1998 Presidential Address: Our Shrinking Earth
这篇致辞分析了美国管理学会会员结构的变化，指出非美国会员增长迅速，学会正日益国际化，并探讨了地球“缩小”的原因，如管理学院全球发展、机票降价和互联网普及。
The Academy's membership has been changing. Perhaps the most significant change has been the increase in members who live outside the United States. Non-U.S. membership has been increasing more rapidly than U.S. membership since at least 1980. Figure 1 shows the numbers of U.S. and nonU.S. members since 1980. Throughout the 1980s, U.S. membership was increasing about 5 percent per year, while non-U.S. membership was increasing about 8 percent per year. The increase in U.S. membership decelerated in 1990, and since 1994, the average rate of change has been slightly negative. At the same time, the increase in non-U.S. members rose to 15 percent in 1990 and 1991, and it has averaged over 11 percent since 1991. Obviously, no one knows what the future holds. As the great physicist Niels Bohr is said to have observed, Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future. However, by amplifying the recent trends, an extrapolation into the future can help us to appreciate their character. Figure 2 extrapolates the last 5 years. If recent trends continue for only a few more years, more than half of the Academy's members will be living outside the United States. The Academy is becoming an international organization. Growth in non-U.S. membership has not been a result of explicit strategies. It has occurred spontaneously, and not until recently did it even come to the attention of the Academy's Board of Governors. Non-U.S. membership seems to be what Andrew Grove has labeled Segment O-a new market that rises unnoticed until it grows rather significant. Basically, the earth is shrinking, and this shrinkage is causing the Academy's world to expand. One cause of this shrinkage has been the development of management schools around the world; over the last two decades, many more nations have come to view management as a topic worthy of distinct study. A second cause of shrinkage has been a decline in air fares; it has become cheaper and cheaper to cross oceans. A third cause is the Internet; our domains for professional interaction have expanded from the colleagues in