Jermen Gvishiani

"Member of United Nations Advisory Committee on the Application of Science and Technology to Development. Deputy Chairman, State Committee of Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Council of Ministers for Science and Technology since 1962. Chairman, Scientific Council on Problems of Scientific & Technological Revolution, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Academy of Sciences since 1972.

"Member, Bureau of Branch for Philosophy & Law, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Academy of Sciences since 1970. Company-Chairman, Intergovernmental Commission on Scientific, Technical & Economy Cooperation between Union of Soviet Socialist Republics & France since 1966. Member, Board of Trustees, United Nations Institute for Training and Research, 1968-1969.

"Chairman, Committee on Coordination of Scientific & Technological Cooperation, Council for Mutual Economy Assistance. Head of Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Deln to United Nations Industrial Development Organization, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

"Presidium, Soviet Sociologists’ Association since 1972. USSR Academy, of Sciences, Institute of Manager Academy, Sweden Royal Academy, of Engineering Sciences, American Manager Association, American Manager Academy, Foreign member of Finnish Academy Technology Sciences. Club of Rome. "

Married to Lyudmila Alekseyevna Kosygina (daughter of the late Aleksey Kosygin, Chair, of USSR Council of Ministers in 1964-in 1980) in 1948.

Academician Jermen Gvishiani, Chairman of the IIASA Council and Deputy Chairman of the State Committee for Science and Technology of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, one of IIASA’s founding fathers.

• Former member, US-USSR Trade and Economic Council ‎
• Founding president, Russian Association for the Club of Rome

Background

J. Rennie Whitehead recalls: "After the war, Peccei established a Fiat organization in Latin America and negotiated an agreement with the Soviet Union to produce the first Fiat-designed cars there in a huge factory. It was on this project that he worked with Djerman Gvishiani, Kosygin's son-in-law and Vice-Chairman of the State Committee on Science and Technology of the USSR. Gvishiani was to play a leading role in some of Peccei’s future plans (and, as a result, become a friend and colleague of mine)."

IIASA

According to IIASA's first director Howard Raiffa: McGeorge Bundy "and Gvishiani realized that if IIASA was going to be stable, it should be multilateral. On that basis, Gvishiani pushed for inclusion of the German Democratic Republic. This was embarrassing for the United States which didn’t recognize East Germany. Our first crisis. It was surmounted by deciding that the new institute would be nongovernmental. How lucky!" He continues:

"At the beginning the Council transferred something like $200,000 to my personal bank account in Boston and I was given freedom to hire people and write checks. The trouble was that these checks had to be endorsed by Alex Letov, the deputy director. I was in the United States and Letov was in Moscow — it would take three weeks, if at all, to get a check for $50.

"So I opened a personal account and the Ford Foundation gave me a discretionary fund of $300,000. I would spend money without authorization and then go back to the council and say, "Did I do right or wrong?" And they said, "You did right." And I said, "Well, put the money back into the fund.""

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