History
50 years of research and teaching
Founded in 1963 by two prominent Austrians living in exile, the sociologist Paul F. Lazarsfeld and the economist Oskar Morgenstern, with the financial support from the Ford Foundation, the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, and the City of Vienna, the IHS is the first institution for postgraduate education and research in economics and the social sciences in Austria. Paul F. Lazarsfeld, a leading pioneer of modern social research, and Oskar Morgenstern, famous for his seminal contributions in the field of game theory, by an international and interdisciplinary forum intended to re-establish Austria's intellectual heritage in the field of theoretical and empirical social sciences and economics which had been destroyed by rising fascism in the thirties and the Nazi regime.
Morgenstern was the director of the former Austrian Institute for Economic Research, when he was driven out from Austria in 1938. Paul F. Lazarsfeld had founded the Institute for Applied Social Psychology at the University of Vienna in 1929 and was its director until his emigration in the USA in 1933. From 1940 to 1970, Lazarsfeld worked at the department of sociology at Columbia University, where he expanded the Bureau for Applied Social Research into a world-famous and renowned institution for empirical social research.
By establishing an international institute for postgraduate courses and theoretical and empirical research programmes it was intended to overcome the post-war anti-intellectual attitude and the dreary status of Austrian universities. According to Morgenstern's vision, mathematical game theory should play a crucial role as an interdisciplinary theory. According to Helga Nowotny the "social innovation" of the IHS created by the transposition of an American model of post-graduate education was based on "objectives which combined subjects and methods into a new organizational shape in order to support the modernization process of the country by the introduction of the social sciences into political decision-making."
According to Bernhard Felderer, director of the Institute for Advanced Studies from1991-2011, multidisciplinary approaches and the combination of research and training are the characteristics of IHS. It was conceived as a postgraduate research and education institution which, according to Walter Toman, director of the IHS from 1966 to 1967, was to restore part of Vienna's pre-war intellectual heritage. Under the instruction of renowned scientists from abroad graduated students were offered the possibility to deepen their knowledge skills and theoretical reflections by becoming involved in empirical scientific projects.
According to Gerhart Bruckmann, director of the IHS from 1968 to 1973, it was the well-justified task of the IHS to get innovative methodologies and research designs for economics and the social sciences generally accepted in Austria and, thus, to allow for the "internationalization" and for substantial contributions to the progress within the social and economic sciences. The basic interface and at the same time the element associating the different disciplines represented at the IHS, according to Helga Nowotny was ensured by the orientation towards formal methods. According to Nowotny the IHS has successfully recombined the diverse tasks of postgraduate teaching, basic research, and applied science into a consistent organizational matrix.
Critical years
Among the Austrian politicians who clearly recognized the need for an international scientific dialogue and who were thus most engaged in establishing the IHS, Bruno Kreisky took on a prominent role. In the critical years prior to the founding of the IHS in 1963, Kreisky served as an indispensable intermediator who finally managed to "synthesize" the conflicting interests and aspirations among the key actors from the ministry, the universities, the Ford Foundation, and Austrian scientists living abroad.
In his recent extensive research on the founding of IHS, Christian Fleck shows how well-meaning efforts of innovation in economics and the social sciences coming from abroad were counteracted by the political protagonists in Austria and adjusted to the constraints of the existing political culture. It was not until 1968 that IHS could effectively position itself within economics, political and social sciences in Austria. ( "Wie Neues nicht entsteht. Die Gründung des Instituts für Höhere Studien in Wien durch Ex-Österreicher und die Ford Foundation", in: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften 2000/1.)
Promoting interdisciplinary approaches, comparative research, international training, and intellectual exchange
The crossing of geographical and disciplinary borders, which Erhard Fürst, co-ordinate director from 1973 to 1983, considered an IHS trademark, has been characterizing both postgraduate training and theoretical and empirical research activities since its beginnings. In his recollections Gerhart Bruckmann stated an identity crisis in the late eighties when universities had made up for their lack of scientific and international standard and had partly become rivals to the IHS. A series of curriculum reforms led to a redistribution of roles and functions between universities and IHS programs. While due to the growing number of students universities can provide a first-rate survey of the existing disciplinary state of the art, IHS postgraduate programs serve as the international training ground for applying existing "best practices" in the fields of economics or social sciences. In this manner, a growing number of co-operations have been established between the postgraduate program and universities in Austria and abroad, which guarantee the high-level standards of the existing postgraduate IHS education.
If international standards are to be handed on and maintained in research and training programs, the unity of basic research, applied science, and training, as practised at the IHS for many years, and, thus, the specific training for research as realized in a postgraduate program must be promoted and appreciated, accordingly. IHS still proves to be a "social innovation" committing Austrian economics
and social sciences to future European and international research and education systems.
Growing interdependencies within Europe as well as on global scale are leading to the increasing importance of institutions like IHS, which place the emphasis on interdisciplinarity, comparative research, international teaching, and intellectual exchange.
Morgenstern was the director of the former Austrian Institute for Economic Research, when he was driven out from Austria in 1938. Paul F. Lazarsfeld had founded the Institute for Applied Social Psychology at the University of Vienna in 1929 and was its director until his emigration in the USA in 1933. From 1940 to 1970, Lazarsfeld worked at the department of sociology at Columbia University, where he expanded the Bureau for Applied Social Research into a world-famous and renowned institution for empirical social research.
Drawing on my experience from Columbia,
I was convinced that the best way to train younger
people to become creative empirical social
scientists is to have them participate as staff
members in a project of experienced seniors
I was convinced that the best way to train younger
people to become creative empirical social
scientists is to have them participate as staff
members in a project of experienced seniors
Paul F. Lazarsfeld
By establishing an international institute for postgraduate courses and theoretical and empirical research programmes it was intended to overcome the post-war anti-intellectual attitude and the dreary status of Austrian universities. According to Morgenstern's vision, mathematical game theory should play a crucial role as an interdisciplinary theory. According to Helga Nowotny the "social innovation" of the IHS created by the transposition of an American model of post-graduate education was based on "objectives which combined subjects and methods into a new organizational shape in order to support the modernization process of the country by the introduction of the social sciences into political decision-making."
According to Bernhard Felderer, director of the Institute for Advanced Studies from1991-2011, multidisciplinary approaches and the combination of research and training are the characteristics of IHS. It was conceived as a postgraduate research and education institution which, according to Walter Toman, director of the IHS from 1966 to 1967, was to restore part of Vienna's pre-war intellectual heritage. Under the instruction of renowned scientists from abroad graduated students were offered the possibility to deepen their knowledge skills and theoretical reflections by becoming involved in empirical scientific projects.
According to Gerhart Bruckmann, director of the IHS from 1968 to 1973, it was the well-justified task of the IHS to get innovative methodologies and research designs for economics and the social sciences generally accepted in Austria and, thus, to allow for the "internationalization" and for substantial contributions to the progress within the social and economic sciences. The basic interface and at the same time the element associating the different disciplines represented at the IHS, according to Helga Nowotny was ensured by the orientation towards formal methods. According to Nowotny the IHS has successfully recombined the diverse tasks of postgraduate teaching, basic research, and applied science into a consistent organizational matrix.
Critical years
Among the Austrian politicians who clearly recognized the need for an international scientific dialogue and who were thus most engaged in establishing the IHS, Bruno Kreisky took on a prominent role. In the critical years prior to the founding of the IHS in 1963, Kreisky served as an indispensable intermediator who finally managed to "synthesize" the conflicting interests and aspirations among the key actors from the ministry, the universities, the Ford Foundation, and Austrian scientists living abroad.
In his recent extensive research on the founding of IHS, Christian Fleck shows how well-meaning efforts of innovation in economics and the social sciences coming from abroad were counteracted by the political protagonists in Austria and adjusted to the constraints of the existing political culture. It was not until 1968 that IHS could effectively position itself within economics, political and social sciences in Austria. ( "Wie Neues nicht entsteht. Die Gründung des Instituts für Höhere Studien in Wien durch Ex-Österreicher und die Ford Foundation", in: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften 2000/1.)
Promoting interdisciplinary approaches, comparative research, international training, and intellectual exchange
The crossing of geographical and disciplinary borders, which Erhard Fürst, co-ordinate director from 1973 to 1983, considered an IHS trademark, has been characterizing both postgraduate training and theoretical and empirical research activities since its beginnings. In his recollections Gerhart Bruckmann stated an identity crisis in the late eighties when universities had made up for their lack of scientific and international standard and had partly become rivals to the IHS. A series of curriculum reforms led to a redistribution of roles and functions between universities and IHS programs. While due to the growing number of students universities can provide a first-rate survey of the existing disciplinary state of the art, IHS postgraduate programs serve as the international training ground for applying existing "best practices" in the fields of economics or social sciences. In this manner, a growing number of co-operations have been established between the postgraduate program and universities in Austria and abroad, which guarantee the high-level standards of the existing postgraduate IHS education.
If international standards are to be handed on and maintained in research and training programs, the unity of basic research, applied science, and training, as practised at the IHS for many years, and, thus, the specific training for research as realized in a postgraduate program must be promoted and appreciated, accordingly. IHS still proves to be a "social innovation" committing Austrian economics
and social sciences to future European and international research and education systems.
Growing interdependencies within Europe as well as on global scale are leading to the increasing importance of institutions like IHS, which place the emphasis on interdisciplinarity, comparative research, international teaching, and intellectual exchange.
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