In the worldview of the elites gathered in Davos this January for the World Economic Forum’s 2023 meeting , the world's crises call “for bold collective action.” Of the ongoing crises calling for such action, climate change unsurprisingly made the top of the list.

“While a global energy transition is under way, further action is needed to reduce carbon emissions and mitigate the effects of climate change,” read an overview page for the event.

Prescriptions include “decoupling economic growth from energy consumption” and “mainstreaming breakthrough technological innovations and addressing equity,” as well as using other crises “to develop more ambitious, comprehensive, and sustainable infrastructure investment plans that [help] the world to meet the 2030 targets.”

Much of this is vague, and even a thorough perusal of some of the articles published by the WEF and presentations given by speakers on topics related to climate and energy often reveal more about the collective psyche of WEF members and meeting attendees than their specific plans for collective action.

Despite being out of touch to the point of being buffoonish, they have an inflated sense of self-importance, as exemplified by John Kerry when he referred to himself and his audience as a “select group of human beings” who assembled to “talk about saving the planet,” prior to referring to the mere thought of what they were doing as “extraterrestrial.”

They also possess a strong sense of urgency as they seek to enact the changes they view as necessary to save the world.

“[W]e must act now to avoid hitting the emissions cliff by 2030,” wrote Pedro Gomez, a member of the WEF’s Executive Committee.

“We’re cutting emissions, but not making headway fast enough,” stated Jeremy Jurgens, the WEF’s managing director.

When they do give the world a glimpse of their plans for collective action, these plans would appear to entail fundamentally altering key aspects of business and society regardless of whether anyone other than their “select group of human beings” actually wants to see these changes enacted.

Writing about the importance of environmental, social, and governance considerations for corporations, Rex Pak-Kuen Auyeung, the chairman of MTR, a Hong Kong public transit company, described ESG as “no longer optional, but a prerequisite for companies to maintain their social license to operate.” These words seem to call for the conscription of corporations into furthering fashionable climate and social causes, even elevating them above traditional business interests.

A major target of the WEF in 2022 was private car ownership. An article published by the WEF in the summer of 2022 gently pushed for a transition from car ownership to car "usership."

Earlier that year, the WEF published a far less gentle article pushing for fewer cars in general, largely through a combination of top-down measures to make driving more expensive and less convenient in major cities through policies that would, for example, limit parking, charge entrance fees, or outright ban private vehicles in large car-free zones.

There are other concrete examples as well, such as the push by people including Bill Gates for more synthetic beef and bugs in our diet, but they are largely variations of the same theme, collectively revealing that this “select group of human beings” has no qualms about reorganizing our world around abstract goals related to a "Chicken Little" cause that is very much in vogue.

Although these people may at times appear buffoonish, speaking and writing of “extraterrestrial” thoughts concerning a grandiose mission to save the world, they in many cases have real power, and, if the past three years have taught us anything, it is never to underestimate the potential of buffoons with power to wreck society as they tell us they’re saving the world.

Daniel Nuccio is a Ph.D. student in biology and a regular contributor to the College Fix and the Brownstone Institute.