The Asia Society (ISPA member organization), has announced exciting plans to expand in Houston, Texas and Hong Kong.

Below is an article about the Asia Society's expansion plans published in the New York Times on January 31st, 2012, and written by Robin Pogrebin.

The buildings are part of a philosophical as well as physical expansion for the society, a nonprofit institution founded in 1956 by John D. Rockefeller III to educate the public about Asia and perhaps best known for the elegance of its headquarters and galleries on Park Avenue at 70th Street.

Long regarded as a New York institution with regional branches, Asia Society over the last few years has aimed to recast itself as an international organization, partly through the construction of the two major centers in cities where it previously had only offices.

The new buildings — each of which cost about $50 million — will catapult the annual operating costs of each location to $4.5 million from about $700,000, but Asia Society says it is confident about the investment.

“By the year 2050, more than 50 percent of the world’s gross domestic product will come from India and China,” said Vishakha N. Desai, president of the society, in a recent interview at her office. More than 60 percent of the population will live in Asia then, she said.

“We’re going from Pax Americana to possibly Pax Pacifica,” she added. “This is a century when America will be a very important player, but not the player. There is a different balance of power in the world.”

Because the world has changed, so has Asia Society’s mission. Where once the organization was focused on explaining Asia to Americans, now it emphasizes strengthening partnerships in areas like culture, business, public policy and education, not only between Asians and Americans but among Asians themselves.

“We have to think about how we relate to Asians as partners,” Ms. Desai said. “The fastest-growing trade is intra-Asia trade, yet there isn’t an Asian community. People don’t know each other well because for the last 250 years, everybody looked to the West.”

In May the organization announced its first appointments of chairmen on both sides of the Pacific: Henrietta Holsman Fore, a former chief of the United States Agency for International Development, who is based in Washington, and Ronnie C. Chan, a real estate developer in Hong Kong and China.

“This is that time when we should be increasing our footprint,” Ms. Fore said. “We are covering 51 countries in Asia. They are not one country. They are very different, interesting, growing countries. As a result there is a need for more scholarship, more visits, more business transactions, more tourists, more exchanges of artists, more connections between leaders.”

To read the rest of this article, visit the New York Times website here.