At this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos, President Trump unveiled a new global initiative—the “Board of Peace”—and promoted it
At this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos, President Trump unveiled a new global initiative—the “Board of Peace”—and promoted it as a flexible mechanism for dialogue and conflict mitigation. The language soothed, the ambition sprawled, and the audience offered polite applause.
But the underlying story is not “peace.” It is power—where it is moving, how leaders are organizing it, and who ultimately controls it.
President Donald Trump recognized this reality earlier than his critics did. Long before policymakers embraced “ecosystems” as fashionable language, Trump argued that nations that lacked control over production, supply chains, and leverage surrendered real power, regardless of how many forums they attended or diplomatic statements they signed.
Trump’s Board of Peace signals a shift from rule-based global institutions (e.g., the United Nations) to fast-changing, interest-based global coalitions. To understand why this shift matters, policymakers must look past rhetoric and examine how power actually functions in modern systems—an approach Trump adopted instinctively when he challenged the global consensus.
Power does not flow from treaties or multilateral institutions. It flows through ecosystems: integrated systems that combine infrastructure, global standards, platforms, capital, and rules.
The private sector grasped this dynamic long before governments did. When Trump insisted that trade, security, and industrial policy were inseparable, he spoke not from ideology but from realism.
Apple, for example, does not merely sell phones. Through the iOS ecosystem, it controls hardware, software, payments, app distribution, data permissions, and developer access.
