In 1978, the Czech philosopher Václav Havel described a greengrocer who places a sign in his shop window. The sign reads: "Workers of the World, Unite!"
The greengrocer did not write the sign. He did not choose it. It arrived with his vegetable delivery and he put it in the window because that is what you do.
The greengrocer had to put the slogan in the window, and why? What is he trying to communicate to the world? Is he genuinely enthusiastic about the idea of workers uniting? His enthusiasm may have known no bounds — but the slogan he displays is not a message of enthusiasm. It is a sign.
If the greengrocer had been instructed to display the slogan "I am afraid and therefore unquestioningly obedient," he would not be nearly as indifferent to its semantics, even though the statement would reflect the truth. The greengrocer does not put the slogan in the window to express enthusiasm; he puts it there to signal his compliance — his willingness to be the kind of person who puts signs in windows.
Forty-eight years later. World Economic Forum, Davos. January 20, 2026 — the day of Donald Trump's second inauguration. Mark Carney, former Governor of the Bank of England and Bank of Canada, addresses the assembled leaders of global finance.
"I think about Havel's greengrocer. We placed the sign in the window. We participated in the system. We benefited from it. We did not ask what it was doing."
Carney was speaking about the global financial system — the rules-based international order, free trade, open markets — that the assembled audience had built, sustained, and profited from. He was asking whether they had understood what they were actually endorsing when they endorsed it.
What signs do you put in the window?
And what do they actually say?