There are decades in which history seems to slow down – periods of apparent stability, in which institutions resist and change appears gradual. And then there are decades like those we have experienced since the founding of ASERI: turbulent, disorderly and marked by continuous reversals of course.
Born in the uncertainty following the end of the Cold War, ASERI was not born in an era of equilibrium, but at the beginning of a long season of instability. The promise of a peaceful, liberal and interdependent global order has been shaken time and time again – by crises, wars and a slow corrosion of democratic institutions. Instead of stable interdependence, we experience asymmetric vulnerabilities; instead of cooperative governance, the return of a direct and brutal geopolitical confrontation.
Nothing demonstrates this better than the current escalation engulfing the Middle East: the escalating conflict between Israel and Palestine, Iran's involvement, and the progressive involvement of the United States. This new crisis is not an exception, but the symptom of a world in which power, once again, tries to free itself from the rules; in which the lives of civilians become bargaining chips in zero-sum calculations; And in which international institutions are struggling to react.
In such a world, ASERI's mission remains clear and essential: to train students capable not only of understanding these dynamics, but of dealing with them responsibly. From its origins, the School has sought to integrate the analysis of politics, economics and law – not as separate disciplines, but as intertwined dimensions of international life. This method – based on intellectual rigor and ethical awareness – is what allows ASERI to resist ideological shortcuts and cynical disenchantment.
Throughout its thirty years, ASERI has never taught that the world can be easily "fixed", but it has always taught that it can be understood – and that this understanding is the necessary condition for any meaningful action.
Today, as war returns to occupy the international scene and autocracies regain ground, we are once again called to the courage of liberal conviction. A world governed by law is not a utopia: it is a goal to be defended, sometimes imperfectly, but always with awareness. Because if democracy is to survive externally, it must also remain vital internally. And this requires not only institutions, but training; Not only consensus, but culture.
The legacy of ASERI is exactly this: the refusal to separate competence from conscience, analysis from responsibility. Thirty years later, ASERI continues to be what it had chosen to be: a place where the global is not accepted as destiny, but addressed as a field of action – a School where taking the world seriously remains the first step to being able to change it.