By David S.Aikman (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-09-07 10:09

The author is the director of the Forum of Young Global Leaders

In the 7th and 8th centuries during the heyday of the Tang Dynasty, China was the envy of the world. The capital Chang'an (modern day Xi'an), was the most populous city on the planet and was so filled with riches that Emperor Taizong ordered his municipal authorities to build a private mansion for every visiting official.

Trade along the Silk Road boomed; influences from Central Asia and the Islamic world revolutionized painting; visitors and political emissaries were treated to poetry, acrobatics and music; noblemen (and women) played polo; wine from western Asia along with tea, sugar and spices from India and Southeast Asia transformed the Chinese diet. Indeed, the Tang Dynasty is widely viewed in Chinese history as a period of progress, exchange, openness and stability, a time when China wielded her power and influence to offer a benevolent and welcoming hand to the world.

Song Wenming (left) and Zhou Yu celebrate after winning 10 million and 7 million yuan respectively in the Winning in China entrepreneurship contest on China Central Television, to start their own businesses. Entrepreneurial spirit is very prevalent in China. [Chinafotopress]

Today, exactly 1,100 years after the fall of the Tang Dynasty, China again faces similar opportunities. Newspapers, policy papers, legislation and company P&Ls all reflect China's growing prosperity and the global economy's shift to the east. The remarkable re-emergence of China since the reforms of Deng Xiaoping, particularly in the past 10-15 years, will demand significant shifts in the way the world does business everywhere.

To date, doing business has largely meant doing business the "old-fashioned" way, with an attention to hierarchy, position, influence and power. In China, this has meant guangxi (relationships); elsewhere, this has meant an unquestioning adherence to old governance and business frameworks, which explicitly or implicitly are reflective of the post-World War II global order. Yet times are changing. In fact, they have already changed.

Whether in Beijing or Bangalore, London or Lusaka, business is increasingly being driven by a new class of entrepreneurs who operate in a complex, networked, multipolar and interconnected world where one's worth is more likely to be determined by one's social network, flexibility and creativity than by one's pedigree or diploma. Of course, ample cash for investment helps, but no longer is it the case that being born into the "right" circumstances (be it an aristocratic family or the northern hemisphere) is a meal ticket to success. Indeed, the current moment is, in part, an echo of Darwin's observation on the Galapagos islands nearly 200 years ago - "It is not the strongest of the species that survives but the most responsive to change." Today's new leaders are just that - flexible chameleons who have the ability to change depending on the context.

It is in this dynamic context that, for the first time, the organization I work for will come together in China for its third Young Global Leaders Annual Summit. Each year the World Economic Forum recognizes 200 to 300 of the world's most accomplished leaders in the realms of business, politics, academia, the media and civil society as Young Global Leaders.

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