EDITORIAL

The post-doctorate International Institute for Asian Studies
(IIAS) has been founded with the purpose of giving a focal point
to Asian Studies in The Netherlands. Its founders The Royal
Netherlands Institute for Arts and Sciences, the University of
Amsterdam, the Free University of Amsterdam and Leiden University
underline the necessity to co-ordinate scientific research in the
field of Asian Studies in The Netherlands. It is clear that
insular attitudes so tenaciously groomed by scientists and
scientific institutions alike in the past three decades have
caused a pulverization of scientific efforts also in the field
of Asian studies.
The awareness of the necessity for a close co-operation between
the institutions in the field of Asian studies is exemplified by
the gesture of CASA (Amsterdam) and the Kern Institute (Leiden)
to merge their newsletter, the South Asia Newsletter, with the
the newsletter of the International Institute for Asian Studies
(IIASN). Contributions meant for the next issue of their
newsletter have been included in this issue of the IIASN. Former
contributors to the South Asia Newsletter will be approached by
the South Asia editor of the IIASN, N. Bonouvrie, head of the
Documentation Centre on South Asia, in order to seek their
continued co-operation. The names of the correspondents of the
IIASN will be mentioned in the colophon of the next issue of
IIASN.  
For a substantial part the opening special of the IIASN is
devoted to the Institute itself: the history of its foundation,
its staff, its research programmes and the research topics of the
IIAS fellows are passed in review. In that respect this issue is
atypical but in many other ways the IIASN will feature the
columns presented herein. It consists of a section which contains
material relating to Asian studies in general. Furthermore, the
IIASN has three main sections: South Asia, Southeast Asia and
East Asia. These are each subdivided into columns in which you
will find news about institutes, conference reports, calls for
papers, lectures, awards and events. In the next issue columns
such as personnel adds, queries and information received will be
included.
The IIASN strives to create a great measure of transparency into
what is happening in the field of Asian studies. This is not only
important for Asianists but also it should dawn on
decision-makers in politics that the age of global Asianization
is drawing near!