Organisers and participants alike are these days concerned to present the human face of capitalism. Corporate conscience is in fashion.
Inclusion is the buzz word.
So will those who rioted in Seattle in 1999 or who demonstrated last year in Prague and Nice at other gatherings of influential people. They have made a difference, but change was happening anyway. There was too some genuine humanitarian concern on display. Two stars of the show were Mexican President Vicente Fox and Microsoft chairman Bill Gates. Another star was United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, who impressed journalists in a private session with his command of detail and who went up front to warn the Davos set that unless they proved to be more inclusive in their trading practices then there would be a serious backlash against globalism.