Options Magazine, Summer 2022

ADVANCING
© Agsandrew + Vladystock | Dreamstime
SYSTEMS
SCIENCE
ACROSS
THE GLOBE
ADRI
By Fanni Daniela Szakal
NAASAC
In the last decade, IIASA has helped to establish several systems analysis
research centres worldwide, partnering with local researchers from East
to West and North to South to advance the discipline.
SASAC
50 years ago, IIASA was founded with the aim of
supporting collaboration between the East and the
West. Today, international collaboration is still at the
heart of IIASA. Researchers from all over the world
gather between the historic walls of Schloss Laxenburg
in Austria and work together across borders on pressing
global issues. However, to increase the footprint of
what IIASA can achieve, in the last decades there have
been greater efforts to develop systems analysis
capacity locally, right where it is needed.
“A core part of our mission is to advance systems
analysis around the world,” says Iain Stewart, former
head of Communications and External Relations at
IIASA. “For us, it is equally important to develop
capacity here at IIASA and in our member countries.”
ASIAN DEMOGRAPHIC
RESEARCH INSTITUTE (ADRI)
The first stop on the systems
analysis journey around the world
is the economic and cultural hub
of the East, Shanghai. Responding
to a need for comparative analysis of demographic and
socioeconomic changes across Asia in the past decades,
the Asian Demographic Research Institute (ADRI) was
jointly established by IIASA and Shanghai University
in 2015.
“Most institutes in Asia focus on purely countryoriented
issues. There is no institute working on
comparative analysis of important issues that the
12 Options Summer 2022
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