Submission draft for publications consideration; 9/5/16

TOWARD A PRACTICAL UNDERSTANDING OF GLOBALIZATION

Roger Kaufman
Gonzalo Rodriguez
Abstract
The authors make a case for a new approach to economic and social globalization based
on the practical applications including those developed at the Performance Improvement
Institute program at the Sonora Institute of Technology (ITSON), other published research
and the experiences in Mexico and other developing countries. The article proposes
replacing the traditional focus on conventional approach of low-cost manufacturing and
commodities with high-tech, knowledge-intensive cross-national ecosystems such as the
Arizona-Sonora ecosystem that links Arizona (US) and Sonora (Mexico). They also
propose a distinction between economic and social globalization and suggest how to
integrate them.
Introduction
Borders have become increasingly economically irrelevant but problems persist. Borders
still matter for goods and services and even though there are many “free trade”
agreements, many feel that they are not of reciprocal benefit. According to Parag Khanna
(2016) in his recent book Connectography, connectivity is a major driver of the deep shift
to a more complex global system. In this new paradigm, we can shift from traditional
borders to ecosystems borders that are linked thru knowledge and information. But are
economic drivers sufficient?
Globalization and connectivity
Khanna says, connectivity itself –alongside demographics, capital markets, labor
productivity, and technology- is a major source of momentum. Currently we are
witnessing a massive global commitment to infrastructure. Cities and highways, pipelines
and ports, bridges and tunnels, telecoms towers and internet cables, electricity grids and
sewage systems, and other fixed assets command about $3 trillion dollars per year in
global spending, with well over the $1.75 trillion dollars spent annually on defense.
Because of ecosystems, infrastructure issues can go across borders.
Globalization will not be effective until we treat globalization not as a zero- sum game but
as a game where there are only winners. This paradigm shift will only happen when
narrow self-interests are replaced with a measurable concern for measurable good for all.
Peter Drucker (1993) in his Post Capitalist Society posits that the old capitalism is one of
money and things while the new capitalism is of knowledge and ideas. Under this
conceptualization there is a coming shift from zero-sum games to win-win ones. Current
policies of nations have not yet turned to this new capitalism. One issue might be the unit-

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of-analysis, or scope of definition for trade. Functional globalization depends on such a

holistic shift from borders to ecosystems; a larger unit-of-analysis and attention.
Emergence of new international relations
For example, Southwest US and Northern Mexico has more in common with each other
than each does with the rest of their nations, in fact, according with different sources, is
the geographical area that since 1994 is growing faster in both, Mexico and the United
States. Why not remove conventional barriers so there can be a free flow of knowledge
and ideas that will result in functional profit-shared products and services? Ideas flow
across borders so why not seek a globalization that encourages, allows, and benefits from
the consequences of so doing?
Christopher Wilson, Erik Lee and, and Alma Bezares (2015) suggest an initiative named
mapping and developing the U.S.-Mexico trans-border Industries. This initiative gives
specific data related with the integration thru infrastructure of the border sub-regions such
as: California-Baja California, Arizona-Sonora, Paso del Norte Chihuahua, New Mexico,
el Paso Texas, Coahuila-Nuevo Leon, Tamaulipas, Texas, lower Rio Grande Valley-
Tamaulipas. In their final report, they specify that since the implementation of NAFTA,
twenty years ago, trade between the US and Mexico has grown six-fold. It now totals
more than half trillion dollars a year, with approximately 80% of that, more than a billion
dollars a day, crossing at the U.S.-Mexico land border. If we are to have sensible
globalization, there must be reciprocal mutual benefits for all stakeholders for each
ecosystem.
New vision for our common world
We can define common good which is shared by most cultures: jointly creating the world
we want for tomorrow’s child. We can measure this common good in terms of Kaufman’s
(2006, 2011) Ideal Vision. This shared vision is about purpose for the ‘long-haul’ which
might have to be realized step-by-step:
No person will be under the care, control, or custody of another person, agency,
or substance. There will be no losses of life, nor elimination or reduction of levels of well-
being, survival, self-sufficiency, or quality of life from any source or intervention, including:
War, riot, terrorism, or unlawful civil unrest
Unintended human-caused changes to the environment
including permanent destruction of the environment and/or
rendering it non-renewable
Murder, rape, or crimes of violence, robbery, or destruction to property
Substance abuse
Shelter
Permanent or continuing disabilities
Disease
Starvation and/or malnutrition
Destructive behavior (including child, partner, spouse,

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self, elder, others)

Accidents, including transportation, home, and business/
workplace
Discrimination based on irrelevant variables including
color, race, age, creed, gender, culture, sexual orientation,
religion, wealth, national origin, or location

We all share this ideal for our own children and grandchildren, but why not have it for
children world-wide? The Ideal Vision can provide us with metrics for measuring the
mutual benefits of a practical globalization for all.
Diversity within the countries
A recent set of articles and books by Berkeley economist and National Bureau of
Economic Research (NBER) Enrico Moretti (2013) provides some thoughts-provoking
insights about the trends of our knowledge-base, globalized economy. Moretti study how
growth of cities determine the growths of nations. Using a spatial equilibrium model and
data on 220 US metropolitan areas from 1964 to 2009, he first estimated the contribution
of each U.S. city to national GDP growth. He demonstrated that the contribution of a city
to aggregate growth can differ significantly from what one might naively infer from the
growth of the city´s GDP. He concludes that despite some of the strongest rate of local
growth, New York, San Francisco and San Jose were only responsible for a small fraction
of U.S. growth in this period. By contrast, almost half of aggregate US growth was driven
by growth of cities in the south.
Building Ecosystems for Entrepreneurial Innovations
In an article by Mariano Bernardez (2011), he described how The Sonora Technological
Institute (ITSON) developed a new direction, based on the Ideal Vision for the Southern
Sonora and, in 2005, started the Performance Improvement Institute (PII), a new PhD
and MBA program in Societal and Organizational Performance in order to transform the
ideal vision into reality. The PII utilized a double bottom line business case, defining
measurable goals at three levels according to Roger Kaufman´s Mega Planning
methodology (2006, 2011):
Micro level: products and deliverables produce by individuals and groups for each
year
Macro level-. Revenue and benefit for the new organizations based on what they
can or do deliver outside of their organization,
Mega level- Measurable value added for society and communities such as paying
jobs created; direct and indirect revenue, for the community and market, and reduction of
societal costs derived from unemployment, health, and other community problems.
Using the double bottom line business case PII/ITSON was able to align the teaching,
research and consulting activities with strategic goals and monitor and manage the

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process, applying a modified version of Geary Rummler´s and Brethower´s (2014)

Anatomy of Performance –AOP- model to design cross-organizational value chains to
connect and synergize the new companies. An example is that during the 2005-2010
periods, ITSON installed a Wide Area Network (WAN) covering three cities, two clusters
to incubate technology and agribusiness companies, a tourism operator and a multi-
purpose arena.

Linking the region and the Universities for development

It is important to say that the OCDE, in 2013, using the Higher Education in Regional and
City Development conducted a study for the state of Sonora. The principal objective of
the Sonora review was to examine the links between the region and the tertiary education
institutions, and to strengthen these links to the benefits of both.
In the section of recommendations (page 35) for the federal and state governments in the
theme of promoting regional innovation in Sonora, says: “Articulate a state level
innovation plan and technological vision, and focus on implementation. Sonora´s
economic strategy has traditionally stressed the development of maquilas, recruitment
policies and infrastructure building, rather than R&D and new product and process
innovations. The state would nonetheless benefit from a clearer focus on technological
perspectives…A state level innovation plan would help policy makers focus on the merits
of endogenous R&D policy for certain niche sectors (aerospace, alternative energy,
desalinization plant, logistics and measurements instruments) and to depart from the
“technological follower” model that has been prevalent in Sonora for the past decades.
This framework will provide TEI´s with a roadmap for the future and make their R&D
program more coherent and easier to evaluate. The process of designing the plan would

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be facilitated by referring to ITSON Strategic Development Plan for Southern Sonora,

which was developed at the end of the 2000s in collaboration with state and sub-state
authorities.
Some sensible globalization issues remain.
While economic globalization is practical and useful, there is still to be resolved issues
relative to cultural as well as political globalization. The world is experiencing massive
immigration is some areas of the world. While some of this might be driven by economics
and seeking a better life, there comes with this cultural conflicts The political imposition
of movement of people and regulations across borders are becoming increasingly
suspect…witness Europe and the political impositions of political globalization to deal with
climate change. There are, perhaps 3 kinds of globalization:
Economic
Cultural
Political
A work-in-progress is to find ways for cultural and political globalization to also use
the Ideal Vision for all parties to determine what globalization should progress without
threatening each other
Conclusion
By sharing of knowledge and information in a world without conventional borders but with
ecosystem borders, we can identify and build social, political, and economic systems that
will benefit all. The world is changing, the questions for us are will we be the masters of
change or the victims of it, and ask for each initiative, “will this get us closer or further
away from the shared Ideal vision.”

References
Bernardez, M. (2005). Achieving Business Success by Developing Clients and
Community: Lessons from Leading Companies, Emerging Economies and a Nine
Year Case Study. Performance Improvement Quarterly, Vol. 18, Number 3. Pp.
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Bernardez, M. (2006) Prespuesto Mega para el Impacto Social: Como crear casos de
negocio que garanticen el impacto social y la autosuficiencia. ITSON Performance
Improvement Institute.
Bernardez, M., & Kaufman, R. (May-June 2013). Turning Social Capital into Societal
Performance: Three Case Studies and a New Framework for Value Creation.
Performance Improvement. Vol. 52, No. 5. Pp. 5-18.

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Bernardez, M., Kaufman, R., Krivatsy, A., & Arias, C. (2012). City Doctors: A Systemic
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Authors
Roger Kaufman is professor emeritus, Florida State University, and has served as Distinguished
Research Professor at the Sonora Institute of Technology. He is a past president, honorary member
for life and Thomas Gilbert Award winner, all with International Society for Performance Improvement
(ISPI), and received ASTD’s Distinguished Contribution to Workplace Learning and Performance
award. ISPI has created the Roger Kaufman Award for measurable contribution to societal impact.
Kaufman consults world-wide and has published 41 books and over 290 articles on strategic planning,
performance improvement, quality management and continual improvement, needs assessment,
management, and evaluation. He is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association and the
American Educational Research Association. . Email: [email protected]
Gonzalo Rodriguez is director of the Regional Center of Innovation in Sonora, Mexico, is professor of
Economics in the Sonora Technological Institute. Past President of the Technological of Sonora
Institute (2003-2011). Received the Kaufman award to the Social Impact, given by the International
Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), 2014. He has published numerous articles and chapters
of books related with Higher Education and Economic Development. Also is a consultant in Regional
Strategic Planning. Nowadays is working with the General Direction of the Working Labor Centers of
Mexico, with the Sonora-Arizona Commission and with the Tourism Commission in Sonora and in the
Infinity City Entertainment District E-mail: [email protected]

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