World Economic Forum (WEF) founder Klaus Schwab will “start the process” of stepping down as chair of its board of trustees, The Financial Times reports.
“I am deeply convinced that in today’s special context the forum is more important and relevant than ever before,” Schwab wrote in an email to trustees. “It is also financially very well equipped thanks to successful financial management since its beginning. What is essential now after the turmoil of the last months, is to recover our sense of mission.”
According to The Financial Times, Schwab did not provide a timeline for his departure, although the process is expected to be completed by 2027.
People familiar with the development told the outlet that Schwab’s resignation “came as a surprise.”
Schwab has led the WEF since 1971 and will now focus on writing memoirs.
Last year, the WEF founder said he would be transitioning to a non-executive role. “By January 2025, Klaus Schwab will transition from Executive Chairman to Chairman of the Board of Trustees,” an announcement read. “In addition, the Forum’s prominent Board of Trustees will be organized around four strategic committees to further reinforce the impact of our work. These shifts underscore our institutional continuity in providing an independent and impartial platform to address the complex challenges of an interconnected world.”
Upon meeting for their annual Davos meeting earlier this year, WEF leaders admitted they “lost” to President Donald Trump.
“Trump has done something no person in the world has ever done. A dead man, a dead politician, has risen. Four years ago at Davos, he’s buried and dead politically. He has now returned,” political scientist Graham Allison said. “This is the greatest comeback in political history. And then, therefore, he thinks he can do anything.”
“We need to also factor in not only who’s won, which is Trump, but who’s lost, which is to say us,” Yale University Professor Walter Mead acknowledged. “The epitome of the ‘us’ who is losing here is Europe. That the European Union and, by and large, its member states, have misread the direction where events were going.”
