SMARTS@-AIT Research Center

The South and South-east Asia Multidisciplinary Applied Research Network on Transforming Societies of Global South (SMARTS) is the newly established research center at the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), Thailand.

 

The objective of the center is to “Study the impact of multilevel changes including climate change and other socio-technical changes on various societal scales in South and South-East Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective and influence global discourse by promoting scientific voices from global South highlighting unique challenge, equity, justice and regional niches in line with special focus on SDG 12 and its inter-sectoral linkage with other Sustainable Development Goals.” In line with this objective, we aim to carry out research on 'investigating the impact of climate change and other socio-technical global changes in transforming societies in South and South-East Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective' with the help of affiliated researchers, mainly focusing on the following five thematic areas: 

 

Thematic Areas of Research:

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• Infrastructure: Risks and Resilience

• Transforming world: Changing Demand, lifestyle, human wellbeing

• New Technologies:  Social Innovation and service provision 

• Communication for Social Change and Transformation

• Equity and Justice: in Sustainable Development & Transforming societies

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Center Activities:

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• Original research: To undertake research on investigating the impact of climate change and other socio-technical global changes in transforming societies in South and South-East Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective with a focus on the five thematic areas mentioned above (in line with the main objective the Center). 

• Knowledge creation and Outreach through expert consulting for decision and policy support:  In order to manage and/or investigate transitions and social transformation in various contexts in different country and in the region, the center will provide expertise to regional governmental, intergovernmental, non-governmental and academic/research and policy planning bodies.

• Regional Research Network and Capacity building Activities: To advance the dialogue and cross-fertilization of research and policy analysis, a network of regional and global researchers and institutions will be created, and build research capacities in the region through academic workshops, seminars, international conferences and publications, academic scholarships to study at AIT, joint research activities with partners and mentoring of early career scholars through physical and virtual platforms.  

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