Francesco Grillo, Bocconi University
Donald Trump’s newly launched “Board of Peace” presents itself as a bold attempt to break with what its founders describe as decades of failed international diplomacy. Its charter opens with a declaration that few would openly dispute: “Durable peace requires pragmatic judgment, common-sense solutions, and the courage to depart from approaches and institutions that have too often failed.”
It is true that the world urgently needs to overcome decades of inertia to reform its international organisations. It is true that new institutions are needed to solve global problems rather than merely managing never-ending crises.
This is perhaps why Donald Trump decided to hold the signing ceremony for his new board on the margins of the World Economic Forum in Davos. Here, more than any other place, is where results-oriented global business leaders supposedly gather. At the signing of the charter, a jubilant Trump was among 20 heads of state and prime ministers (of the 60 who had been invited).
The “most prestigious board ever formed” so far includes the presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and the prime ministers of Mongolia, Armenia and Pakistan. Rightly, representatives of the governments more directly involved in the “Gaza peace plan” are also present, including Israel, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt.
From south-east Asia we have Indonesia and Vietnam and from South America, President Javier Milei from Argentina. Hungary, Bulgaria and Kosovo are the only European countries to join so far.
The board’s charter goes on to set out a “partnership” that would be even less accountable than the old United Nations security council and even less democratic than any publicly listed company whose CEO is attending Davos.
It has potential as an instrument for building peace in Gaza, but risks failure if its scope becomes too diluted. And Davos itself risks losing credibility as a place where people “make sense of global challenges and move the world forward together”, if the search for a new world order becomes the celebration of one single man.
I have been to Davos several times. It’s certainly not one of the most prestigious ski resorts of the Swiss Alps. And this year, more than ever, I have felt increasingly sceptical about its capacity as a forum for generating the ideas that the world desperately needs to make sense of those global challenges.
Out of about 3,000 delegates, less than one out of ten seems to be under 30, to my eye. The gender balance is not good either. There are lots of Americans and most pay expensive attendance fees. It’s a world in which power lines are not clearly drawn unless you are in the know.
The Board of Peace is far more transparent when it comes to asserting where the power lies. Trump is expressly nominated by the charter as the chairman for life. He is the only one who can invite states to become members – and revoke their membership. He alone nominates his successor. He holds a veto over any decision.
At the security council, this is a power held by the five nations that won the second world war. Trump may continue to serve even if he is no longer president of the US. Nobody may, of course, seek to dismiss the chairman, although the charter graciously acknowledges that a removal may happen in case of “incapacity” of the supreme leader, if the other members of the board agree unanimously.
This is more power than most modern dictators can claim. Putin has to win elections, and Xi Jinping is nominated by a party. It is more power than even Roman emperors, who were formally designated by the senate (and in reality chosen by the army). Trump has proposed a document that hands him powers of which Augustus himself could not even dream.
What is striking is that most EU member states are “considering” the invitation to join. Some are even said to be trying to work out how they would navigate conflicts such a move would present with their own national constitutions or with the EU treaties (it should be obvious to any student of law that there is no such possibility for a self-declared liberal democracy).
It would be catastrophic if they did. They would be agreeing that an international organisation based on the unaccountable leadership of one single individual could be a starting point for constructing a new world order.
Trump’s advisers are right when they write in the charter that “too often the approaches to most of the global problems foster perpetual dependency, and institutionalise crisis rather than leading people beyond it”. We need to make sure that international organisations are rewarded according to their ability to solve problems and not just manage them endlessly. Yet this requires more accountability and participation – not less. We need proposals that are creative but serious.
I am sure that many have doubts about the World Economic Forum becoming the stage for the never-ending show of the producer of The Apprentice.
Francesco Grillo, Academic Fellow, Department of Social and Political Sciences, Bocconi University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
