Further, he said, mainstream economics departments cannot yet be trusted to hire regional specialists and to train graduate students in the field.

He was also a regional specialist, particularly in western Indonesia with structuralism as his main subject of interest.

A year ago, Iraq's boast to have tested a ground-to-ground missile with a range of 450 miles was greeted with derision by some regional specialists.

Indeed, the trends associated with globalization will hardly stop the feuding between the modelers and the regional specialists.

The program provides capacity building for international professionals, including government officials, development consultants and regional specialists who wish to contribute to development policymaking.

The concession, some regional specialists say, still rankles the Iraqi leader as a humiliation to be redressed.

But the world is also certainly a more complicated place, and the need for regional specialists is more acute than ever.

It requires "production" - often without the necessary regional specialists and linguists.

The Regional Office is staffed by American diplomats and regional specialists.

The offer of amnesty, regional specialists said, would not have been made if President Hussein regarded the Kurds as a continuing military threat.