SDPI among top 100 global think tanks

The Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) of Islamabad has been ranked amongst the top 100 think tanks in the world.

The rankings were part of the 13th edition of the University of Pennsylvania Global Go To Think Tank Index (GGTTI) which was released on Thursday. The GGTTI is based on a ranking by 1,796 peer institutions and experts who looked at 8,162 think tanks registered with GGTTI from some 85 countries across the world.



SDPI was ranked top in Pakistan and at 15 amongst think tanks from South East Asia and the Pacific. Among global (non-United States think tanks), it was ranked at 99.

In its report, the GGTTI team explained that the number of think tanks across the world had declined due to a changing political and regulatory environment which had grown hostile towards think tanks in many countries. It was coupled with decreasing funding for policy research by public and private donors; the tendency of public and private donors towards short-term, project-specific funding instead of investing in ideas and institutions; underdeveloped institutional capacity; increased competition and institutions having served their purpose and discontinued their operations.



The report concluded that there were more issues, more actors, more competition, and more conflicts and those who could manage competitive challenges, resource challenges, and technological challenges would be able to remain relevant to their domestic, regional and global audience.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 1^st, 2019.