The Forum has reached a level of recognition and a scale where for the very first time it has a chance of achieving Schwab's ambition of being influential on public policy decisions across the globe on the major complex issues of our time. This will demand that the Forum become still larger, better organized, more accommodating to media and civil society critics, and permanently located in New York.

But, there is a danger that Schwab will miss the opportunity, or permit his staff to wreck its prospects--a danger heightened by its actions in the last 24 hours.

The media--so crucial to building a powerful global image for the Forum--has been treated with contempt by Schwab's staff, which has brazenly played favorites. Some German and Brazilian reporters have been barred from access to the Waldorf, while some American and British journalists have been fêted. Now, the staff has gone a step further and banned The Earth Times from the Waldorf's halls.

Dissemination of The Earth Times has been stopped because Sunday's edition contained an article that members of Schwab's staff disliked. Schwab has long claimed to be an advocate of democracy, human rights, freedom of statement and social justice. Now, his staff discriminates among the press and practices censorship.

Last year in Davos we saw how paranoid Forum officials handled the protesters so badly that the Forum, which sought an image of being an open, all-embracing umbrella for diverse opinions, won a vicious reputation. The result was that this year much of the media focus was on the protesters, not the Forum's substance. Schwab is losing the goodwill of the press and civil society. Further missteps may see the Forum collapse under the weight of its taciturnity and insensitivity.

Schwab needs the support of the media and civil society leadership groups if he is to continue to build the prestige and effectiveness of the Forum. Above all, the key to the Forum's future will be Schwab's ability to continue to secure the participation of the businessmen who pay large fees to be present. He has to continue to offer them something that they dare not miss. He has to do this in ways that make them feel comfortable, not frustrated.

• If he takes the conference back to Davos it will be a signal that he lacks the self-confidence to handle New York and that he is far more secure in the cozy isolation of the Swiss mountains. If the Forum returns to Davos, then invited business and political leaders will probably send their deputies. The Forum would be seen as a place for second-raters and it would be on a downward dive to oblivion.
• If he offers them again a rambling, powerless and incoherent Yasser Arafat, as he did last year in Davos, rather than an eloquent Colin Powell as he did last week in New York, then the businessmen will stay away.
• If he overcrowds the panels, as was done in some instances this year, reducing participants to sound bites when they hoped to make speeches, then key government officials will steer clear of the next Forum.
• If his staff continues routinely to mangle press relations with the result that the politicians, business, academic and civil society leaders fail to win the flurry of self-promotional press that so many of them seek, then the big names may have another reason to steer clear of the next Forum.
• If Schwab suggests that delegates crowd again into third-rate Davos hostelries rather than the comforts of top-class Manhattan hotels, then he risks losing some of the business stars.
• And, if the Forum wins a reputation for being anti-media and anti-civil society, then many politicians and businessmen will not risk any form of public association with Schwab and his team. Klaus Schwab is admired and he is disliked. Envy is obvious in much of the criticism of him and the Forum. Moving the conference to New York raised his public profile to the stars. His future access to the loftiest offices of tycoons and politicians could be assured if he builds on this year's event.

The continuous front-page coverage of the Forum in The New York Times catapulted Schwab's enterprise to a level that rivals the major meetings of the United Nations and the World Bank. The constant references to the Forum on CNBC over the last few days have added vastly to the event's name recognition. The WEF, in the parlance of the "media leaders" attending the Forum, is now a global brand name worth a fortune and ripe for mass-marketing.

Schwab may complain that some major media representatives commented on his personal fortune, while others took more interest in the parties and the protests than in the substantive panels. He may be angered by the ridicule heaped on "Davos Man," the comments that "Davos Woman" was absent--as were President Bush and Vice President Cheney--and the additional vitriol masquerading as humor that dripped this week from the pen of lead Barron's magazine columnist Alan Abelson. While one result is that many in the American investment community may find the Forum laughable, the hard fact is that, thanks to Abelson and many others like him, the Forum is now better known than ever before.

If Schwab is sincere that he wants the Forum to make a meaningful contribution to public understanding of the most important and complex issues of our time, then he dare not return the Forum to Davos. The Forum is just too big for Davos and everyone knows it.

Last year, for example, the hotels could not accommodate the crowds, the local folks hated the protesters, and the delegates hated a conference center surrounded by barbed wire. Last year's event was huge, but few top politicians on the global stage attended.

For all the inconveniences of the Waldorf, the massive publicity that the Forum attracted this year lends golf-club prestige to many of those who attended. Back home, over drinks with friends and on the putting green with customers, people will casually comment that they were at the Forum. There will be instant recognition of a kind that was not present before.

The Forum has always had a double agenda for its most powerful delegates from national governments, multilateral institutions and business. There has been the Klaus Schwab program of panels, plenaries, breakfasts, lunches and dinners. And then, off to the side and removed from the glare of the press, there have been private meetings where key negotiations have taken place. In 1990, for example, I went to Davos as a World Bank official, to enjoy the Forum but also--and most importantly--to help my then boss, the President of the World Bank, arrange some key meetings with finance ministers from G7 countries on critical development aid issues.

This week in Manhattan, again far removed from the focus of the media on the Waldorf, there have been key meetings on Afghanistan's reconstruction, the war on terrorism, the political chaos in Argentina and, no doubt, numerous other sensitive matters. For officials and business leaders Manhattan is a far more sensible location for such discussions than Davos, and being able to hold the private talks at the same time as enjoying some of the Forum is seen as a very economical use of time.

At the end of his Barron's column this week, Abelson asks whether the World Economic Forum improves the lot of humankind. He argues that only the very, very rich attend and that "What's good for Davos Man is good for everyone, except less so."

Klaus Schwab has a chance to prove Abelson wrong. To succeed he needs to treat the media and civil society in ways that convince them that they are an essential component of the open dialogue around the very issues that the Forum is established to further. Then he must plan for the next Davos in New York, on a scale and in facilities that match the huge visibility that the Forum has attained and that can accommodate the press--including critics- while offering the comforts required by business and political leaders.