Hitotsubashi University, as a research university in the social sciences, has long been a leader in various social science fields in Japan. Today, while academic research activities are globally extending rapidly, people in the society strongly expect universities to contribute toward solving major social problems in the world. In order to respond to these requests from the society by advancing the higher level of international joint research, we established the Hitotsubashi Institute for Advanced Study (HIAS) in 2014 as a research organization directly under the President, aiming for the world’s cutting-edge of social sciences research.