The Institute of Pacific Relations

The Institute of Pacific Relations

The Institute of Pacific Relations (IPR) was an international ‘think-tank’ established in 1925, initially in Honolulu, to promote economic, political and intellectual co-operation between the nations of the Pacific Rim. Funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, the IPR undertook research projects, organised conferences and published a journal, Pacific Affairs, edited by Owen Lattimore, an authority on China and central Asia. Pictured is the Sixth Biennial Conference of the IPR, held from August to September 1936 in Yosemite National Park. The IPR and other US-backed international organisations sought to preserve the spirit of Wilsonian internationalism after 1918 in defiance of American isolationism, though it was viewed with growing suspicion after 1945 and was eventually dissolved following a campaign by anti-communist Senator Joseph McCarthy.

University of British Columbia Library, Institute of Pacific Relations fonds