In Memory of Dr. Enrique Campos Lopez

1941-2015, IIASA 1980-81

by Robert Anderson

Enrique with visitors from South Korea in Mexico.

Many people have generously contributed to the preparation of this note, including Dr. Roger Levien, Dr. Enrique Campos Nanez, Professor Nicholas Vonortas, Dr. Yongsuk Jang, Ing. Alena Urdiales Kalinchuk, Ing. Ernesto Neavez Camacho, Professor Dennis Meadows, Dr. Jesus Borja Tamayo, and Dr. Citlali Colin Chavez. Their personal reflections on Enrique are included and greatly enrich the story of this remarkable man.

Personal Reflections

The tangible products of Enrique’s career activities – new institutions, new buildings, new laboratories, books, monographs, articles, students instructed – bear ample testimony to his impressive achievements. Those who had the opportunity to know him and work personally with him understand, however, that a list of these tangibles would be only a superficial accounting of his impact and would miss by far the greater significance of his life. Enrique had an incredible capacity to motivate and inspire. His welcoming personality drew people to him in lifelong relationships of trust and confidence in a quest for knowledge. His enthusiasm, energy and optimism were infectious. He enriched the lives of all he came into contact with him. This is reflected in personal recollections of some of the people I have contacted for this piece, which are presented below in rough chronological order.


ING. ERNESTO NEAVEZ CAMACHO, one of CIQA’s first researchers, who took leading roles in CIQA’s guayule and subsequent renewable resources development programs; Environmental Consultant:

I think I met Enrique in the middle of 1972 at the Instituto Tecnológico de Torreón (Technological Institute of Torreón), in Coahuila. Enrique and Chucho (Manuel de Jesús García Delgado) were there promoting the establishment of CIQA, and with the support of CONACYT, they rented laboratory facilities in Torreón to do tests of the extraction of rubber from guayule and the first physical and reological tests pursuant to the manufacture of automobile tires. I had been carrying out, together with Rolando Maldonado, the first tests of the extraction of rubber from guayule in a laboratory in the house of Ingeniero Carlos Garza, as a professor at the Instituto Tecnológico of Saltillo.

After the tests in Torreón several months passed and at the beginning of 1973, Enrique and Chucho called us to begin working in the newly established CIQA, first located in a rented house on Calle Aldama in Saltillo. That’s where my relationship with Enrique Campos Lopez began.  

During almost 11 years we worked together and shared many experiences in Saltillo. In 1980, he invited me to IIASA where we lived and worked together for several months.

We had many shared experiences, mainly in CIQA. And Enrique became the godfather of our son, Oswaldo, when he was baptized in Vienna.


DR. ROBERT J. ANDERSON, JR, Resources and Environment Area at IIASA, 1979-82, collaborator with CIQA on arid zones natural resources development, applications of plastics in agriculture, and design of the ASZA project:   

I met Enrique in 1981, in the Kaiser Wing, when I went to find the source of the “Siren song” laugh I had heard. We quickly found mutual interests in sustainable management of natural resources and economic and social development, and conversations on the bus to and from Laxenburg developed in relatively short order into collaboration in areas of mutual interest, and – after hours - enjoyment of Mexican food at his flat and the rich cultural environment of Vienna. 

Enrique was as widely-educated (despite his academic and professional specialization in science) an individual I have ever met, knowledgeable in all dimensions (books, music, and art) of the Western Canon. Among many other occasions, I particularly remember enjoying with him a performance of Carmina Burana in which his two oldest children performed in the choir, and also a concert presented by Mexican concert pianist Salvador Neira Sugasti, a Saltillo native who was resident in Vienna at a conservatory there. Enrique’s love and enjoyment of the arts was also evident in his activities back in Mexico. In CIQA’s original facility on Calle Aldama in Saltillo or at Enrique’s home, I remember hearing the music of Pachabel, Vivaldi, Albinoni, Wagner, and others at all hours of the day and night. When CIQA’s new building was opened in 1982, the music moved to the new facility and was joined by paintings and sculptures that Enrique commissioned. He took great joy and pride in Mexican literature, music, and art. When in Mexico, I enjoyed forays with him looking for the work of Mexican artisans, and looked forward to occasional evenings of ranchera or mariachi music, accompanied by fine Mexican food and drink, and, as the evening progressed, enthusiastic but unmusical singing as we joined the performers.

I did not see him very frequently after 1984, but he was never far from my mind and today much in my memory. My work with him in Vienna and subsequently in Mexico inspired me to make a mid-career change to work in economic development, at USAID and the World Bank. The IIASA model we were trying to adapt to Mexico was very relevant to the changes in thinking about development during the last 30 years. But most of all I am grateful for his friendship and his memory.  

From the left, Thomas Jozseffi, Buzz Holling, and Enrique Campos Lopez, at IIASA circa 1983.




















PROFESSOR DENNIS MEADOWS, co-author of Limits To Growth, IIASA alumnus, distinguished professor practitioner of systems dynamics and systemic learning:  

Enrique was at IIASA in 1980-81. I worked on the IIASA staff in 1976 and again in 1983-84. But somehow we met. We became friends when we attended the first three meetings in Hungary of an international group of resource scientists - 1982-4.

Both of us were interested in promoting sustainable use of resources, and that shared passion lead into a variety of collaborations. Enrique translated some of my natural resource simulations into Spanish and ran workshops with them. He and I went to Cuba for a week, sponsored by the United Nations to conduct training programs on resources and environment for senior Cuban officials. Enrique was a member of the international team that met at my university every summer in the mid-1990s to develop new teaching tools. And he eventually used some of them to create a training center high in the mountains outside his home city, Saltillo, Mexico. I went there several times to help him conduct workshops for senior industrial managers, university officials and provincial governors.  

He leaves me many impressions. I remember how proud he was of Mexico. One evening he took me to a special workshop in Saltillo where artisans still crafted heavy wool blankets with the traditional techniques and patterns. Another time we made a special detour to visit one of Mexico’s leading ceramists. I still have the blanket and urn I brought back from those trips. And I remember how much fun he had using all the games and other action learning tools we developed.  

He was always eager to learn and ready to try something new. I think he inspired many around him to do the same.


DR. ENRIQUE CAMPOS NANEZ, Enrique’s son, who with the rest of the family accompanied him in Vienna during his stay there, and during and after his studies collaborated with his father on many projects: 

In Vienna, we were enrolled in the Bundes-Oberstufenrealgymnasium und Realgymnasium für Studierende der Musik. It was a high school for music students. My sister and I were both middle schoolers, so we were out of place, but my father did not seem to mind, and I am glad he didn’t. The school’s orchestra and choir (with us included) gave a series of three concerts in Linz, Graz, and Vienna with the Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony and Orff’s Carmina Burana. We also attended the Vienna Conservatory under Salvador Neira Zugasti, who was from Saltillo and gave us a chance to attend the school. Later, the following summer, he also arranged for us (Gorda – ECN’s oldest sister - and me) to attend an advanced Music Seminar. To give you an idea, I was 14 at the time, and all other participants were young adults (early 20’s). Gorda was learning to sing opera and her instructor said she shouldn’t sing that much until she turned at least 17 or her voice could be damaged. I guess he had strong confidence in our abilities! 

A few years after we had returned to Mexico my father attended an IIASA-sponsored international meeting on natural resource modelling with Professor Dennis Meadows and others. He brought back with him a Macintosh desktop computer that Professor Meadows had kindly given him, which was a far more advanced personal computer than any available in Mexico at the time.  I was amazed at its capabilities. What followed was a career of 30 years (to date) in which I have dedicated a good part of my time trying to emulate what I saw that day when I first connected and booted up that Mac…the menus, windows, pallets of tools, a design oriented to the user the ability to address complex problems and create simple tools for addressing them. That Mac, today broken and non-operational, is now in my office, a gift to me from my father a few days before he died. It changed my life. 

I worked with my father at Systemic Learning while studying for my undergraduate degree, helping him with the games and simulations (many based on and adaptation of Dennis Meadows’ systems dynamic model STRATEGEM and the Systems Thinking Playbook which Meadows coauthored) that underpinned most of the workshops he hosted. The workshops covered areas like the nature of innovation, cooperation, systems thinking, etc. As was usual with my father, the workshops were fully packed with many different ideas that usually left participants in awe. He used to say, “If they are not confused enough by the end, I am not doing my job.” 

I especially remember some advice my father gave me at some point in my career, when I was complaining about my work environment. He simply told me, “you know you make your own environment”. I will always remember his tremendous ability to shape and people he worked with. When I was around him, I felt I was doing something difficult, interesting, but most importantly, relevant.


ING. ALENA URDIALES KALINCHUK, began working with Enrique in 1998 at Systemic Learning where she organized events, and remained over the last 18 years as his collaborator on various projects and companion until his death:  

He was a professor, a facilitator, a guide, a collaborator before an expert. He enjoyed learning and together with others. He was a restless man, gifted in both analysis and synthesis and with an innate intelligence and sensitivity to balance them. His interests and purposes are rooted in pursuit of the common good, which always came before his personal interests. He was an avid reader and pursuer of new experiences. He had a natural tendency toward undertaking difficult tasks, and particular joy in completing them.  

Enrique knew how to be a good friend. And, more important, he knew how to be a good companion.  


DR. YONGSUK JANG, a Senior Research Fellow at the Science and Technology Policy Institute of Korea and a Senior Research Scientist at GWU’s Center for International Science and Technology Policy:

I do not remember exactly when I first met him but do remember where and how. He dropped by my office in the Center for International Science and Technology Policy (CISTP) of the George Washington University (GWU). He was a visiting scholar at the Center then and introduced himself as “a typical Mexican who loves science.” I particularly remember his smile, which was a newborn baby's. His smile has always been special and forever will be in my memory. His smile made me smile. Always. 

I was also drawn to his pure passion on science and science policy. I remember that, on that first meeting, he and I had a long discussion on how we could effectively promote science, technology and innovation in developing countries. He asked endless questions about my country, Korea, and I could see that he really loved his country, Mexico. He really wanted to contribute to Mexico by identifying effective policy options to promote Mexican innovation.  

In the months thereafter during our tenure at GWU, I had enjoyed my conversations with him a lot and deepened my knowledge on STI policies. One unforgettable conversation took place after a conference we had both attended in Atlanta. After the conference, we were together at the airport for our flight back to Washington, and became so immersed in our discussions on STI policies at the airport gate that we missed our flight.  

After I returned to Korea and he returned to Mexico, we invited each other almost  every year together with Nick (Professor Nicholas Vonortas). Every time we got together, we were like the Three Musketeers (Enrique called us Los Tres Diablos – the Three Devils) - enjoying food, drinks and conversation, but enjoying our moments together above all.  On my invitation, he had stayed in Korea for almost a year in 2013 as a visiting scholar at the Science and Technology Policy Institute (STEPI), where I am now working. We got together every day for lunch or dinner or drink. That year was for me perhaps the best of my life. When he left Korea, we were not sad because we believed we would see each other soon somewhere else around the globe. 

Now I cannot believe he is gone. I thought he would live forever because he had been healthier than me and any others and especially because he kept his baby-like smile all over the face. I miss him a lot... a lot... a lot!  And I am longing for his smile.

Yongsuk Jang, Nicholas Vonortas, and Enrique on assignment in Panama.



















PROFESSOR NICHOLAS VONORTAS, Professor of Science and Technology Policy at George Washington University; former Director of the Center for International Science and Technology Policy: 

I met Enrique when he applied here (George Washington University Center for International Science and Technology Policy) as a visiting scholar. We had never had anyone at the Center from Mexico before, and his extensive hands-on background in senior positions made him an attractive candidate for our program. He came here for two years. He was an excellent fit for our center and we became friends, professional friends at first but subsequently more than that. He had a wonderful personality…he was an ideal colleague and became a dear friend. 

He thought that Mexican policymakers did not understand the role of the government both at the national and regional levels in promoting innovation and how to best link research institutes like the one he founded in Mexico some years before (CIQA) with business. Enrique wanted to make the Mexican system more adaptive to innovation.  He was very interested in entrepreneurship, in how you take things from laboratory to commercial application. He was also interested in how to strike the proper balance between basic and applied research, avoiding a tendency for developing countries to spend too much on basic relative to applied research. He was interested in making research relevant to industry and the development of networks to promote innovation and diffusion.

While here, he became friends here with another visiting scholar from South Korea, Dr. Yongsuk Jang, who is now a senior member of the staff at the South Korea at the South Korean Science and Technology Policy Institute. STEPI is Korea’s most important and most well-known advisory unit for science and technology policy.

The three of us developed a very strong personal and professional relationship. Previously, Yongsuk and I had been working on projects in East Asia and the United States. When Enrique joined we started working together in Mexico and subsequently other Latin American countries as well. We visited Mexico and other countries on a variety of projects several times over the years, up until roughly 2012 when I went on sabbatical. During this sabbatical, I also developed collaborative relationships in Brazil that subsequently involved Yongsuk and Enrique. 

Enrique thought that Latin American countries could learn much from the experience of South Korea and other advanced developing countries. He viewed that experience as more relevant than that of developed countries since South Korea’s development experience “was closer in time” to that of LA countries. Developed countries’ experiences were many years in the past, of a different scale, and the policy and institutional specifics long forgotten, he argued.

I invited Yongsuk and Enrique to come to Brazil in May 2015 to a conference. Enrique cancelled at the last minute because the Mexican Government prepared an official group to travel to Korea at that same time and requested Enrique’s participation. That was last time I would have seen him.

I have so many memories of him, but a few in particular come to me today. Enrique came to Greece. I think it was 2010, summertime. He did it the hard, no-frills way, with very little money and within Greece traveled via Greece’s inscrutable and unpredictable ferry system, finding a place to stay on arrival. We traveled together for a few days, but his appetite for adventure was insatiable. I could not believe it when, at his age, he set off alone on a ferry for Crete!

He was very upbeat and energetic, and one of the best hosts I have ever encountered. I have a marvelous picture with him, Yongsuk, Alena (Urdiales) and a couple of other people whose names escape me now. We are in Guadalajara sitting around the table with big bottles of tequila sitting there in a mariachi place in Guadalajara.

Most of all, he was one of the best people I have ever met as a human being.  He lived well.        

2008 with (from left) Nicholas Vonortas, Alena Urdiales, Yongsuk Jang, and Enrique.


















DR. JESUS ARTURO BORJA TAMAYO, Director of International Cooperation at CONACYT:

I worked with Enrique Campos because he, in his last years, immersed himself in the study of the South Korean development model. In 2012-13, he spent a one-year sabbatical as a visiting scholar at a Korean agency, STEPI, which is a Korean think tank addressing public policy concerning regional development. In CONACYT, where I work as Director of International Cooperation, we were intensely interested in developing a cooperative relationship with STEPI, and he generously helped us in doing so. In fact, in what may have been his last international activity as a researcher, he participated – with a delegation from CONACYT and other Mexican research centers, in a workshop on policies for promotion of science and technology at a regional level hosted by STEPI. This workshop was in May of 2015. A little after this event he was diagnosed with the cancer that would end his life.

I don’t know about Enrique’s efforts in the early 1980s to promote Mexican membership in IIASA; I never discussed this with him.  But I do know that after his stay at IIASA, he attempted, without success, to transform one of CONACYTs centers (CIQA) to adopt the IIASA model, but the resistance was very strong.

In the short time that I knew him while he helped us establish contact with STEPI, I developed a very favorable impression of him both as a scientist and as a person. He was always willing to help, bringing to bear his considerable experience. I profoundly lament his passing. I also know that CIATEJ, the last CONACYT center in which he worked, has dedicated a section of its library that now bears his name.


DR. CITLALI COLIN CHAVEZ, Research Associate, CIDAM; Member of CIDAM’s Innovation Management Nucleus; Responsible for CIDAM’s Post-Harvest Laboratory: 

“I only came for the chromatograph” is what I always say when asked why I came to CIDAM. I was the first associate researcher hired by the project. The initial working group was only Dr. Enrique Campos Lopez, the administrative director of CIDAM, and me. The three of us began the formal “implementation” of the CIDAM model, and I began a “parting of the waters” in my life. Bit by bit more young investigators were integrated into the team with highly diverse professional backgrounds to staff the Innovation Management Nucleus. This process did not consist solely in hiring staff but also in forming the modus operandi for working together. The values underpinning this operational model were respect, cooperation, trust, and freedom. Constructing an organization always requires a good leader, and this was for us Dr. Enrique Campos Lopez. We worked as a team in numerous sessions in order to better understand the complex model we were trying to implement. We achieved our objective because, today we are CIDAM. Working with Dr. Campos has been an enormous pleasure and novel experience in the application of systemic learning. We learned that we have no limits and that as a team we will achieve our grandest dreams. 

Many thanks for everything.  We are the Innovation Management Nucleus of CIDAM and your working group.


In Memory of
Dr. Enrique Campos Lopez:
Some Career Details

by Robert Anderson 

Enrique's career spanned over 40 years, serving in various capacities and covering many areas, and played out in Mexico and elsewhere. He was founder and/or director of institutions of scientific and technological research, a visiting professor and/or researcher in national and international institutions, a consultant to international organizations, and CEO of an industrial enterprise. The broad temporal, spatial, functional and organizational spans of his career activities are bound together, however, by a central and unifying theme – the challenge of linking science and technology to economic and social development.  Enrique’s involvement with IIASA in the late 1970s and early 1980s was, I believe a key factor in the evolution of his thinking and the impact – on policies, institutions, and on his colleagues – of his work. This effect on the thinking of those who have participated in its activities has been invaluable and may well be IIASA’s greatest contribution.   


EARLY CAREER - 1970-1979:
FOUNDING AND DEVELOPING THE CENTER FOR APPLIED CHEMISTRY RESEARCH 

After completion of his PhD (Chemistry, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, 1970) Enrique remained at UNAM as a full-time faculty member and researcher in polymer chemistry. At this same time, Mexico’s newly-established (also in 1970) Consejo Nacional De Ciencia y Tecnologia (CONACYT - National Council on Science and Technology) was established, with a mandate emphasizing development of Mexico’s S&T capacity and linking this capacity to Mexico’s economic and social development.  Enrique became increasingly involved in various CONACYT committees and working groups during the early 1970s, taking the lead in formation of one of CONACYT's first joint committees with the private sector, the Committee on Polymers, and participating in the initiation of a portfolio of projects under joint sponsorship of CONAZA (the National Council On Arid Zones) and CONACYT.    

These activities lead to the development and funding (in 1973) of a proposal for consolidating this portfolio of projects and the developing linkages between projects and industry in a new center located in Saltillo, Coahuila, the Centro de Investigacion En Quimica Aplicada (CIQA-Applied Chemistry Research Center). It was initially organized for the purpose of basic and applied research in two main areas: (i) examining the technical and commercial potential of northern Mexico’s native desert plants such as guayule, ixtle, candillia, gobernadora, and larrea; and basic and applied research in polymer chemistry. These projects all progressed quite satisfactorily, including the construction and operation of a pilot plant for extraction of guayule rubber, and in 1976, CIQA was formally established with a broad mission statement:  “To carry out basic and applied scientific research and development in the areas of natural resources, agricultural chemistry, polymers, and food technology, oriented to the solution of national problems, and in particular, problems of the arid zones of the country, as well as the development of human resources in these scientific areas at the bachelors, masters, and doctorate levels.”


EARLY MID-CAREER – 1979-1885: 
RETROSPECTIVE EVALUATION AND THE ADOPTION OF A SYSTEMS APPROACH, PROMOTING THE APPLICATION OF SYSTEMS ANALYSIS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF MEXICO'S ARID ZONES, AND DEVELOPING AND PROMOTING COLLABORATION WITH IIASA 

In 1979, CIQA did a retrospective evaluation of its work. The evaluation found that while the scientific and technical research and development objectives of CIQA's program had broadly been met, actual application of CIQA's work to the development of Mexico's arid regions was not progressing. Indeed, other institutions working on arid zones development seemed to be largely disinterested in CIQA's work. In part, this seemed to have been attributable to practical questions that CIQA's research had not yet addressed. While technical prospects for new or enhanced uses of native plants and applications of plastics to problems of arid lands development were promising, very serious practical questions remained to be answered. How extensive were the fields of the native plants that were the targets of CIQA’s technical investigations and where were these fields located? What would happen to their biomass stocks under harvest for use? Was some form of agro-forestry technically and economically feasible?  Would other resources (e.g., water and energy) be necessary and, if so, were they technically and economically feasible? If new harvest and extraction technologies were involved, how would adoption of these be promoted among a poor, poorly educated, dispersed and isolated populace theretofore using decades-old traditional methods of harvest and extraction?   

In part, the lack of application seemed to be due to the fragmented nature of institutional responsibility and decision-making, with multiple and sometimes conflicting objectives of the actors involved. Enrique realized that these questions were perhaps even more serious than the remaining technical uncertainties, and that answering them would require a focus that encompassed both the various natural phenomena and the behaviors of the social actors involved. That focus would need to incorporate these natural and social interactions, and to be useful for decision-making in a pluralistic setting, would have to incorporate the development of a shared understanding of this system and cooperative approaches to its management. 

These considerations led to the decision, enthusiastically supported by CONACYT’s leadership, that CIQA's program going forward would take a multidisciplinary, systems approach – addressing all dimensions of technology development and application ... research and development, innovation, and diffusion. To implement this approach, a proposal was developed subsequently for a pilot-project Analisis De Sistemas En Zonas Aridas (ASZA-Systems Analysis in Arid Zones), which was funded in 1981, leading to the start up of the ASZA project in 1982. 

I do not know and have not yet been able to find anyone who remembers in this regard exactly when Mexico’s contact with IIASA was first made or how knowledge of and/or contact with IIASA may have factored into CIQA/CONACYT’s decision to pilot a systems analysis approach in its program going forward. I do know that Enrique had visited Vienna in 1975 to explore possible collaboration with UNIDO, that in 1977, the first Mexican researcher – Luis Javier Castro – joined IIASA’s staff, and that in 1978 and 1979, he was joined by Luis Donaldo Colosio, a Mexican economist who later in his career held various senior government posts rising through the ranks to become the Partido Revolucionario Institucional’s (PRI’s) candidate for the Mexican Presidency in 1994. Sometime in this period, IIASA was visited by a member of CONACYT's senior management team (Dr. Raúl Ondarza), who returned strongly supportive of the idea of developing collaboration with IIASA.  In the summer of 1979, a team from CIQA participated in a conference on natural resource accounting and geographic information systems sponsored by IIASA's then WELMM program.  

Whatever the sequence of events, it is clear in retrospect that the collaboration between IIASA and CIQA that developed made a great deal of sense. From CIQA/CONACYT’s perspective, the IIASA institutional/operational model was clearly relevant – perhaps with some adaptation - for both substantive (i.e., major focus on sustainable use of resources) and methodological (i.e., multidisciplinary, examining things systemically, involving all stakeholders, simulation, gaming, expert systems, etc) reasons. Collaboration also made sense from IIASA's perspective. The CONACYT/CIQA decision to pilot a systems analysis approach and Enrique's arrival at IIASA coincided with the then IIASA Director-General Roger Levien's exploratory initiatives to expand IIASA membership to include some scientifically advanced developing countries. In this regard, Levien had identified Brazil, India, and Mexico as promising candidates.   

Collaboration with IIASA developed rapidly in the context of Enrique’s residence there in 1980-81 and played an important role in the design and early implementation of the ASZA project. In addition to natural resource accounting and geographic information systems, collaboration also developed with the then Resources and Environment Program and WELMM on a program for evaluating renewable resource development alternatives for Mexico's northern arid regions, and with the Resources and Environment Area in the context of natural resource systems modelling and the Lake Balaton Project. IIASA also provided technical assistance in establishing CIQA's computer center, in transferring modelling, gaming, and data display software, and in the design and conduct of workshops/scientific meetings as a vehicle for promoting group learning, team work, shared understanding and group decision making. 

At the inception of the ASZA project, it seemed possible that the collaboration between CIQA and IIASA could develop into some more formal arrangement, including the possibility of formal membership.  However, Mexico's 1982 economic crisis soon struck and the shifting political priorities began to erode both the financing and political support for the systems analysis initiative and ended, for the time being, any possibility of Mexican membership in IIASA.[i]  In 1984, CONACYT decided to refocus CIQA's remit on plastics in agriculture and polymers, and terminated the ASZA project.

 

MID CAREER: 1985-2005 

Enrique left CIQA in 1985, but carried with him a lifetime commitment to the approaches to promoting applications of science and technology in economic and social development that he was developing at CIQA. Of this, he wrote: 

Systems analysis is not a method or a fixed set of techniques or recipes, and can be seen in different forms: such as a concept of how to see problems and how to incorporate the scientific method and scientific thought to manage them; as a form for studying how to generate the best support for decision-makers or those who elaborate plans for addressing complex problems under uncertainty; and as practical philosophy for guiding interdisciplinary research for the purpose of decision-making. [Perlas, p 165] 


On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the start of CIQA’s operations, Enrique summed it up thusly: 

Innovation is a profoundly social phenomenon that generates flows of information and knowledge in all directions. These flows imply relationships between functions and actors.  One of the most frequent weaknesses found in systems like ours is the lack of these relationships.  Establishing them, maintaining them, multiplying them and making them more complex is what we mean by the generic term “linkages”. 

Establishing a linkage or a new relationship requires the development of a shared interest, based on the development of new behaviors, such as confidence, credibility, the development of a common language, the adoption of a shared objective, and the capacity for negotiation. Also, as with fine wines, time.” [Perlas, p 17].

 

These conceptions are the unifying themes of his work throughout the rest of his long and distinguished career. As noted above, it is impossible given the enormous number of his activities to do more than touch on a few specifics that highlight these themes.

After CIQA, Enrique spent the late 1980s developing and deploying support systems approaches and methods for industrial management, both internationally as a consultant to the United Nations Industrial Development, and in Mexico at CONACYT and as Director of the Institute of Systems Development in Cuernavaca. He closed out the decade as co-director of a program to develop an organization in the Mayan Region of Mexico for the sustainable development of that region, and as a visiting faculty member in the School of Management at the University of California-Riverside developing a curriculum for environmental management.

In the early 1990, his broader entrepreneurial and managerial skills came into play in an industrial setting. He established and directed a Technology and Productivity Center for a Mexican industrial group. He subsequently became CEO of the group’s paper manufacturing and importing enterprise, where he was charged with restructuring the enterprise in preparation for its privatization.

In 1995 he founded Systemic Learning, which he ran for 10 years. This firm developed and applied new approaches to organizational learning based on systems dynamics methods, modelling and simulation, development of teams and networks. Fellow IIASA alumnus Dennis Meadows was a frequent collaborator with Systemic Learning’s programs.


LATE CAREER: 2006-2015 

In 2006, he began a two-year stint as a visiting scholar at the George Washington University’s Center For International Science and Technology Policy. His research there focused on cooperative approaches to technological innovation, strategies for the formation of consortiums/alliances/networks to facilitate innovation. He also researched the evolution of Mexico’s systems for cooperative research and development and strategies for facilitating these. In 2006, he was also affiliated with the Research Center in Technology and Design Assistance of Jalisco State (CIATEJ – Centro de Investigación y Asistencia en Tecnología y Diseño del Estado de Jalisco) as a researcher.

These two associations and initiatives evolved to carry through the balance of his career. He and two of his colleagues (Yongsuk Jang and Nicholas Vonortas at the George Washington Center) began to work together in a variety of assignments related to development of science and technology policies in Brazil, Mexico, South Korea, and elsewhere. After his stay at GWU, he traveled frequently to South Korea in conjunction with activities organized/hosted by STEPI (Science and Technology Policy Institute of South Korea). In 2013-14, he spent a year as a visiting scholar at STEPI, where he researched regionalization of innovation and began the preparation of material for a book on South Korea’s policies and institutions for innovation. He also helped develop a relationship between CONACYT and STEPI, which culminated in a Memorandum of Understanding for Joint Cooperation in 2014. In May 2015, he was asked to join CONACYT’s delegation to South Korea to review progress under the MOU and set the framework for the next phases of the cooperation.

At CIATEJ, Enrique was responsible for a variety of projects concerning innovation networks, design and organization of scientific and technological events, instruction, and activities to evaluate and develop a cooperative environment and internal organizational learning. Sometime around 2010, he became heavily involved in a project to establish a research center in the neighboring state of Michoacán, CIDAM – Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo Agroalimentario de Michoacán. This was a particularly appropriate focus for the end of his career, as it drew again on his motivational and entrepreneurial skills in addressing the same kinds of problems he had faced in the CIQA start-up almost 40 years earlier.



 [i] Negotiations began again, and in 2014 Mexico became a National Member Organization represented by CONACYT and the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI)

[ii] I have also benefitted from readingEnrique Campos-López and Luis Franciso Ramos de Valle, De las Perlas Al Collar: Historias de la Evolución del CIQA, CIQA Ciencia Editorial, Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico, 2001. Published to commemorate the 25th Anniversary of CIQA. This is a wonderful, insightful book on the challenges of linking science and technology to economic and social development – one of the best I have read. It is a pity that it is not more widely available and accessible to non-Spanish speakers.



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Last edited: 31 March 2016

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