. Obviously, we have to shift away from that and tax capital instead. As long as you have a functioning economy, where someone will buy what you produce, you have economic activity. You can tax it. However, it may have to be a different kind of tax from what we have right now; there are various ways to do that.

There are also consumption taxes: In Europe, you have value added taxes. In the United States we do not have that at all.

Also, many people have suggested that we should have a carbon tax and just give the money – or the per capita rebates – back to low-income households. That could be something contributing to a guaranteed income as well.”

Does the idea of a guaranteed income resemble what we would call socialism?

“Many people would say that, but the reality is that guaranteed income has historically been supported by people who were totally opposed to socialism. The most famous one is Friedrich Hayek, a conservative who wrote “The Road to Serfdom”.

There is socialism when the government takes over the economy and private production, when it takes over companies and runs them in a way to create jobs.

Or maybe when the government gets involved in building housing for people, or feeding people. A guaranteed income is the other approach: just give the people money and then they will go out and participate in the economy. So it is actually a free market approach to a safety net.”

Why do you believe that people subject to this income floor will want to start companies instead of just living a peaceful life thanks to the income they get?

“I think many people want to do something productive. And remember: We are going to give people a minimal income, not a very generous one – at least not initially. So people will search for more in ↦

96

order to be satisfied. They will do other things. They will work part time. They will start businesses. Of course, there will be exceptions. Some people will take the money and lay on the beach, drink all day or take drugs. That is the downside, so we have to be careful how we design this programme. But I do not think you can get rid of those problems entirely.”

I was not thinking mainly of addicts and slackers. Once a large part of the society is not embedded in the productive economy, would the people change their mindset from consumerism and materialism to a more spiritually fulfilling lifestyle?

“It is unpredictable, but I suspect the reactions will be different among countries. In the US, we have a very strong consumer society, I do not think people are going to stop wanting material things. There was another session [at the 46th St. Gallen Symposium] by Lord Robert Skidelsky about the question: How much is enough? At what point do people become satisfied? And so far we have not seen that. People always want more.”

You say it is inevitable that robots will take over many jobs. Is that statement biased by a technocentric ideology? Is there something we, as humans, can do about it?

“Some people would say: ‘Yeah, let us pass a law to prevent that from happening.’ I think some will advocate for that, especially people who are losing their livelihood. It is not an idea I would support because I believe in progress; I think technology will make us better off. Would it not be a better world if we did not have to do jobs we do not like? Not everyone can be a journalist and do something they enjoy, a lot of people have horrible jobs, and so getting rid of those is not a bad thing.

So, I think rather than trying to stop it we need to adapt.”

What about automation coming to politics?

“I think we will see more of it, for sure.

That is the question for society. If you had a smart algorithm choosing the Republi-

97

If we leave politics to robots, that reduces it to problem-solving and bridging knowledge gaps. Do not political problems rather emerge from competing interests?

“Realistically, we are never going to fully automate politics because I do not think those interests would allow it. If algorithms ran politics, it would be a pure technocracy, as opposed to democracy.

I do not envision that happening. Just to give a specific example, in the US we have primary elections where Republicans and Democrats have preliminary votes.

Maybe you could do that algorithmically to choose the best candidate, and then the people would vote on who they really want to be president. So you then have kind of a hybrid system.”

But what would be the criteria to choose the best candidates? That is a subjective matter.

“That is more of a philosophical question.

You would look at their competencies, presumably to how much support they have among the population by some means, maybe polls. Anyway, in the US these people belonging to the so-called smokefilled rooms choose the candidates, which is not very democratic either.”

Could social bonds be affected when people stop working and do not really need to engage in society anymore?

“That is possible, and the other thing is people developing relations with machines instead of other people. You already see some of that. Kids play too many videogames already. Imagine when your devices interact with you the way another person does, when you cannot notice the difference. A lot of people are going to lose their grip on what is human and what is not.”

In Spain, where I am from, we have had unemployment rates of over 20 per cent for the last five years. The government has implemented policies aimed at increasing labour flexibility. Now, where you used to see a full-time, well-paid job, now you find two part-time, badly paid ones. Are these policies going to ease the effects of automation in the long run?

“It may be helpful in the short term. That is more like it is in the US, where we have a very flexible economy. Those good solid jobs disappeared, and got replaced by these lousy jobs flipping hamburgers. The problem is, automation is ultimately going to come for those less desirable jobs too: A lot of them can be automated.

Therefore, I do not view that as a longterm solution.” u

WE WILL ALWAYS NEED LAWYERS Eli Morgan Harris may be 23, but he has got a lot to say. As a Leader of Tomorrow, he impressed everyone at the symposium with his stories about working at DJI Technology, the world’s leading civilian drone manufacturer with a 70 per cent market share. As a member of DJI’s business development team, he is very much aware of the tasks subject to automation by drones. “A lot of our focus is on new commercial applications, from agriculture to construction, mining, firefighting and search & rescue,” he says. Although concerned with unemployment caused by automation –“it is becoming a serious issue”– he does not foresee a future where there will be no market for human labour. “Drones will be able to do a lot of jobs that humans previously did, but they are also creating a whole new industry and market: drone manufacturing, maintenance, service providers, software developers, hardware designers, marketing people, lawyers,” he says.

ALGORITHM BLUES

can candidate in the United States, I do not think they would have picked Donald Trump, right? Democracy, to some extent, requires the people to vote, but I think definitely there will be more roles for artificial intelligence.”

98

BEWARE OF SKYNET – Computer power is growing at incredible speed, doubling approximately every two years.

Scientists are predicting a technological explosion with unforeseen impact. Are we prepared for the computer revolution?

TILL DALDRUP (TEXT)

WELCOME TO THE SURPRISE PARTY Computer power is growing at exponential speed – but what does that really mean? To understand this, imagine a chessboard. Put a grain of rice on the first square. Put two on the second, four on the third. Keep doubling the amount with every square. How much rice is on the board when you reach the 64th and last square? Well, it sure will not fit on a chessboard: The amount would outstrip global annual rice production approximately 1,000 times over. In fact, it would probably be enough to cover the whole world in a several inch-deep layer of rice grains. Surprised?

The same thing has basically happened to computer power over the past fifty years: It has doubled approximately every two years, as chips become smaller and are packed with twice the amount of transistors. This process is called Moore’s law, named after Intel Co-Founder Gordon E. Moore. Moore predicted this development in the 60s, first saying the amount of transistors on chips would double every year, later revising his prediction to a twoyear cycle.

This progress brought us from roomfilling machines to high-tech computers in our pockets, from bulky telephone systems to ultra-fast data transport on the Internet. The future outcomes of this exponential growth are nearly unforeseeable: Since we humans have mostly dealt

with linear developments throughout our evolution as a species, we have a hard time processing this exponential progress – and we might be surprised where it leads us.

But Moore’s law is not a natural principle like Newton’s laws of motion. It is merely an observation of a technological development. So is this progress really going to go on forever? Scientists are split over that question: Moore himself predicted in 1995 that technological growth would start to decelerate within ten years, a prognosis that turned out to be incorrect. Now he forecasts that the end of his law would come in 2025. And this time he could be right.

The growth of computer power has slowed down a little bit recently: As it gets more and more expensive to double the amount of transistors on a chip, they might also reach a physical limit. A transistor nowadays is 14 nanometers small, 500 times tinier than a red blood cell.

If you shrink them further, to the size of just a few atoms, the physics of electrons working in them might not function anymore.

But recent developments have raised hopes that other techniques might replace the “traditional” way of building computer chips. That is why Martin Ford, computer engineer and robotics expert, thinks that Moore’s law is going to con-

B

99 BEWARE OF SKYNET

tinue in the long run, even if the growth rate might deteriorate. “There are other options on the table, for example making three-dimensional chips, where we are stacking transistors on top of each other,” Ford says. Another possible alternative is quantum computing, a technology which promises to accelerate computers nearly infinitely. It is still unclear if these techniques are going to be the big break the industry wishes them to be. But the potential is immense.

Some even think that this development might lead to something called singularity, a point of no return in tech growth.

Supporters of this hypothesis believe that from that moment on, computers could improve themselves or build even smarter machines. Soon they could far exceed human intelligence.

Society would radically change: Machines could become overlords or superBy calculations per second per $1000 intelligent helpers. “I think more and more of our society and economy will be run by

artificial intelligence, by algorithms," says Ford. “Hopefully there will be an important role for people, and they will be in control.”

So when are we going to see this explosion of technological development? No one can be sure. Predictions range from 30 to 100 years. Some say it is never going to happen. But that is the thing with exponential developments: Few people expect them until they are already there. u

GORDON E. MOORE Moore is the Co-Founder of semiconductor giant Intel. In the tech world, he is hailed for his predictions regarding the growth of computer power, also known as “Moore’s law”. From 1979 on he was the CEO of Intel, before becoming Chairman of the Board in 1987. He retired ten years later and turned to philanthropy, establishing the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.

WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THE GROWTH OF COMPUTING POWER? Will growth of computer power slow down as doubling the amount of transistors on a chip gets more expensive? Or will other technologies replace “traditional” computer chips?

Growth of computing power by calculations per second per USD 1,000

10 2045 Surpasses brain power of all humans brains combined

26

1020

Source: humanswlord.wordpress.com (until 2045, after that: own estimates)

1015

10.000.000.000

100.000

1

0,00001 1900

1920

1940

1960

1980

2000

2015

2020

2045

Surpasses brain power of human in 2025 Surpasses brain power of mouse in 2015

100 URBAN VISIONARY – How are we going to prepare our cities for the challenges to come? Architect and urban planner Carlo Ratti shares his vision for the metropolis of the future and prepared an exclusive illustration just for the magazine.

TILL DALDRUP (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

What do you think the city of the future will look like?

“What I think will change most is not the appearance of the city, but the life inside: The way of moving, the way of thinking, the way of working. The concept of offices will change a lot. It will be more flexible.

We can be connected from anywhere. Logistics and shopping will be different. Life is going to be transformed thanks to digital information.”

How does digital information help to change our life?

“Data plays a huge role, because it is a way for us to understand what is going on in the city. One way of using it is self-driving cars. They get data in real-time and are basically scanning the city to navigate in it.

This is going to change our everyday life.

Cars become a moving room for working and living. Also, we can share them with our friends and family, because they can pick them up independently. And lastly, they are going to use the infrastructure more efficiently. And that’s why I think that we can change a city more through silicon than through asphalt.”

So how will this change happen?

“I think the most interesting things are happening in a bottom-up way. Uber, AirBnB or smart thermostats by Nest are smart-city applications that are happening naturally through an organic, unforced growth of these companies. And I think that is what is driving this development, not government built model cities that are labelled smart city.” ↦

WE BUILT THIS CITY ON BITS & BYTES

101 URBAN VISIONARY

LIFE IN THE FUTURE IN 2050, THERE WILL BE NEARLY 10 BILLION PEOPLE ON EARTH, 70 PER CENT OF WHICH WILL LIVE IN CITIES. HOW IS LIFE GOING TO BE ORGANISED IN METROPOLISES? LET US IMAGINE WHAT LIVING IN THE CITY OF THE FUTURE MIGHT LOOK LIKE.

7 A.M. – WAKING UP I wake up snuggled in my bed. I am already not a morning person, but my new intelligent thermostat makes it even harder for me to get up: It keeps my room at just the right temperature, which makes sleeping in all the more seductive.

Somehow I manage to drag myself into the bathroom, where I check up on the news and the weather report in my virtual bathroom mirror. Just a quick shower with purified rainwater, and I am good to go. As I close the front door, my smart home turns down the heat to save energy.

Illustration by Chiara Borghi, Carlo Ratti Associati ®

8 A.M. – DRIVING TO WORK I am running a little bit late, but fortunately I can already answer some e-mails, since my car does the driving all by itself.

It collects road map and traffic data in order to navigate and it interacts with other self-driving cars to prevent crashes. This makes morning traffic a sort of superefficient car ballet: A central algorithm ensures that every car is taking the most effective route, travels at optimum speed and minimises waiting time at intersections. This spares the asphalt and saves ↦

102 URBAN VISIONARY

Do we not have to plan ahead? There are going to be seven billion people living in cities by 2050.

“Sometimes people say: ‘We will have to build a new London every so-and-so days in the future’ in order to deal with this. But the thing is: This ‘new London’ is made up of millions and millions of people all over the world. This whole movement is incremental, natural growth. People moving from the countryside to the city – it is the same thing that happened in Europe a hundred years ago. And with real-time data we are going to be able to plan this development even better.” u

fuel and resources. And even finding a parking spot has become easy, now that all parking zones are equipped with infrared sensors which tell if the spot is taken or not. My car knows exactly where it has to go. I myself do not have to worry about a thing: Since I do not have to watch the road, my car has become a second office.

1 P.M. – COFFEE BREAK Speaking of alternative workspaces: Thanks to super-fast open WiFi and solar-powered charging stations for phones and laptops all around the city, my office can be wherever I want now.

So I decide to take a small coffee break outside. I feel a little self-conscious though: There are cameras in nearly every street, centrally monitored by the police. The pictures are processed by software that detects suspicious behaviour and automatically informs nearby police. But this is not the only thing being done to prevent crimes: An algorithm analyses immense amounts of social data and can predict when and where crimes are going to happen. These so called pre-cops helped to get the crime rates down, but I still feel a little uncomfortable when I think about it.

8 P.M. – GOING HOME

Carlo Ratti, 45, is an Italian architect and engineer. He teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he leads the “Senseable City Lab.”

I decide to take the long way home and send my car home by itself. As I walk through the park, the light of the street lamps follows me around, triggered by motion sensors. The energy for that comes from wind parks and biogas plants outside of the city. As I return to my smart home, the thermostat has already pre-heated the flat for my arrival time, which I scheduled on my smartphone earlier. I just grab a bite to eat and throw out some trash. I open the door of the vacuum garbage disposal that sucks in my garbage bag and transports it through a tube to the central compound. As I look into the void of the of the garbage tube, I hesitate for a little bit. And then I think to myself: “What a time to be alive.”

103

LET’S TALK ABOUT RETIREMENT

EAT THE YOUNG – Pension systems worldwide are under pressure: Retirees will soon outnumber workers. Many funds have also been criticised for making irresponsible investments with public money. Is there a future for pensions? We asked a Leader of Today and a Leader of Tomorrow to weigh in.

RUBEN DIELEMAN (TEXT)

FEWER AND FEWER WORKERS HAVE TO SUPPORT MORE RETIREES As life expectancy grows and fertility rates sink, the working age population has to pay for retirees’ pension benefits.

Workers per retiree (“support ratio”) for selected countries.

Source: www.macrobusiness.com.au

7

6

5

WORKERS PER RETIREE

While pension funds may still provide today’s seniors with security and happiness, are pension funds sustainable once retirees outnumber the working population?

“Three things will have to happen,” says Adrian Orr, CEO of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund, which invests money on behalf of the government to cover the increasing costs of future entitlements and has been held up as a shining example of a sustainable pension system.

“Humans are going to have to take more responsibility for themselves when they come to retire. They are going to have to save. This also counts for your generation, think hard about that,” Orr says, pointing at his young daughter, standing next to him. “The second one is that the pension funds themselves are going to have to be less generous. No politician will want to introduce this, so that is going to be painful. The third thing to do is to stop destroying wealth through poor investing behaviour.”

Martin Speer, 29, is a Leader of Tomorrow, an Ambassador for the Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations, and Founder of the Institute of Europe. Does Speer agree with Orr that there is still a future for pension funds? “Yes, but only if some major changes are made to make them more stable,” Speer reckons.

From a German perspective, Speer points out that not everyone is paying into the system. German people do not save much, Speer says. “Indeed, people in general will have to work longer, and will have to be more flexible, or they will have to organise themselves to strengthen the state-based system. The current European low interest rates make it unattractive for individuals to save. That is why I think it is so important to improve the state-based system of pension funds. However, I hope the future is a Europe-based pension system.”

4

3

2

1

0

1990

1995

2000

2005

Russia

United States

Japan

Germany

2010

2015

2020

2025

2030

2035

2040

2045

2050

United Kingdom

According to Speer, young people do not care for pensions anymore. “Our parents’ generations have not successfully reformed the system to stay in tune with the new reality of jobs,” he says. “Consequently, the idea of a generational contract does not seem to be working anymore.”

Because of that, Speer wanted to bring young people together to demonstrate in Berlin for better reforms. The turn-out was disappointing. Says Speer: “Our social security system does not really appeal to young people: it is something faraway, and very complex.”

Referring to the 46th St. Gallen Symposium’s theme, Orr says pension funds like his stand for growth in a good way.

“Growth alone is not good, but it is not evil either. It is something that humans will always do,” he says. “Let’s make sure we are doing it in a sustainable way.”

This is not easy, with pension funds facing various fundamental challenges.

Speer is optimistic that his generation will come up with solutions. “There is enough creativity out there, and enough pressure.

Perhaps this concept of basic income is the future,” Speer says. u

YEAR

104

ALL TOGETHER NOW! Where do we want to go from here? For corporate board members, this is a crucial and sometimes tricky question. For Switzerland’s Raiffeisenbank, it turned out to be particularly tricky: It not only asked its board for their two cents on the company’s future, it asked its more than 10,000 employees to help generate new company guidelines. It was the beginning of a complex participation process, managed by a vast array of councils, sub-councils and sub-sub-councils.

The strategic reform took more than four years to finish and cost Raiffeisenbank an eight figure sum. Nonetheless,

TOO MANY COOKS? – Cooperatives are not chasing staggering profits, focusing instead on participation and social responsibility.

Yet some still grow up to be major players.

Is the concept a meaningful model for sustainable growth?

TILL DALDRUP (TEXT)

officials say it was worth the price. “Our employees are way more motivated to work for a strategy that they helped create,” says bank spokesperson Hilmar Gernet. Credibility, sustainability, proximity and local entrepreneurship: These are the values that workers wanted to emphasise.

Raiffeisen is a cooperative and as such participation is one of its core values. Cooperatives are associations that are essentially owned by customers and founded on the idea of member involvement. This may not be easy to handle in a world of globalisation and high-frequency trade,

but it might be a solution for some of capitalism’s core problems.

But this collaboration is very hard to achieve, especially for large firms. Take Migros for example: The supermarket chain is Switzerland’s biggest cooperative. More than two million people in the country are invested in the company. Asking all of these members for input on every decision would be impractical. That is why in everyday business, the management team can work independently.

This does not mean that it has free rein, though. Management has to report to member delegates, who control how

105 TOO MANY COOKS?

profit is used, determine long-term strategy and re-elect the CEO. That could be a hard pill to swallow for a manager, but Migros’ CEO Herbert Bolliger seems to be relaxed about it. “I was never angry over a decision the member delegates made,” he says. “Up to now they’ve been very reasonable and future-oriented.” (He might have been a little bugged when he was reelected as CEO with only a meagre majority of votes back in 2012.)

This major influence of members ensures that basic ideas of the cooperative are not jeopardised. For example, Migros is not after staggering profits, but rein-

vests a lot of its revenues back into the company or cultural projects. It does not sell alcohol and tobacco. And if its revenues are high, Migros starts lowering its prices. All of this is supposed to ensure more sustainable growth.

But restraints like that might be why young entrepreneurs are not that excited about the cooperative model. Worldwide, the number of cooperatives is shrinking.

These founders miss out on an important advantage though: Cooperatives are not only sustainable, they are also traditionally among the most trusted and popular companies. u

“Cooperatives combine two dimensions: They are market-oriented, but they also have a social component rooted in their identity,” says Alexandra Ettlin. The Ph.D. Candidate at the University of St. Gallen won the second place in the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award competition for her essay “Rethinking growth: how cooperatives can foster common growth.” In her opinion, cooperatives have a more sustainable approach than publicly-held companies thanks to their participative model. “Unlike publicly traded firms, managers of cooperative organisations do not face as much pressure about short-term profit optimisation.”

106

AN AFRICAN ANSWER TO GROWTH

LOCAL DIFFERENCE – The Africapitalism philosophy goes beyond the old concept of capitalism. For the Nigerian banker Tony Elumelu, the African private sector can transform the continent through long term investments, simultaneously creating economic prosperity and social wealth.

SARA ROSATI & NATASHA R. SILVA (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTO)

Weak governments are good for business.

For years, global firms strongly believed in this concept, and were attracted to Africa because of the opportunities presented by poor regulation, cheap labour, tax evasion and abundant raw materials. Multinational corporations were able to expand across the continent.

Challenging the contemporary capitalism model is the goal of the so-called Africapitalism movement. This term, created by the multimillionaire Nigerian banker Tony Elumelu, is based on the idea that private investment can be transformed into social wealth.

“The philosophy basically says that Africa’s private sector should lead in the continent’s development. Africa should not depend only on aid from outside,” says Parminder Vir, the Chief Executive Officer of the Tony Elumelu Foundation. They believe that foreign aid to Africa did not help develop the continent, and that it stimulated corruption instead.

“If you look at the 100 most admired brands in Africa, 70 per cent of them are non-African,” says Thebe Ikalafeng, the Founder of the African brand and reputation advisory firm, Brand Leadership. “That means the 70 per cent of the agenda is

non-African.” He thinks that Africans need to fund business and brands in Africa to create jobs and invest it in their agenda.

According to The Economist, one of the main goals for African governments over the next ten years is to keep improving roads, pushing out grasping officials and lowering the tariff barriers that still hobble trade between African countries.

(Trade with neighboring countries makes up only 11 per cent of total African exports and imports.) “Have you tried to travel between two African countries? It is imposible!” Vir says.

Africa’s future rests on the productivity of its people. By 2050, the UN predicts that there will be 2.5 billion Africans, a quarter of the world’s population. “I believe that in 50 years Africa will be the land of opportunity,” Vir says. “In the next 10 years, we will see an economic revolution guided by young entrepreneurs.”

This rising generation of Africapitalists believe the private sector can solve Africa’s development challenges more effectively and with greater sustainability than either the philanthropic or public sector.

“Some economies across Africa, Nigeria being the classic example, became too dependent on oil,” Vir says.

CHINESE INVASION? Africapitalists will have to prove if it is possible to do good and make money at the same time. They are under pressure: The rise of Chinese investments in Africa has increased significantly in the recent years, to the point that some call it Chinese neocolonialism.

Some argue the exchange can be mutually beneficial. Vir says Africa simply needs Chinese capital to build infrastructure and China needs African resources.

Others say Africa’s prices are set too low. “The African problem is that we are too desperate and we accept that kind of support at any cost,” says Ikalafeng.

“We should be more aggressive, more determined, and more decisive in fighting for investment in our own terms.

Those terms are what moves our agenda forwards. Our agenda is what makes Africa economically independent.”

107 LOCAL DIFFERENCE

Nigeria actually derives more than 90 per cent of its export revenue from oil, which has recently plummeted far below the price needed to draw in new investors.

“And it has become imperative to diversify those economies,” Vir says. The role of governments is to build political stability and consistent policies to stimulate economic growth. “It is building institutions that can really train the next generations of leaders,” she says.

A year ago, The Tony Elumelu Foundation launched a USD 100 million entrepreneurship programme with the goal of supporting the education and development of 10,000 African entrepreneurs over the next ten years. Adeloye Olanrewaju, a 24-year-old Nigerian, was a part of this programme; he is a Leader of Tomorrow at the St. Gallen Symposium. He created an app called SaferMom to monitor the health of mothers and their newborns. “I had a great experience creating my start-up. We also had the best mentors.” His startup received The Queen’s Young Leaders Awards, among others.

“The principles on which Africapitalism is founded are ones of responding to inequality by empowering young entrepreneurs,” Vir explains. u

African entrepreneurs gathered for an impromptu lunch (and selfies) on the last day of the symposium.

108

EQUALITY IS NOT THE SOLUTION DIFFERENT PIE, PLEASE – As a black feminist, Reni Eddo-Lodge emphasises that striving for equality in terms of race and gender is not enough. Today’s system should be restructured to dismantle inequality.

ANNA-LENA SACHS (TEXT), LUKAS RAPP (PHOTO)

When Reni Eddo-Lodge was growing up in South London, people told her she lived in a meritocracy. But she soon realised that there were different forces at work.

“I had aspirations, I had ambitions and I tried to get into powerful places. I just noticed these places were homogenous.

Nobody looked like me. I realised that there were forces other than merit that got those people in the room,” she says.

These realisations led the journalist and blogger, who has contributed to The New York Times, The Guardian and The Telegraph, to identify as black feminist. Being a black feminist means incorporating the dominant structures of both racism and feminism into the analysis of power, Eddo-Lodge explains. By criticising the status quo, black feminists seek to dismantle structural inequality.

With regard to the symposium, the Leader of Tomorrow would have liked to hear more female perspectives: Two thirds of the Leaders of Tomorrow were male, and most of the speakers who attended the symposium were male, giving only a few women the chance to give their perspectives.

While most only thought about this gender gap when filling in the poll (see poll, next page), it is a daily reality for the

British blogger. The 26-year-old wants to be free from limits imposed on her by others. Still, she notices these structural inequalities in her everyday life. “When I hand in my CV, I am less likely to be called in for an interview simply because my name sounds African,” explains EddoLodge.

These barriers are not only visible in terms of race. Being a woman comes with restrictions. “I want to be free from limits that tell me that I have to be extra careful when walking home at night because as a woman it is more likely that somebody is going to attack me,” she says.

EQUAL TO WHOM? While addressing these issues, Eddo-Lodge distinguishes between striving for equality and liberation. While women seek equality, they have to ask which men they want to be equal to. She points out that not even all men are equal: Some men are CEOs, and others take out the rubbish every week.

“Do I want parity with people who already have a disproportionately large slice of the pie, or do I want to start thinking about why the pie is structured the way it is and how to actually fundamentally change the pie in the first place?”, she asks.

109

Eddo-Lodge does not want to be equal in a system that is not just. For her, it is simply not enough to achieve equality. She wants to be free of a system that limits her by virtue of being a black woman.

Moreover, equality suggests that in order to be successful, women have to act like men. Some organisations “offer young women employees subsidies to freeze their eggs in order to have children in later life, rather than actually fundamentally restructuring their company to embrace the fact that half the population can get pregnant and have children in order to continue the human race,” says Eddo-Lodge.

Some people are profoundly uncomfortable with these differences between men and women but also between different skin colours, explains Eddo-Lodge. But she believes that difference should be accommodated and not erased.

UNCONSCIOUS BIAS AT THE SYMPOSIUM While Eddo-Lodge engaged in several conversations about black feminism as a Leader of Tomorrow, she also spotted unconscious biases at the symposium.

During a panel of the programme for the

Leaders of Tomorrow three men and one woman discussed whether or not one has to give up work-life balance in order to advance in their career as quickly as possible.

Some discussion participants claimed that to be successful one has to sacrifice personal time. Eddo-Lodge, however, argues that half of the population are women and some of them want to get pregnant and start families. She pointed out that success, as discussed in this panel, does not account for people who want to be successful in their career but also spend time with their families.

Prioritising professional advancement is not possible for people who have caring responsibilities, “but it is a lot easier if you are a man and the current social roles are that you are the breadwinner and your wife takes care of the children at home,” says Eddo-Lodge.

While she leaves the policy and legislating on social justice to others, she tries to change the way people think about these issues through her writing. “Laws may be the beginning of the public conversation, but they certainly do not solve the problem,” Eddo-Lodge explains. u

JOHANNES BERCHTOLD, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER OF THE ST. GALLEN FOUNDATION FOR INTERNATIONAL STUDIES, ON GENDER REPRESENTATION AT THE SYMPOSIUM “Gender diversity both among our speakers and participants is paramount to us. Unfortunately, we can do little influence to the outcome.

Where the Leaders of Tomorrow are handpicked, we look for gender equilibrium. However, we cannot interfere with the results of the essay competition. The only thing we can do is encourage female students on our roadshow across the continents to apply for it. As much as it is true that our faculty is still male-dominated, it is also the case that we do invite many female speakers but were unlucky this year with securing their participation.

We do, however, struggle with the fact that there are still fewer women in top leadership positions than men.

Since the leaders of big corporations make up an important proportion of our speakers, the imbalance on some of the St. Gallen panels simply reflects the sad reality?”

Participants in the session “Future Growth – Tops and Flops” were able to vote via the MySymposium App on the question "Why is there no woman on the panel?”

DIFFERENT PIE, PLEASE

“WE CANNOT INTERFERE”

110 BREXIT

WHY I AM WORRIED SUSANN EBERLEIN (TEXT)

As a German, should I worry about Great Britain leaving the EU? Will Brexit have a tremendous impact on my life? I have to change my euros into pounds anyway, and besides, getting rid of a sceptical, perpetually complaining country could also be a relief ...

Well, I am still worried. The European Union is already in trouble: The refugee crisis, Euro-skepticism and the rise of nationalism are all troubling developments. Brexit would be another punch in the EU’s face. Even the strongest boxers can endure only a few of them. Great Britain dropping out of a club that offers economical and political advantages and secures peace on the old continent could be the beginning of the EU’s collapse, encouraging others to leave too.

The EU needs Great Britain as an example of liberty and democracy. With its 43 years of EU experience, its economic power and its huge population, it acts as counterpart to my country. Do I want an even stronger Germany in the EU, while being left alone with weak(er), struggling countries? I do not.

However, as the Brexit threat shows, the EU project needs to be pushed further.

Economical and political integration is not enough. A shared European identity is necessary, an attachment to each other – like the one a boxer shares with his coach, who pushes his pupil through twelve rounds instead of taking him out the ring too fast. At the end, the boxer might even win on points.

HISTORY Even though it was British Prime Minister Winston Churchill who came up with the idea of a united Europe after the Second World War, the integration process was driven by others. Ever since, Great Britain has taken a rather sceptical attitude. Economic problems encouraged them to join the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1973. Margaret Thatcher refused to sign on for the euro.

Great Britain is often described as unwilling to integrate and as the problem child of the EU.

CAUSES In the run up to the 2015 general election, the UK Independence Party (UKIP) was quickly gaining supporters as well as publicity. They argued that Britain has no say and has lost all control to the EU. They also stirred up fears of immigration, arguing that Britain must leave the EU in order to have control of who is coming in and out of the country. Prime Minister David Cameron wanted to gain some support back from UKIP supporters and so promised a referendum if he won the elections. He has since come out in favour of staying in the EU.

REFERENDUM On Thursday, June 23rd 2016, a referendum will be held to decide the future of Great Britain in the European Union.

British, Irish and Commonwealth citizens over 18 who are residents in the UK have the opportunity to go to the polls to decide on the following question: Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union? This is not the first such referendum: In 1975, the Brits had to choose whether to stay in or leave the EEC. At the time, over 67 per cent of the voters were in favour of integration.

111

BREXIT – Britain has been a part of the EU since the 1970’s, but with the referendum soon approaching, Brexit has become the buzzword of 2016 as well as at the St. Gallen Symposium. In the words of English punk band The Clash, “Should I stay or should I go now?”

SUSANN EBERLEIN & JESSICA WILLIAMS (TEXT)

POLITICAL OUTCOMES Those in favour of Brexit argue that Britain will have a chance to re-establish itself as an independent nation and regain rights such as its coastal fishing rights. However, those against leaving the EU maintain that Britain risks isolating itself from the rest of Europe and becoming a much less useful ally to the US, thus reducing its standing globally.

ECONOMIC OUTCOMES There is no doubt that leaving the EU would save money for Britain in the short term, as it contributes billions of pounds each year to the EU budget. On the other hand, lots of big financial companies use Britain as a point of contact in the European Union. They may move to another country within the EU. There is a risk of Britain losing access to the single market and to free movement of labour.

BREXIT

BREXIT IN BRIEF

STRONGER TOGETHER JESSICA WILLIAMS (TEXT)

As a British student, Brexit has become a buzzword the past couple of years. It is a topic covered over a pint at the pub and always has prominent place in the papers for some reason or another. I believe we Brits are stronger in the EU than out of it. Although I have always thought about myself as British first, European second, I feel that Europe is still a crucial part of my identity.

Not only that, it is a crucial part of Britain’s identity: Without Europe we are merely a lonely island with no ties to anywhere but ourselves. To isolate ourselves in this way seems incredibly short-sighted. It means we cut ourselves off from allies.

From what I have heard, there seems to be a lack of solid statistics from the Brexit campaign as to why exactly we will benefit from leaving – whereas there are so many that contest it, such as the fact that the EU has increased the average British salary by GBP 18,000. As far as I can see, the only thing Brexit can really offer is more independence for Great Britain. However, if you want to be part of a community you have to be willing to lose a little independence and cooperate.

We get so much more from being in the EU than we do by leaving it, such as the freedom to work and live anywhere in the EU. In addition, having lived in London for most of my life, I can see the benefits of such a multi-cultural society and how much EU workers contribute to public services. I feel that an unsubstantiated fear of immigrants has been perpetuated by parties such as the UK Independence Party (UKIP). Britain must give up on this vanity project and stop blaming the EU for its problems.

112

FOLLOW ME – The 46th St. Gallen Symposium is over. We met up with the ISC member, the Leader of Tomorrow and the Leader of Today to reflect on the experience.

Were their expectations met?

PARTICIPANTS LOOK BACK

RUBEN DIELEMAN (TEXT), DANIEL KINDSTRAND (PHOTOS)

ISC: MORITZ SCHNORPFEIL 19, BACHELOR STUDENT OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ST. GALLEN AND MEMBER OF THE ORGANISING COMMITTEE “My expectations have definitely been met! Except for one thing: Usually, I am not great at approaching people, but during the symposium, it was surprisingly easy. I had wonderful conversations. The experience of organising it was great.”

113

25, COINTELEGRAPH.COM “The symposium is big, but it is still such an intimate experience. At the St. Gallen Symposium, people are so open to connecting. It has been such a moving experience. The crew go out of their way to make this possible. I think the symposium is one of the world’s best kept secrets.”

LEADER OF TODAY: JAMIE TUUTA 39, MAORI TRUSTEE “The rain forced people to remain in the sessions and brought them together. It was really interesting to hear the things that emerged through the conversations and discussions. I feel privileged to have been here, meeting people and sharing our views. What stood out to me was the realisation and acceptance that many people are now looking at growth in a more holistic way.”

FOLLOW ME

LEADER OF TOMORROW: TONI LANE CASSERLY

114

SPEAKERS

Each year, a distinguished faculty of eminent international personalities explores and develops its views on present and long-term issues in business, politics and society with a focus on economic processes within their relevant environments. This year, the following speakers joined the symposium:

Nils Smedegaard Andersen (DK)

Martin Ford (US)

Joe Landolina (US)

Group Chief Executive Officer, A.P. Møller - Mærsk A/S

Entrepreneur & Author, Solutionsoft

Leader of Tomorrow, Founder, President & Chief Executive Officer, Suneris, Inc.

Xavier Bettel (LU)

Christoph Franz (DE)

Prime Minister of Luxembourg

Markus J. Beyrer (AT) Director General, BUSINESSEUROPE

Mark Boleat (GB)

Chairman, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd

Guido Fürer (CH) Group Chief Investment Officer, Swiss Re

Chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee, City of London Corporation

Prof. Gary Gillespie (GB)

Peter Brabeck-Letmathe (AT)

Alex Goad (AU)

Chairman of the Board of Directors, Nestlé S.A.

Adrien Briod (CH)

Chief Economic Advisor, The Scottish Government

Leader of Tomorrow, Co-Founder, Reef Design Lab

Leader of Tomorrow, Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer, Flyability SA

Michael Hankel (DE)

Prof. Monika Bütler (CH)

Larry Harvey (US)

Member of the Board of Management, ZF Friedrichshafen AG

Professor of Economics, University of St. Gallen

Co-Founder & Chief Philosophic Officer, Burning Man

CHAN Chun Sing (SG)

Thebe Ikalafeng (ZA)

Minister, Prime Minister’s Office of Singapore

Founder & Group Chief Executive Officer, Brand Leadership

Carlo d’Asaro Biondo (IT/FR)

Katarina Ilic (CA)

President EMEA strategic relationships, Google

Baron David de Rothschild (FR) Executive Chairman, Rothschild & Co Group

Jacques de Watteville (CH) State Secretary, Swiss Federal Department of Finance

Marcela Escobari (US/BO) Executive Director, Center for International Development, Harvard University

Leader of Tomorrow, Head of Research and Development, Voltera, Inc.

Mitsuru Izumo (JP) President, euglena Co., Ltd

Prof. Tim Jackson (GB) Professor of Sustainable Development, University of Surrey

Mari Kiviniemi (FI) Deputy Secretary-General, OECD

Fabrice Leggeri (FR) Executive Director, Frontex

Prof. Danny Leipziger (US) Managing Director, Growth Dialogue

Doris Leuthard (CH) Vice-President & Federal Councillor of the Swiss Confederation

Kevin Lu (CN) Distinguished Fellow, INSEAD and Partner & Member of the Global Executive Board, Partners Group

Leslie Maasdorp (ZA) Chief Financial Officer, New Development Bank

Kathy Matsui (US) Global Investment Research, Goldman Sachs Japan Co., Ltd.

Dambisa Moyo (GB) International Economist & Author

Andrew Mullinger (GB) Co-Founder, Funding Circle

Adrian Orr (NZ) Chief Executive Officer, New Zealand Superannuation Fund

Falko Paetzold (CH) Research Affiliate, Sloan School of Management at Massachusetts Institute of Technology

115

Sachin Pilot (IN)

Tidjane Thiam (FR/CI)

Former Minister for Corporate Affairs of India & President, Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee

Chief Executive Officer, Credit Suisse Group AG

Sarah Turine (BE) Cesar Purisima (PH) Secretary of the Philippine Department of Finance

Carlo Ratti (IT) Director, MIT Senseable City Lab & Founding Partner, Carlo Ratti Associati

Rick Ridgeway (US) Vice President of Public Engagement, Patagonia

Stephan Rietiker (CH) Chief Executive Officer, LifeWatch

Deputy Mayor of Molenbeek, Brussels

Jamie Tuuta (NZ) Maori Trustee & Chief Executive Officer, Te Tumu Paeroa

Eyda Varela de Chinchilla (PA) Vice-Minister of Finance of the Republic of Panama

Parminder Vir (GB) Chief Executive Officer, Tony Elumelu Foundation

Luca Visentini (IT) General Secretary, European Trade Union Confederation

Patrick Scheurle (CH) Chief Executive Officer, BlueOrchard Finance Ltd

Mathis Wackernagel (CH/US) President, Global Footprint Network

Jan Schoch (CH) Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Leonteq Securities AG

Clare Woodcraft-Scott (GB) Chief Executive Officer, Emirates Foundation

Antonis Schwarz (DE/GR) Impact Investor

Felix Zhang (CN)

Markus Seiler (CH)

Executive Director, Envision Energy

Head, Swiss Federal Intelligence Service

Danny Zheng (CN) Vice President,

Lord Robert Skidelsky (GB) Professor of Political Economy, University of Warwick

Bruno Stagno Ugarte (CR) Deputy Executive Director for Advocacy, Human Rights Watch

Charles ThĂŠpaut (FR) Political advisor, North Africa and Middle East Directorate, French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development

DJI Innovations

116

TOPIC LEADERS

Topic Leaders act as ambassadors of the St. Gallen Symposium and through their presence and role promote dialogue between the generations. In doing so, they bring together the Leaders of Today and the Leaders of Tomorrow.

This year, the following Topic Leaders joined the symposium:

Ivan Adamovich (CH)

Prof. Simon Evenett (GB)

Pranjal Sharma (IN)

Head of Private Banking International & Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Notenstein La Roche Private Bank Ltd

Director, Swiss Institute for International Economics, University of St. Gallen

Consulting Editor, Businessworld

Prof. Omid Aschari (AT)

Peter Fischer (CH)

Managing Director, SIM-HSG, University of St. Gallen

Economics-Editor-in-Chief, Neue ZĂźrcher Zeitung

Professor of Philosophy, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of St. Gallen

Priscila Bala (BR)

Prof. Christoph Frei (CH)

Prof. Peter Vogel (AT)

Member of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community

Associate Professor, School of Economics and Political Science, University of St. Gallen

Assistant Professor for Technology Entrepreneurship, University of St. Gallen

Misha Glenny (GB)

Prof. Klaus Wellershoff (DE)

Author

Chairman of the Board and Partner, Wellershoff & Partners Ltd.

Prof. Dieter Thomä (DE)

Andres Barreto (CO) Leader of Tomorrow, Founding Partner, Socialatom Group

Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach (GB) Prof. Thomas Bieger (CH) President, University of St. Gallen

Andrew Hill (GB) Management Editor & Columnist, The Financial Times

James Chau (GB) Special Contributor, China Central Television

Prof. Yoshinori Imai (JP) Visiting Professor, Ritsumeikan University

Heinrich Christen (CH) Partner, Ernst & Young AG

Riz Khan (GB)

Peter Day (GB)

Leslie Maasdorp (ZA)

Global Business Correspondent, BBC News

Chief Financial Officer, New Development Bank

Michael Dillhyon (US)

Bree Romuld (AU)

Chief Executive Officer, YouBase, Founder, healthbank

Member of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community

Aiko Doden (JP)

Stephen Sackur (GB)

Senior Commentator, NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation)

Presenter HARDtalk, BBC News

Nina dos Santos (GB)

Viswa Sadasivan (SG)

London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

Chief Executive Officer, Strategic Moves

Prof. Thomas Dyllick (CH/DE)

Gerhard Schwarz (CH)

Director, Institute for Economy and the Environment, University of St. Gallen

Author & Columnist

International Journalist

117

WORK SESSIONS

The Work Sessions are the core element of the St. Gallen Symposium. They complement and expand on the Plenary Sessions and allow participants to directly exchange their opinions and experiences. In groups of about thirty participants, the Work Sessions provide the opportunity to take part in intense debates.

Infrastructure as a growth generator – the corporate perspective Nils Smedegaard Andersen (DK), Group Chief Executive Officer, A.P. Møller-Mærsk A/S Topic Leader: Andrew Hill (GB), Management Editor & Columnist, The Financial Times

Can Europe be successful without industry?

Markus J. Beyrer (AT), Director General, BUSINESSEUROPE Topic Leader: Nina dos Santos (GB), London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

Brexit – the City of London view Mark Boleat (GB), Chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee, City of London Corporation Topic Leader: Riz Khan (GB), International Journalist

Water Peter Brabeck-Letmathe (AT), Chairman of the Board of Directors, Nestlé S.A. Topic Leader: Riz Khan (GB), International Journalist

Break-through innovations: smart solutions delivered by the young Adrien Briod (CH), Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer, Flyability SA Alex Goad (AU), Co-Founder, Reef Design Lab Katarina Ilic (CA), Head of Research and Development, Voltera, Inc. Joe Landolina (US), Founder, President & Chief Executive Officer, Suneris, Inc. Topic Leader: Andres Barreto (CO), Founding Partner, Socialatom Group

Basic income – a base for growth?

Prof. Monika Bütler (CH), Professor of Economics, University of St. Gallen Topic Leader: Prof. Klaus Wellershoff (DE), Chairman of the Board of Directors, Wellershoff & Partners Ltd.

Do city-states have any chance to grow well without growing bad and ugly in the new world order?

CHAN Chun Sing (SG), Minister, Prime Minister’s Office of Singapore Topic Leader: Pranjal Sharma (IN), Consulting Editor, Businessworld

Technology drives growth and innovation Carlo d’Asaro Biondo (IT/FR), President EMEA strategic relationships, Google Topic Leader: Stephen Sackur (GB), Presenter HARDtalk, BBC News

Family businesses – the pros and cons Baron David de Rothschild (FR), Executive Chairman, Rothschild & Co Group Topic Leader: Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach (GB)

Challenges ahead for Swiss-EU relationship: could it get bad and ugly before it gets good?

Jacques de Watteville (CH), State Secretary, Swiss Federal Department of Finance Topic Leader: Prof. Thomas Bieger (CH), President, University of St. Gallen

The rise of artificial intelligence: implications for jobs and the economy Martin Ford (US), Entrepreneur & Author, Solutionsoft Topic Leader: Peter Day (GB), Global Business Correspondent, BBC News

Big data – the future has just begun Christoph Franz (DE), Chairman, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd Topic Leader: Prof. Omid Aschari (AT), Managing Director, SIM-HSG, University of St. Gallen

118

A recipe for growth: unlock the long-term investor asset base Guido Fürer (CH), Group Chief Investment Officer, Swiss Re Topic Leader: Prof. Klaus Wellershoff (DE), Chairman of the Board of Directors, Wellershoff & Partners Ltd.

Inclusive Growth – Scotland’s approach to achieving the best of both worlds Prof. Gary Gillespie (GB), Chief Economic Advisor, The Scottish Government Topic Leader: Peter Fischer (CH), Economics-Editor-in-Chief, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

Growth – the good, the sustainable, and the exciting Michael Hankel (DE), Member of the Board of Management, ZF Friedrichshafen AG Topic Leader: Prof. Peter Vogel (AT), Assistant Professor for Technology Entrepreneurship, University of St. Gallen

Growth – the good, the bad, the ugly, and the sublime Larry Harvey (US), Co-Founder & Chief Philosophic Officer, Burning Man Topic Leader: Prof. Dieter Thomä (DE), Professor of Philosophy, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of St. Gallen

Beyond shareholders' supremacism to environmental friendly capitalism Mitsuru Izumo (JP), President, euglena Co., Ltd Topic Leader: Prof. Yoshinori Imai (JP), Visiting Professor, Ritsumeikan University

Prosperity without growth – foundations for the economy of tomorrow Prof. Tim Jackson (GB), Professor of Sustainable Development, University of Surrey Topic Leader: Peter Day (GB), Global Business Correspondent, BBC News

Moving beyond GDP: towards Inclusive Growth Mari Kiviniemi (FI), Deputy Secretary-General, OECD Topic Leader: Prof. Klaus Wellershoff (DE), Chairman of the Board and Partner, Wellershoff & Partners Ltd.

Moving towards a European Border and Coast Guard Fabrice Leggeri (FR), Executive Director, Frontex Topic Leader: Prof. Christoph Frei (CH), Associate Professor, School of Economics and Political Science, University of St. Gallen

Are we stuck in a growth trap and if so, what to do about it?

Prof. Danny Leipziger (US), Managing Director, Growth Dialogue Topic Leader: Pranjal Sharma (IN), Consulting Editor, Businessworld

Is Abenomics dead? – can women save Japan?

Kathy Matsui (US), Global Investment Research, Goldman Sachs Japan Co., Ltd. Topic Leader: Aiko Doden (JP), Senior Commentator, NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation)

Economic growth has stalled – let's fix it Dambisa Moyo (GB), International Economist & Author Topic Leader: Peter Fischer (CH), Economics-Editor-in-Chief, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

Marketplace lending – an agent for growth or a zero sum game?

Andrew Mullinger (GB), Co-Founder, Funding Circle Topic Leader: Peter Day (GB), Global Business Correspondent, BBC News

Responsible growth Adrian Orr (NZ), Chief Executive Officer, New Zealand Superannuation Fund Topic Leader: Viswa Sadasivan (SG), Chief Executive Officer, Strategic Moves

The Philippine growth story – an update after the elections Cesar Purisima (PH), Secretary of the Philippine Department of Finance Topic Leader: James Chau (GB), Special Contributor, China Central Television

119

The senseable city Carlo Ratti (IT), Director, MIT Senseable City Lab & Founding Partner, Carlo Ratti Associati Topic Leader: Prof. Christoph Frei (CH), Associate Professor, School of Economics and Political Science, University of St. Gallen

How can businesses still prosper in a new economy of constraint resources and no growth?

Rick Ridgeway (US), Vice President of Public Engagement, Patagonia Topic Leader: Andrew Hill (GB), Management Editor & Columnist, The Financial Times

Digital health – cloudy the future is Stephan Rietiker (CH), Chief Executive Officer, LifeWatch Topic Leader: Michael Dillhyon (US), Chief Executive Officer, YouBase & Founder, healthbank

FinTECH changes the world – how any global company can benefit from digitised financial solutions Jan Schoch (CH), Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Leonteq Securities AG Topic Leader: Heinrich Christen (CH), Partner, Ernst & Young AG

How much is enough?

Lord Robert Skidelsky (GB), Professor of Political Economy, University of Warwick Topic Leader: Ivan Adamovich (CH), Head of Private Banking International & Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Notenstein La Roche Private Bank Ltd

The imperative of long-term thinking Tidjane Thiam (FR/CI), Chief Executive Officer, Credit Suisse Group AG Topic Leader: Leslie Maasdorp (ZA), Chief Financial Officer, New Development Bank

Inclusive Growth – What is true economic success? An indigenous New Zealand perspective Jamie Tuuta (NZ), Maori Trustee & Chief Executive Officer, Te Tumu Paeroa Topic Leader: James Chau (GB), Special Contributor, China Central Television

Panama is not just about the papers Eyda Varela de Chinchilla (PA), Vice-Minister of Finance of the Republic of Panama Topic Leader: Prof. Simon Evenett, Director, Swiss Institute for International Economics, University of St. Gallen

Africa's future belongs to its entrepreneurs Parminder Vir (GB), Chief Executive Officer, Tony Elumelu Foundation Topic Leader: Pranjal Sharma (IN), Consulting Editor, Businessworld

Public Investment, internal demand, social dialogue: 'unusual' factors for a new narrative on sustainable growth Luca Visentini (IT), General Secretary, European Trade Union Confederation Topic Leader: Gerhard Schwarz (CH), Author & Columnist

Growth is magical: a magical pyramid scheme or a magical route to prosperity?

Mathis Wackernagel (CH/US), President, Global Footprint Network Topic Leader: Prof. Thomas Dyllick (CH/DE), Director, Institute for Economy and the Environment, University of St. Gallen

Navigating the complexities of the 21st century – engaging youth in the Arab World Clare Woodcraft-Scott (GB), Chief Executive Officer, Emirates Foundation Topic Leader: Nina dos Santos (GB), London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

Creating and leading a booming industry – how the world’s largest manufacturer of civil drones manages triple-digit annual growth rate Danny Zheng (CN), Vice President, DJI Innovations Topic Leader: Viswa Sadasivan (SG), Chief Executive Officer, Strategic Moves

120

PLENARY SESSIONS

On both days of the symposium, Plenary Sessions were held in which prominent speakers introduced the major topics, discussed controversial issues and provided impetus for the upcoming sessions. The sessions were moderated by a chairman to ensure the participants were constantly involved in the discussion.

Thursday WELCOME Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach (GB) Conferenciers: Priscila Bala (BR) and Bree Romuld (AU), members of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community

KEYNOTE: The case for slower growth – but how?

Prof. Tim Jackson (GB), Professor of Sustainable Development, University of Surrey

PANEL: The case for faster growth – but how?

Markus J. Beyrer (AT), Director General, BUSINESSEUROPE Luca Visentini (IT), General Secretary, European Trade Union Confederation Topic Leader: Nina dos Santos (GB), London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

KEYNOTE: Address by the Vice President of the Swiss Confederation Doris Leuthard (CH), Vice President & Federal Councillor of the Swiss Confederation

PANEL: Economic growth: what governments can, should and should not do CHAN Chun Sing (SG), Minister, Prime Minister’s Office of Singapore Doris Leuthard (CH), Vice President & Federal Councillor of the Swiss Confederation Sachin Pilot (IN), Former Minister for Corporate Affairs of India & President, Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee Topic Leader: Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach (GB)

PANEL: Future growth: the tops and the flops Nils Smedegaard Andersen (DK), Group Chief Executive Officer, A.P. Møller-Mærsk A/S Peter Brabeck-Letmathe (AT), Chairman of the Board of Directors, Nestlé S.A. Baron David de Rothschild (FR), Executive Chairman, Rothschild & Co Group Christoph Franz (DE), Chairman, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd Topic Leader: Andrew Hill (GB), Management Editor & Columnist, The Financial Times

ONE-ON-ONE Cesar Purisima (PH), Secretary of the Philippine Department of Finance Topic Leader: Stephen Sackur (GB), Presenter HARDtalk, BBC News

121

Thursday A CONVERSATION: Rise of the robots Martin Ford (US), Entrepreneur & Author, Solutionsoft Topic Leader: Andrew Hill (GB), Management Editor & Columnist, The Financial Times

St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award: what are alternatives to economic growth? 6 ideas put to the test Marcela Escobari (US/BO), Executive Director, Center for International Development, Harvard University Thebe Ikalafeng (ZA), Founder & Group Chief Executive Officer, Brand Leadership Clare Woodcraft-Scott (GB), Chief Executive Officer, Emirates Foundation Topic Leader: Riz Khan (GB), International Journalist

Wrap-up Thursday Conferenciers: Priscila Bala (BR) and Bree Romuld (AU), members of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community

A conversation with Larry Harvey Larry Harvey (US), Co-Founder & Chief Philosophic Officer, Burning Man Topic Leader: Stephen Sackur (GB), Presenter HARDtalk, BBC News

A conversation with Tidjane Thiam Tidjane Thiam (CI/FR), Chief Executive Officer, Credit Suisse Group AG Topic Leader: Nina dos Santos (GB), London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

Background Session Impact investing & private wealth: a marriage for catalytic action tackling the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sustainability challenges?

Falko Paetzold (CH), Research Affiliate, Sloan School of Management at Massachusetts Institute of Technology Patrick Scheurle (CH), Chief Executive Officer, BlueOrchard Finance Ltd Antonis Schwarz (DE/GR), Impact Investor Topic Leader: Prof. Thomas Dyllick (CH/DE), Director, Institute for Economy and the Environment, University of St. Gallen

122

Friday WELCOME Conferenciers: Priscila Bala (BR) and Bree Romuld (AU), members of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community

ST. GALLEN WINGS OF EXCELLENCE AWARD CEREMONY Presentation of the St. Gallen Wings of Excellence Award by the President of the Award Jury Prof. Georg F. von Krogh (NO), Professor of Strategic Management and Innovation, ETH Zurich

ONE-ON-ONE: The so-called "Panama Papers" – a view from the inside Eyda Varela de Chinchilla (PA), Vice-Minister of Finance of the Republic of Panama Topic Leader: Stephen Sackur (GB), Presenter HARDtalk, BBC News

PANEL: Emerging markets: a beacon of hope faltering Prof. Danny Leipziger (US), Managing Director, Growth Dialogue Leslie Maasdorp (ZA), Chief Financial Officer, New Development Bank Parminder Vir (GB), Chief Executive Officer, Tony Elumelu Foundation Felix Zhang (CN), Executive Director, Envision Energy Topic Leader: Prof. Simon Evenett (GB), Director, Swiss Institute for International Economics, University of St. Gallen

PANEL: Migration: the bigger picture Fabrice Leggeri (FR), Executive Director, Frontex Dambisa Moyo (GB), International Economist & Author Topic Leader: Prof. Christoph Frei (CH), Associate Professor, School of Economics and Political Sciences, University of St. Gallen

PANEL: Brexit – Europe's fateful moment Mark Boleat (GB), Chairman of the Policy and Resources Committee, City of London Corporation Prof. Gary Gillespie (GB), Chief Economic Advisor, The Scottish Government Topic Leader: Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach (GB)

PANEL: The global economic outlook Kevin Lu (CN), Distinguished Fellow, INSEAD & Partner and Member of the Global Executive Board, Partners Group Kathy Matsui (US), Global Investment Research, Goldman Sachs Japan Co., Ltd. Mathis Wackernagel (CH/US), President, Global Footprint Network Topic Leader: Nina dos Santos (GB), London Anchor, CNNMoney View, CNN International

Wrap-up Friday & presentation of the ISC Team Conferenciers: Priscila Bala (BR) and Bree Romuld (AU), members of the St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow Community 46th International Students’ Committee

Background Session 6 months after Paris Markus Seiler (CH), Head, Swiss Federal Intelligence Service Bruno Stagno Ugarte (CR), Deputy Executive Director for Advocacy, Human Rights Watch Charles Thépaut (FR), Political advisor, North Africa and Middle East Directorate, French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development Sarah Turine (BE), Deputy Mayor of Molenbeek, Brussels Topic Leader: Misha Glenny (GB), Author

123

ST. GALLEN FOUNDATION FOR INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

The activities of the International Students’ Committee are guided by the St. Gallen Foundation for International Studies. This combination of student responsibility and professional guidance is vital to the long term success of the St. Gallen Symposium.

Board of Trustees

Foundation Team

Special Advisors

Chairman

Chief Executive Officer

Singapore

Peter Voser (CH)

Philip Erzinger (CH/DE)

Vice Chairman

Karin Keller-Sutter (CH) State Counselor Canton of St. Gallen

Prof. Dr Thomas Bieger (CH) University of St. Gallen

Prof. em. Dr Peter Gomez (CH) University of St. Gallen

Bénédict G. F. Hentsch (CH) Walter Kielholz (CH) Swiss Re

Dr Nicola Leibinger-Kammüller (DE) TRUMPF GmbH + Co. KG

Dr Christoph Loos (DE) Hilti AG

Dr Ralph Schmitz-Dräger (DE) Arcron AG

Dr Gerhard Schwarz (CH) Honorary Chairman

Dr Josef Ackermann (CH)

Alexander C. Melchers (CH/DE) C. Melchers GmbH & Co.

ABB Ltd Chief Operating Officer

Dr Johannes Berchtold (CH)

Japan

Yuji Suzuki (JP) Vice President

Credit Suisse Securities (Japan) Ltd.

Dominic Baumann (CH) China Head Leaders of Tomorrow

Rolf Bachmann (CH) Vice President

Claudia Wimmer-Rapp (DE) Project Manager

Dr Sraboni Ghose (IN) Project Manager Leaders of Tomorrow

Vera Bachmann (CH) Project Manager Innovation & Technology

Oliver Krek (AT/CH/US)

Dr Jianzhong Yao (CH/CN) Asia Capital Reinsurance Group

124

CIRCLE OF BENEFACTORS

The International Studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Committee is thankful to be able to count on the support of its Circle of Benefactors, which includes some 350 major companies around the world. The circle is of crucial importance to the financing of the St. Gallen Symposium and ensures the continuity of the initiative.

Main Partners

is an official main partner of the St. Gallen Symposium

is the official technology consultant of the St. Gallen Symposium

is an official transport services partner of the St. Gallen Symposium

is an official information technology partner of the St. Gallen Symposium

is an official information technology partner of the St. Gallen Symposium

is the official telecommunication services provider of the St. Gallen Symposium

is the official financial services supplier of the St. Gallen Symposium

is the official document services provider of the St. Gallen Symposium

Main Partners Leaders of Tomorrow

125

123 2Xideas 360 Treasury Systems AG A ABACUS Research AG ABB Ltd Abraxas Informatik AG Accenture (Schweiz) AG Dr Josef Ackermann a-connect (group) ag ACXIT Capital Partners Adecco Management & Consulting S.A. ADM International Adveq Management AG Aepli Metallbau AG AFG Arbonia-ForsterHolding AG Akris AG Albers & Co AG ALDI Suisse AG Alfa Treuhand- und Revisions AG ALID AG Allgemeines Treuunternehmen Allholding Beteiligungsverwaltungs GmbH Allianz SE Alpha PetroVision Holding AG Altium Capital AG Alu Menziken Extrusion AG Alwys Holding AG Amann & Söhne GmbH & Co. KG Ameropa Holding AG AMS Österreich ANA HOLDINGS INC. Arcron AG Argon Asset Management ASH Group Audemars Piguet AUGUSTIN QUEHENBERGER GROUP GmbH Autoneum Holding AG Avaloq Group AG B B.Grimm Group Baker & McKenzie Zurich Bank Julius Baer & Co. Ltd. Banque de Luxembourg S.A. Banque Internationale à Luxembourg S.A. Bär & Karrer AG

Barandun von Graffenried AG Barclays Wealth and Investment Management Barry Callebaut AG Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank BASF SE Bauwerk Parkett AG Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wirtschaft und Medien, Energie und Technologie BB Biotech BDO AG BearingPoint Beekeeper AG Beiersdorf AG Beisheim Holding GmbH Belimo Holding AG Bellevue Asset Management AG Berenberg Bank (Schweiz) AG Bewital Holding GmbH & Co. KG Bilfinger SE BKW AG Blasto AG BlueOrchard Finance Ltd BMW (Schweiz) AG BNP Paribas (Suisse) SA The Boston Consulting Group BRAINFORCE AG Bratschi Wiederkehr & Buob AG Brauerei Locher AG BSI S.A. bta first travel ag b-to-v Partners AG Bucher Industries AG Bühler Management AG Bystronic Group C Capgemini Schweiz AG Capvis Equity Partners AG Careerplus AG Cargolux Airlines International S.A. Cat Aviation AG CEAMS CE Asset Management CEWE Stiftung & Co. KGaA CF&C Finance Suisse SA Jenny Chiam China Construction Bank Christian Fischbacher Co. AG Cisco Systems (Switzerland) GmbH

Clariant International AG Cofra Holding AG Commerz Real AG Conova Consulting AG Dr Philipp Cottier Credence Partners Pte Ltd Crédit Agricole (Suisse) SA Credit Suisse Group AG CRIF AG Crypto AG CSL Behring AG D Danzer AG Dätwyler Holding AG DBAY Advisors de Sede AG Deloitte AG Deutsche Apotheker- und Ärztebank eG DMG MORI AG Dr. Bjørn Johansson Associates AG Dr. J. Bollag & Cie. Dreyfus Söhne & Cie AG, Banquiers E E. Gutzwiller & Cie. Banquiers Ecolab Europe GmbH Dr Pierre Edelmann Egon Zehnder Elcotherm AG elea Foundation for Ethics in Globalization ElringKlinger AG Emil Capital Partners Emil Frey Gruppe Energie 360° AG EQT Ericsson AG Ermenegildo Zegna Group Ernst & Young AG Esselte Leitz GmbH & Co. KG Evaluglobe AG EVRY F F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG Falcon Private Bank Ltd. Falke KGaA Farner Consulting AG Ferring Pharmaceuticals SA Festo AG & Co. KG Finyon Consulting AG Fis Organisation AG Flughafen Zürich AG Fondazione Fidinam

126

Forbes Marshall Private Limited Forma Futura Invest AG Fresenius Medical Care AG & Co. KGaA Fritz Carl Wilhelm Stiftung furrerhugi. ag

HOPI HOLDING a.s.

HSG Alumni Hans Huber Huber + Suhner AG Hublot SA Hyposwiss Private Bank Genève SA

LGT Group Foundation Lidl Schweiz Liebherr-International AG Lilienberg Unternehmerforum Linz Textil Holding AG Lombard Odier & Cie Lyreco Switzerland AG

G Gallus Holding AG Geberit International AG Gebrüder Weiss GmbH Generali CEE Holding B.V. Georg Fischer AG Georg Haag AG Givaudan SA Glatz AG Glen Fahrn AG Glencore International AG Global Law Office Goba AG, Mineralquelle und Manufaktur Goldbell Corporation Pte Ltd Goldman Sachs International Golien Ltd Google Graubündner Kantonalbank Greenhill & Co. Europe LLP GRENKELEASING AG Groz-Beckert KG Guldborg International Toyoo Gyohten

I IBM Schweiz AG IKEA Foundation IMD Industriellenvereinigung Wien Infosys Consulting AG ING-DiBa AG InterGlobe Aviation Limited (IndiGo)

M Maerki Baumann & Co. AG Malun LB GmbH MANN+HUMMEL GMBH Manor AG Marcol Capital Europe S.A. Martel AG St. Gallen Pierre-Alain und Monika Mathier Max Schmidheiny-Stiftung Mazars S.A. McKinsey & Company Medela AG medienwerkstatt ag Merifin Capital Microsoft Schweiz GmbH Mikron Holding AG MLS Dr. Max Schnopp AG Mobiliar Versicherungen Dr Christoph Müller Müller-Möhl Foundation Mutschler-Gruppe My Drop in the Oceans

H Habib Bank AG Zurich Halcyon Agri Corporation Limited Halfmoon Bay Capital Limited Hälg Building Services Group Hathon Holding AS Haufe-umantis AG HAWE Hydraulik SE Haws Switzerland AG HBM Partners AG Heidrick & Struggles Helbling Holding AG Helsinn Healthcare S.A. Helvetia Holding AG Hesta Services AG Hewlett Packard Enterprise Hewlett-Packard (Schweiz) GmbH Hexagon AB HIAG Immobilien High Meadows Foundation Hilcona AG HILTI AG Homburger AG

J Japan Tobacco Inc. Jaquet Technology Group Jebsen & Co. Ltd. JENOPTIK AG Johnson & Johnson JT International S.A. Jung Technologies Holding AG Jura Elektroapparate AG K KABA AG Kienbaum AG KIND Hörgeräte GmbH & Co. KG Dr Karl-Heinz Kipp Klingelfuss & Cie. KPMG AG KUHN RIKON AG KUKA Aktiengesellschaft Kuoni Travel Holding Ltd. L LafargeHolcim Ltd. Landesbank Baden-Württemberg Landewyck Tobacco S.A. Le Freeport Luxembourg Leader's Solutions AG LEGIC Identsystems AG Leister AG Lenz & Staehelin Lenzing Aktiengesellschaft Leonteq Securities AG Lephatsi Investments (Pty) Ltd Lexzau, Scharbau GmbH & Co. KG

N NEOPERL International AG Nespresso Suisse Nestlé Skin Health Neue Zürcher Zeitung Neutrik AG Niederer Kraft & Frey AG Nikko Asset Management Europe Limited NIMO Holding AG Notenstein La Roche Privatbank AG Novartis AG Novozymes A/S O Oettinger Davidoff AG Oki Matsumoto OMV Aktiengesellschaft Omya Management AG One North Capital Pte. Ltd. Orell Füssli Holding AG Orifarm Group A/S Osim International Otto (GmbH & Co. KG)

127

P Papyrus Deutschland GmbH & Co. KG PartnerRe Ltd. Partners to Leaders Paul Hartmann AG Pictet Prager Dreifuss AG PRE Management Group Premchand Roychand & Sons PricewaterhouseCoopers AG Private Client Bank AG PSP Group Services AG Q Quadriga Capital Beteiligungsberatung GmbH Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP Quittenbaum GmbH R Rahn + Bodmer Co., Banquiers Raiffeisen Schweiz Remi Finanz- und Verwaltungs AG Richter + Frenzel Rieter Management AG Rivella AG Robert Bosch AG Robert Bosch GmbH Roland Berger AG Rolex SA Rosenbauer International AG Rothschild Bank AG Rotronic AG RP - Sanjiv Goenka Group RUAG Holding AG Russell Reynolds Associates RWE Ceská republika a.s.

S Saab AB Sabinum AS Salt Mobile SA Sammelstiftung Vita SAP (Schweiz) AG Schellenberg Wittmer AG, Rechtsanwälte Schenck Process Holding GmbH Schenker Storen AG Andreas Schmid Schneeberger Holding AG Schöffel Schweiz AG Joachim Schoss

Monika und Wolfgang Schürer SCOR Services Switzerland Ltd. Scott Sports SA Securitas AG Sefar Holding AG Sennheiser Elektronic GmbH & Co. KG SFS Holding AG Siegfried Holding AG Dr Gralf Sieghold Sika AG Silverhorn Investment Advisors Limited Sitecore Deutschland GmbH SIX Skyadvisory AG smARTec Veranstaltungstechnik AG Sonova AG Sopra Steria GmbH Southern Capital Group SpotMe St. Galler Kantonalbank AG St. Galler Tagblatt AG Stadt St. Gallen Staiger, Schwald & Partner AG Starrag Group Holding AG Stiftungsfonds Deutsche Bank Gertrud Stoll-Fein Sulzer Ltd. Yuji Suzuki Swiss Life AG Swiss Prime Site AG Swiss Re Swissmem swisspartners Investment Network AG SYMA-SYSTEM AG T Tamedia AG TCI Consult GmbH The Tokyo Club ThinxNet GmbH Transformation Partner TRL Krosaki Refractories Limited TÜV SÜD AG U u-blox Holding AG UBS AG Umdasch Group AG Underberg AG Unilever Schweiz GmbH

Union Bancaire Privée Universitätsspital Basel Universitätsspital Zürich upc cablecom GmbH USM U. Schärer Söhne AG V Valcambi sa Valincor Management AG Valora Holding AG Vaudoise Assurances Vetropack Holding AG Victorinox AG VISCHER AG voestalpine AG VP Bank AG W Weisse Arena Gruppe Wellershoff & Partners Ltd. Wendel S.A. Wenger Plattner Wicor Holding AG Willy Bogner GmbH & Co. KGaA Winton Capital Management Limited Würth International AG Dr Peter A. Wuffli X Xerox AG XL Catlin Y Ypsomed AG Z Zehnder Group International AG Zentis GmbH & Co. KG ZF Friedrichshafen AG Dr Heinz Zimmer Zimmer Germany GmbH Zühlke Engineering AG Zumtobel AG Zürcher Kantonalbank

128

PATRONS

123 2Xideas

The Leaders of Tomorrow contribute to the success of the St. Gallen Symposium not only during the two days in May, but also in various initiatives through-out the year. We would like to express our sincere gratitude to our Leaders of Tomorrow Patrons who enable the empowerment of the next generation.

Friedli Corporate Finance Fritz Carl Wilhelm Stiftung furrerhugi. ag

N Notenstein La Roche Privatbank AG

A ABACUS Research AG ABB Ltd Abraxas Informatik AG Accenture (Schweiz) AG Albers & Co AG Allgemeines Treuunternehmen AMS Österreich Autoneum Holding AG Avaloq Group AG

G Galactic Energy Ventures (Pty) Ltd Christophe R. Gautier Geberit International AG Georg Fischer AG Globus SB-Warenhaus Holding GmbH & Co. KG Graubündner Kantonalbank

O Österreichische Nationalbank

B BDO AG BearingPoint Belimo Holding AG BSI S.A. Bucher Industries AG Bühler Management AG

H Helsinn Healthcare SA Friedrich-Wilhelm Hempel HIAG Immobilien Homburger AG HR Matching AG Hupac S.A.

R Raiffeisen Schweiz

C Cat Aviation AG China Taiping Life Insurance (HK) Company Limited Cathrina Claas-Mühlhäuser Credit Suisse Group AG

I Iqbaljit Kahlon

D Dätwyler Holding AG de Pfyffer & Associés Dreyfus Söhne & Cie AG, Banquiers E elea Foundation for Ethics in Globalization Emil Capital Partners Ericsson AG F F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG Festo AG & Co. KG FISBA AG

J Jung Technologies Holding AG K Kasikornbank Public Company Limited L Lephatsi Investments (Pty) Ltd M Manor AG Michelin S.C.A. Mobiliar Versicherungen Max Müller Müller-Möhl Foundation Munksjö Oyj Mutschler-Gruppe

P Pargesa Holding SA P.T. Surya Toto Indonesia Tbk. Projects Intelligence PSP Group Services AG

S Sammelstiftung Vita SIX swisspartners Investment Network AG Swiss Re U Union Bancaire Privée USM U. Schärer Söhne AG V Valcambi sa Valora Holding AG Anoop Vasisht W Wellershoff & Partners Ltd. Wenger Plattner Würth International AG X Xaxera GmbH XL Catlin Z ZF Friedrichshafen Zürcher Kantonalbank

129

130

GROWING CONFIDENCE ISC TEAM – It was Friday evening, the end of the 46th St. Gallen Symposium, and the whole ISC team was standing up on stage – a spot normally reserved for influential people like Tidjane Thiam or Nils Smedegaard Andersen to talk about growth.

Now it was our turn to step on stage and attribute the last few words to our participants before they headed off for the weekend or joined the evening buffet line.

As the audience stood to applaud, each team member was overwhelmed by various feelings and emotions.

On the one hand, we all felt sad thinking about the time and effort we put into making this whole event happen and knowing that it was already over. On the other hand, it was a moment of relief once we realised that we finally reached our goal. A great weight was lifted off our shoulders: We no longer had to carry the vast responsibility of successfully mastering this huge task of organising the St. Gallen Symposium. Funnily enough, we never had the chance to actually attend a symposium before, but we were trying to meet and surpass the bar set in previous years. Then again, all of us were so happy and proud that we took this opportunity to pause our studies for a whole year to create an intimate environment for honest discussions and debates.

Looking back, the topic “Growth – the good, the bad, and the ugly” reflects our own growth and personal development through the ISC. We all started as a group of 34 students who did not really know each other, who came from different cities and had different backgrounds. During the nine months of collective effort, we became a strong and healthy team

with one goal – to create an extraordinarily unique experience for all of our 1,000 participants.

And we learned a lot! We travelled the world, invited and won future participants to join the next St. Gallen Symposium. It is fascinating for us to see how powerful a team of students can be and what it can achieve, together with the longstanding support of our Circle of Benefactors and the many friends of our initiative.

Even if there were a few moments where we thought we could, we all know that we did not change the world during the three days of the symposium. But we do hope that we inspired our many international guests and provided a platform where generations could share their ideas and maybe come up with new ones that make a difference.

We hope you felt and lived the spirit of the St. Gallen Symposium and we look forward to welcoming you in St. Gallen again in May 2017!

Top: Tobias Rordorf (CH), Philipp Ding (CH/DE), Moritz Schnorpfeil (DE), Melissa Engelhardt (DE/MX), Tillman Hofrichter (DE), Tamara Blank (CH/CL), Diego Gladig (CH), Patric Naville (CH/DE/US), Mark Heinrichs (DE), Fabian Karst (DE), Tobias Schinn (DE), Guillaume Depres (CH/FR), David Rohner (CH), Jonathan Jasper (DE), Benedict Distler (DE), Robin Kreimeyer (DE), Lennart Oser (CH), Michael Wittwer (CH/DE)

131 ISC TEAM

Middle: Sophie Eisl (CH/DE), Anastasia Troyanov (AT/CH), Philipp Seidl (DE), Natalie Feder (CH/GB/US), Georgina Frölichsthal (AT/DE), Rebecca Fencl (CH/AT), Eveline Leupi (CH), Floriane Schmid (CH) Bottom: Sébastien Dewarrat (CH), Daniel Dippold (DE), Vinzenz von Teufenstein (CH), Raphael Burger (CH), Moritz Daendliker (CH) Peter Goetz (DE), Sebastian Guggisberg (CH), Christian Sutter (CH) (from left to right)

132

Publisher International Students’ Committee (ISC)

Text Editor Andrew Curry (US)

Editor in Chief Julia Kramer (NL)

Managing Editor Alexandra Stark (CH)

Art Director Michel Müller (CH), Sergeant AG

Editorial Staff Elías Camhaji (ES) Till Daldrup (DE) Jolien de Vries (NL) Ruben Dieleman (NL) Susann Eberlein (DE) Danielle Keeton-Olsen (US) Germán R. Páez (ES) Natasha R. Silva (PT) Sara Rosati (SE/AR) Anna-Lena Sachs (DE) Jessica Williams (UK)

133

MAGAZINE TEAM – It is not often that you get the chance to work with a group of talented journalists, photographers and designers from all over the world. It was a true privilege to get this opportunity and I would like to sincerely thank Anna-Lena, Daniel, Danielle, Elías, Germán, Jessica, Jolien, Lukas, Natasha, Ruben, Sara, Susann and Till for their commitment, creativity and professionalism. Special thanks to Alexandra and Andrew, for sharing their experience and insights. You both were a true inspiration to the whole team.

Michel, Tulu and Sandra, many thanks for the great layout and pushing the limits of the design. Last but not least, many thanks to Rebecca from the ISC Team for coordinating the whole magazine project.

I hope our paths will cross again soon.

Photo: Lukas Rapp

All the best, Julia

Photography Daniel Kindstrand (SE) Lukas Rapp (DE) Social Media Staff Jessica Williams (UK) Graphics and Illustrations Sandra Loser (CH), Sergeant AG Tu Loan Huynh (CH), Sergeant AG Alexandra Stark (CH)

Magazine Project Manager Rebecca Fencl (CH/AT) Print medienwerkstatt AG Steinackerstrasse 8 CH-8583 Sulgen

Paper PlanoJet Offset, white FSC sponsored by Papyrus Copyright International Students’ Committee (ISC)

46th St. Gallen Symposium Magazine