With 800 CEOs, two dozen heads of state, and topics ranging from global
poverty to Web 2.0, Davos is impossible to describe. Like the blind men
touching the elephant, each participant feels a different part of the
beast. My favorite touch for the day went as follows: In a plenary session
on terrorism, I asked David Cameron, head of Britain's Conservative Party,
whether he agreed with the British Foreign Office position that the term
"war on terrorism" was counterproductive because it reinforced the Al Qaeda
narrative of being engaged in a holy war. He agreed, and said it would be
better to call it a "struggle." Secretary of Homeland Security Michael
Chertoff basically ducked the question. (Not long ago, the US State
Department had tried to get the White House to stop using the term, but the
move was vetoed by President Bush.) Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz
said not to worry about words because the root causes of terrorism were
local deprivation (read: more aid to Pakistan). Gijs de Vries, Counter
Terrorism Coordinator for the Council of the European Union, replied that
the term "war" not only helped terrorists to recruit, but also led us to
justify violating the rights and freedoms that provide the soft power we
need to prevail in this struggle. Clearly, where people stood on this
question depended on where they sat.
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