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The POPJUS Program continues and builds upon research activities previously undertaken in the IIASA World Population and Risk and Resilience programs. Insights into current and future population sizes, structures, and distributions are fundamental to understanding human impacts on ecosystems and simultaneously, the impact of environmental changes on human wellbeing differentiated by sub-populations.
The program’s research agenda embraces the key priority in the IIASA strategic plan by identifying sustainable development challenges and exploring people-centric systems solutions for sustainable, resilient, just and equitable societies. The program focuses on strengthening the human-centered and population-based approach, taking into consideration equity and the just distribution of opportunities, outcomes, and processes. In doing so, the program builds on existing strengths and expertise in population and human capital modeling as well as expertise in understanding, managing, and equitably governing systemic and existential risks associated with global change. The program will continue to invest in advancing its methods, approaches, and data to deliver results that can be incorporated into system analytical models, inclusive policy processes, and ultimately into equitable and effective policy pathways and transformations.
POPJUS Research Groups
Equity and Justice (EQU)
The EQU Group focuses on the human dimension of selected globally relevant policy challenges, with the aim of delineating and advancing their analysis, management, and governance with special attention paid to the design and application of equity and justice frameworks, both within the group and across IIASA.
Migration and Sustainable Development (MIG)
MIG focuses on applying advanced data collection and estimation methods to quantify and better understand the trends, patterns, drivers, and consequences of different types of migration considering its interactions with the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development.
Multidimensional Demographic Modeling (MDM)
Through its research, the MDM Group aims to advance demographic modeling methods to assess and forecast population dynamics with a focus on demographic and spatial heterogeneity under different socioeconomic scenarios at the global, national, and sub-national level.
Young Scientists Summer Program
The Young Scientists Summer Program (YSSP) at IIASA offers an exceptional opportunity for PhD students to engage in collaborative research with IIASA's interdisciplinary teams.
YSSP opportunities in POPJUS More information on applying to the YSSP
Wittgenstein Centre
POPJUS is one of the three pillars of The Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital, a collaboration among the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW), the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and the University of Vienna.
Read POPNET Newsletter WIC Report of Activities 2018–2022
Models, tools, datasets
Social and Policy Simulations
Wittgenstein Centre Human Capital Data & Graphic Explorer Version 3.0 (WCDE)
Population and Human Capital Projections (SSP 2023)
The World Aging Data Explorer (WADE)
Projects
Systems approach to EU wildfire risk management project (FIRELOGUE)
Climate Change and Human (Im)Mobility: The Role of Compound and Cascading Risks (2C-RISK)
Link4Skills (Link4Skills)
Cognitive health in aging society – The role of context for cognitive functioning and related policy implications in Europe (CHIAS)
Staff
Alaa Dafallah
Research Assistant (POPJUS)
Joanne Linnerooth-Bayer
Distinguished Emeritus Research Scholar (EQU)
Piotr Magnuszewski
Senior Research Scholar (WAT, EQU)
Rimjhim Bajpai
Researcher (MIG)
News
12 August 2026
Planning for the Future Through a Population Lens
IIASA researcher suggests a fundamentally different way for governments to plan for the future: using population as a common framework to connect health, education, food, jobs, housing, social protection, and climate risk. The approach integrates demographic data with sectoral planning to help governments make more coordinated, evidence-based decisions and improve population wellbeing.
13 July 2026
Focus Issue in Environmental Research: Climate – Guest Editors from SPARCCLE, CROSSEU and ACCREU
A new Focus Issue has been launched in Environmental Research: Climate on ‘Climate Risks and Socioeconomic Vulnerability’, bringing together Guest Editors from sister projects SPARCCLE, CROSSEU and ACCREU.
16 June 2026
Peking University and IIASA advance plans for a new Centre on Global Change and Health
On 28 May, Peking University (PKU) and IIASA held a joint online seminar to discuss health research under global change and to review the progress, priorities, and coordination arrangements for a proposed Centre on Global Change and Health.
Events
Helsinki, Finland
The transformative power of education
Dakar, Senegal
Unleashing Africa’s potential: The role of education
Focus
05 August 2026
When Uganda’s refugee policy meets children’s everyday lives
What does integration mean for a refugee child? Manya Oriel Kagan reflects on the research behind her new book, Schooling Experiences of Refugee Children in Uganda: Rethinking Integration Policies. Drawing on months of research in schools and communities in Kampala, Uganda, she explores how children's everyday experiences reveal both the possibilities and the limits of one of the world's most progressive refugee policies.
31 July 2026
When demographic decline becomes a democratic question
In a new Expert Voices article published in Science, IIASA Population and Just Societies Program Director, Anne Goujon examines the concept of “dejuvenation” – the declining demographic, economic, cultural, and political weight of younger generations – and asks how aging societies can ensure that young people and future generations have a meaningful voice in shaping the decisions that will affect them most.