International Astronautical Federation is an international space advocacy organisation based in Paris and founded in 1951 as a non-governmental organization. It has 206 members from 58 countries across the world. They are drawn from space agencies, industry, professional associations, government organizations and learned societies. It is linked with the International Academy of Astronautics and the International Institute of Space Law with whom the IAF organises the annual International Astronautical Congress (IAC). Working in close cooperation with the United Nations, IAF organises annually the Space Workshop for Developing Nations. With the Committee on Space Research and the International Institute of Space Law, the IAF also conducts an annual survey of Highlights in Space for the United Nations.
Every year at the International Astronautical Congress, three awards are given out: the Allan D. Emil Memorial Award, the Franck J. Malina Astronautics Medal and the Luigi G. Napolitano Award.. The 2014 meeting of the IAC is planned for Toronto, Canada with a theme of "The World Needs Space".
Famous quotes containing the words institute, space and/or law:
“Whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“The merit of those who fill a space in the world’s history, who are borne forward, as it were, by the weight of thousands whom they lead, shed a perfume less sweet than do the sacrifices of private virtue.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Will mankind never learn that policy is not morality,—that it never secures any moral right, but considers merely what is expedient? chooses the available candidate,—who is invariably the devil,—and what right have his constituents to be surprised, because the devil does not behave like an angel of light? What is wanted is men, not of policy, but of probity,—who recognize a higher law than the Constitution, or the decision of the majority.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)