Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney opened his remarks in Davos by citing an essay by Vaclav Havel, the Czech playwright, dissident, and eventually president. When The Power of the Powerless was written in 1978, Havel's country was still in the grip of Soviet Communist control. The essay could only be circulated by hand, and read in secret.
It was eventually published around the world. Havel's essay invites us to ask ourselves: how can good people sign on to the nonsense of a bad regime?
Havel presents a greengrocer who puts a sign in his window saying, "Workers of the world, unite!"— an old Communist rallying cry.
"Why does he do it?," asks Havel. "He could be reproached for not having the proper decoration in his window; someone might even accuse him of disloyalty. He does it because these things must be done if one is to get along in life."
And, Havel asks, who would say it's wrong for workers of the world to unite?
"It is an excuse that everyone can use," he writes, "from the greengrocer, who conceals his fear of losing his job behind an alleged interest in the unification of the workers of the world, to the highest functionary, whose interest in staying in power can be cloaked in phrases about service to the working class."
Havel's essay did not call for mass demonstrations, although many would follow. It suggested that change might begin in a society when people stop the rote motions by which a government infers loyalty.
Prime Minister Carney did not mention President Trump by name. But he called on what he called middle-powers, like Canada, and most of the European states at Davos, "to live the truth," and see the scaffold of American power on which so much of their security had been built was being abandoned.
"When even one person stops performing, when the greengrocer removes his sign, the illusion begins to crack," Carney said. "Friends, it is time for companies and countries to take their signs down," and find a different way forward.
Almost half a century later Vaclav Havel's vision and words may offer strength as the world faces another great change.
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