The Italian Association for the Study of Comparative Economic Systems (Associazione Italiana per lo Studio dei Sistemi Economici Comparati - AISSEC) was founded in Florence on April 7th, 1984.

AISSEC is a non-profit association whose main purpose is to promote study and research, both theoretical and empirical, in the field of comparative economic systems. To attain this aim the Association organizes conferences and scientific collaboration among its members and with scholars of related fields, stimulates research activities, fosters the publication of scientific works and establishes connections with similar foreign associations.

Since 1992, the activity of the Association has been subdivided into thematic sections, with the aim to foster scientific debates on the various research fields.

These include:

• Economics and Institutions
• Economics of Developing Countries and Emerging Market Economies (China, India, Brazil, Russia, Mexico, etc.)
• Economics of Industrialized Countries
• Economics of the European Union and of the Candidate Countries - Economics of Transition
• Theoretical and methodological problems of comparative economics

So far, the Association has organized 22 conferences. The first Scientific conference was held on October 25-26th, 1984, at the University of Turin, whereas the last one at the G. D’Annunzio University of Chieti-Pescara, on 16-18th June, 2022.

In addition, AISSEC has also organized numerous single-theme national and international workshops.

During the Urbino Conference back in 1989, a group of economists from several European countries decided to promote the institution of a European Association for Comparative Economic Studies (EACES). The founding General Assembly and the First Scientific Conference of the EACES were held at the University of Verona on September 27-29, 1990, jointly with the Seventh AISSEC Conference. The fruitful collaboration between the two associations continues. EACES publishes an on-line scientific journal, EJCE (European Journal of Comparative Economics), freely downloadable from the web.

AISSEC is affiliated to the Italian Economic Association (SIE), to which also belong, among the others, the Italian Society of Industrial Economics and Policy (SIEPI), the Italian Association of Labour Economics (AIEL), and the Italian Society of Public Economics (SIEP).