BIAP was officially established in 2016, when the University of Barcelona, the Pompeu Fabra University and the University of Girona signed an agreement that institutionally recognized BIAP as an inter-university institute of research whose overarching mission is to promote and improve the practice of analytic philosophy. However, the collaboration of the three research groups that constitute BIAP (the Logos group at the University of Barcelona, the Law and Philosophy group at the Pompeu Fabra University, and the Legal Philosophy group at the University of Girona) started a long time before 2016.

In fact, that collaboration, and the excellence of its results, was already recognized by the Ministry of Science and Innovation with the award, in 2009, of a Consolider-Ingenio Project (PERSP, CSD2009-000569) to those research groups.

In December 2022, the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation recognized BIAP as a María de Maeztu Unit of Excellence. The collaborative research project associated with the María de Maeztu distinction will examine the relationships between evidence and philosophy. It will explore and systematize the sources of, and different roles assigned to evidence in a variety of contexts of enquiry; develop a coherent overall conception of the nature of evidence, and of evidential support; and determine the lessons to be drawn from this research for the uses and roles that evidence should have in the public sphere.

As the first María de Maeztu Unit of Excellence in a traditional humanities discipline, BIAP intends to increase awareness of the value that philosophical thinking can bring to the solution of current problems, including problems in the sciences and in society at large.

Since March 2023, BIAP has been a member of SOMMa, the alliance of Severo Ochoa Centres and María de Maeztu Units, which aims to promote excellence in Spanish research and enhance its social impact both nationally and internationally.

BIAP supports the Barcelona Principles for a Globally Inclusive Philosophy (BP) manifesto.