Mural Davos: Gender Equality? Reverse Reality. In January 2012 Fernando Morales-de la Cruz created together with Cornelia Vinzens the art murals, "Davos: Gender Equality? Reverse Reality", and exhibited them on two floors on the main street of Davos during the World Economic Forum as a way of demanding that the WEF respect the human rights of women to occupy positions of leadership in all sectors of society. Read Bloomberg: 'Davos Collage Spoofs Old Boy Conclave, Lack of Women'.
Finally, the World Economic Forum has at least brought Gender Equality to its co-chairs by appointing equal numbers of women and men to preside over the WEF's six member conference board. The three women who will co-chair the WEF 2016 are: Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, from the United States; Sharan Burrow, General Secretary, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), from Australia; and Amira Yahyaoui, Founder and Chair, Al Bawsala, from Tunisia. These 'SuperGirls' of Davos, as I call them with great admiration and respect, will co-chair the WEF conference together with the Indian born Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft; Tidjane Thiam, CEO of Credit Suisse, born in Ivory Coast; and Hiroaki Nakanishi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Hitachi, from Japan. Fifty percent women co-chairs is a major step forward for the WEF, it has always been led mostly by men.
The Gender Gap in the WEF's Foundation management has also been somewhat reduced, through a reshuffle of the organizational chart. Back in 2012 all WEF Global Managing Directors were male. Now, the WEF's Executive Committee (with 33 members) still has a majority of men, with 22 men (including Klaus Schwab) and 11 women, but this is still important progress for women. They can now sit at the table with their male peers.
The pay gap inside the WEF still remains in favour of men. Most of the top ten salaries at the WEF are paid to men. Although there is little transparency on the amounts paid, which is an unacceptable fact given that the WEF benefits from millions in public funding from several nations in various ways. It also benefits from millions of dollars in free media exposure in public broadcasting channels.
The biggest challenge continues to be the Gender Gap at the WEF's annual gathering in Davos. When we started questioning the Gender Equality in Reverse Reality the Gender Gap was 83 % men and 17% women (Read The Guardian: 'Davos 2013: why are only 17% of delegates women?'). In January 2015 the representation of women was once again at the same unacceptable level of 2012.
Considering that the WEF is an "invitation only" event it is inexcusable that whilst the WEF talks about the Gender Gap in the world in its "Gender Gap Report" it does not resolve it in its own "schmoozefest" that brings the global business and political elite to the Swiss mountains to "IMPROVE THE STATE OF THE WORLD", claming that lack of gender equality in decision making is part of the problem to improve the status quo.
Leaders are not those who follow what is wrong in society but those who dare to lead in changing it themselves against all trends and currents. I dare say this because the WEF is all about leadership at the most senior levels. None of the WEF participants are followers.
The gender question remains open as to what the Gender Gap will be among the participants in the WEF 2016. The even bigger question is: When will the WEF start IMPROVING THE STATE OF THE WORLD? It is high time that senior level task forces were created to end hunger, eradicate poverty with transparent Shared Value, provide education for all, solve conflicts and stop climate change with real business models not with false promises. Just more top level talks without high level tasks are a waste of time and money even for the WEF participants.
After all, the global elite that meets in Davos has the most billions and even trillions to lose, while the majority of the world have little to lose - indeed billions of people have almost nothing.