On Tuesday January 18, The World Economic Forum is hosting a panel discussion on Renewing a Global Social Contract. The concept of a social contract has its origins in the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, who used it to justify the authority of the state. But while it can seem like a useful conceptual tool, it also contains many pitfalls. When it's the global elite inviting the world into a new global social contract, we need to be careful. Who is setting the terms of the contract? And whose interests is the contract protecting exactly? Unless the process by which the terms of the social contract are formulated is democratized, we should be highly suspect of the very idea of a global social contract, writes Jason Neidleman.

Talk of a new global social contract is in the air. Elite institutions from management consultancies, to leading universities and even the United Nations are all alluding to the concept. According to the McKinsey Global Institute, a new global social contract should focus on “two fronts” [1]: The first is sustaining and expanding economic growth and productivity; the second is mitigating the suffering faced by those adversely affected by these trends. Minouche Shafik, director of the London School of Economics, envisions a new global social contract that attends more carefully to women and to the global South [2]. António Guterres, Secretary General of the UN, favors a “New Social Contract and a New Global Deal that create equal opportunities for all and respect the rights and freedoms of all.”[3]