Why a Brussels Institute for Advanced Studies, BrIAS ?
Belgium, and Brussels in particular, is a patchwork of different socio-economic and cultural environments. It offers a unique potential for creativity and groundbreaking progress, making it very attractive to high-level researchers, artists, designers and all those who want to help shape a harmonious and sustainable future.
The Université Libre de Bruxelles, ULB, and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, VUB, are the two leading universities in Brussels. Their origin goes back 150 years.
The words "Libre" and "Vrije" in their name stands for free enquiry, which postulates independent reasoning and the rejection of all dogma. Indeed, both the ULB and the VUB strive to break down the walls of ignorance and dogmatism by stimulating groundbreaking research at the highest level of creativity, without taboos or prejudice.This implies crossing boundaries and building bridges between disciplines and different socio-economic orcultural environments.
Institutes for Advanced Studies, IASs, are incubators of ideas, with no philosophical or political restriction, where some of the very best scientists, artists or designers, coming from various fields and countries, are given the opportunity towork in an atmosphere of complete freedom, collaboration, mutual emulation and cross-fertilisation.The first IAS was created in Princeton, 1930. Since then, several IASs have been established worldwide.
Despite a considerable number of internationally acclaimed university laboratories, there is no IAS in Brussels or Belgium as of yet. The authorities of ULB and VUB have therefore decided to create a Brussels Institute for Advanced Studies (BrIAS) as a joint initiative.