Shaping a Transnational Systems Community (1)
This chapter discusses the importance of shifting forms of association in the development of East-West systems analysis. Several formations played different roles at different times. The first was a strategic coalition, which gathered to forge a new transnational field of systems analysis. This strategic coalition was active mostly in the early stages of the organization of the East-West Institute, from 1966 to the early 1970s. The second formation was the internal informal organization within IIASA, which enabled the institute to perform its diplomatic role as a Cold War bridge from 1972 to 1990. A third formation was again a strategic coalition, activated at the moment of crisis in 1981 when the Reagan administration discontinued paying US membership fees, threatening IIASA's survival. All these informal associations were shaped with an aim to ease Cold War tension and socialize actors from the opposing regimes into a new fraternity of world system governance.