Global strategist will put forward the case for 'region states' at Leaders in Dubai

Ohmae, who is one of the nine speakers at November's international leadership summit Leaders in Dubai, said: "Policymakers, politicians and corporate managers would benefit from looking at 'region states' - the globe's natural economic zones - whether they happen to fall within or across traditional political boundaries.

"With their efficient scales of consumption, infrastructure and professional services, region states make ideal entryways into the global economy."

Referred to as 'Mr. Strategy', Ohmae has an unsurpassed reputation as an advisor on global strategy to foreign governments and multinational corporations. The Financial Times referred to him as "Japan's only management guru" and The Economist has referred to him as one of the top five management gurus in the world.

Ohmae has written more than 140 books including The Borderless World, first published in 1990, which predicted the rise of globalisation - in fact, Ohmae coined the word there for the first time.

He said: "The nation state has become an unnatural, even dysfunctional, unit for organising human activity and managing economic endeavour in a borderless world.

"It represents no genuine, shared community of economic interests; it defines no meaningful flows of economic activity. In fact, it overlooks the true linkages and synergies that exist among often disparate populations by combining important measures of human activity at the wrong level of analysis."

Ohmae gives the example of Italy: to consider it as a single economic entity ignores the reality of an industrial north and a rural south, each vastly different in its ability to contribute to the economy.

Treating Italy as a single economic unit forces corporations to operate on the basis of false averages, as the country has great disparities in industry and income across regions.
In comparison, Ohmae puts forward his solution of a region state. He says: "Region states are natural economic zones. They may or may not fall within the geographic limits of a particular nation - whether they do is an accident of history.

"Sometimes these distinct economic units are formed by parts of states, such as those in northern Italy, Wales, Catalonia, Alsace-Lorraine or Baden-Württemberg. At other times they may be formed by economic patterns that overlap existing national boundaries, such as those between San Diego and Tijuana, Hong Kong and southern China, or the "growth triangle" of Singapore and its neighboring Indonesian islands.

"In today's borderless world these are natural economic zones and what matters is that each possesses, in one or another combination, the key ingredients for successful participation in the global economy."

Ohmae will be putting forward his ideas on the dynamics of the regional state at Leaders in Dubai, on November 28 - 29. The full line-up of speakers is:

• Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the former Soviet Union and winner of the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize
• Bill Clinton (via videocast), former President of the USA from 1993 - 2001

• Dr Mahathir bin Mohamad, former Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1981 - 2003

• Madeleine Albright, the first female Secretary of State in the USA and a director of the New York Stock Exchange

• Daniel Pink, the author of Free Agent Nation, the Washington Post bestseller, who will suggest six aptitudes crucial to the survival of white-collar workers

• Kenichi Ohmae, the former director of McKinsey Japan, who has earned global acclaim as 'Mr Strategy'

• Arie de Geus, who was at the helm of Royal Dutch Shell for 40 years and has been described as "the global statesman" of business change

• Spencer Johnson, the author of the bestsellers Who Moved My Cheese and The One-Minute Manager

• Scott Bedbury, one of the world's leading brand architects, responsible for Nike's Just Do It campaign and the emergence of the Starbucks brand

Regional business leaders - the Leaders in Dubai corporate alumni - have confirmed their support for the event. They include: HE Sheikh Faisal Al Qassemi, founder of the Al Qasimi Group; Nabila Al Anjari, Assistant Under-Secretary for Tourism Affairs in Kuwait; Aramex's President and CEO Fadi Ghandour; former Lebanese minister of national economy Saeb Jaroudi; Bharat Jashanmal, of the GCC retail corporation Jashanmal & Sons; Khamis Al Muqla, founder and chairman of Gulf Hill & Knowlton and Gulf Saatchi & Saatchi; Lebanese industrialist Jacques Sarraf; veteran hotelier Sami Zoghbi, regional head of Le Meridien Hotels & Resorts; and Saudi industrialist Abdulla al Zamil.

Leaders in Dubai is expected to attract more than 2,000 business leaders from across Arabia and will be held at Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai, from November 28 to 29, 2005.

Headline sponsors are the international names Citigroup, EMAAR, Mastercard, Nokia and Saudi Oger Ltd.

CNN is confirmed as the international media partner, with Al Arabiya News Channel as headline media partner. Media sponsors are Al Hayat, AME Info, Gulf Business, Gulf News and Oman Economic Review.

LEADING MINDS, part of the international conference organisers IIR, is a company specialising in presenting the latest thoughts and groundbreaking ideas from pre-eminent international business authorities.