Let's talk about the future. Your vision.
To be that engine [that] runs California, [that] nurtures and feeds California. As I travel throughout California and throughout the country, throughout the world, California is clearly the society that everybody looks to. I remember doing it when I grew up in Canada, when I lived in New Jersey for so many years. You know, California's a place that people love to hate to love. And it's because we're a society that everybody has a deep-down envy of. When I was in China last fall, people would ask: "How do we produce universities like the University of California?"

I was at Szechuan University in October. And I sat there with these kids and their fondest desire -- they would die and be gone to heaven if they could attend the University of California. Qinghua University in Beijing accepts one of every thousand applicants! Why shouldn't we be trying to attract the graduates from that school to come to UC? Two things will happen if we can do that. They will either stay in California, in which case we've had an enormous benefit to California. Or they'll be educated; they'll go back to their home, in which case it's an enormous benefit to California because of their everlasting ties here. So on the ground, it means we've got to be structuring agreements, partnerships, with these nations that are going to, in the 21st century, be dominant nations in the world.

Give us an example.
When I was in China the minister of education was proudly telling me about a very successful start-up company in Beijing, which is a chip design company. And that evening, I had an alumni event. I do alumni events for the whole system, of course. There were Bears attending; there were Bruins; there are a lot of Aggies all over the world, as well, because the wine industry's all over the world. But there were 200-300 people at this alumni event in Beijing. The two guys that started this company were there. They were in their 30s, I guess. They were both Cal graduates, Cal alumni. Electrical engineering. Both Ph.D.s. And sure enough, they had started this company. It's one of the few entrepreneurial venture capital companies that have been created in China. So I said, "Well, where do you live?" And they said, "Well, we live in Beijing and Emeryville." That's the way the world is going to be, and California has to fuel that. I think it is a wonderful future.

Dean AnnaLee Saxenian of Berkeley's Information School recently wrote a book, The New Argonauts, about such people.
Yes. And they go back and forth. And their start-up funds came from some of the faculty at Berkeley. Now, you've got to ask, if I'm talking to some people, some people think that that's a tragedy. Other people think it's a success. I think it's a success. That's the way the world is going to be, and California has to fuel that. I think it is a wonderful future.

It's an embarrassment of riches you foresee?
Well, that's the job. This job is an embarrassment of riches. Ninety percent of it is frustrating. It means dealing with complicated issues that a $20 billion organization has to deal with. But the opportunities to change the world are intoxicating.

Patrick Dillon is executive editor of California magazine.

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