The Business, Government, and Society Initiative is evolving into the Stanford Leadership Institute, an interdisciplinary hub for research, teaching, and convenings. The institute prepares leaders to navigate and shape the forces transforming business and society, and to make a positive impact in their organizations and the world.
We are convening changemakers from Stanford and beyond with practitioners, academics, policymakers, and others who share our ambition and sense of urgency.
Featured Events
Featured Event Briefings
School Stories & News Opensearch
February 04, 2026
Written
Scholars Discuss the Promises and Challenges of Decentralized Governance
At a Hoover Institution conference, Stanford GSB professors explored the governance of American universities and decentralized autonomous organizations.
January 05, 2026
Written
AI Is Transforming How Brands Connect With Their Audiences
GSB conference explores AI-driven opportunities for better personalization, as well as risks.
October 23, 2025
Written
Doug Burgum: Forget Energy Transition. Think Energy Addition.
The U.S. Interior Secretary highlights the rising need for affordable and reliable power.
August 06, 2025
Written
Capital Finance for Sustainability
From pricing of risks into asset prices to modeling uncertainty, researchers examine the changing nature of sustainability investments, insurance markets, and government incentives
Forums
Event List Opensearch
Past Events
Event List Opensearch
Thursday, May 30, 2024
9:00am – 6:00pm
On Campus
The event was co-hosted by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, focusing on Promoting Competition in Artificial Intelligence.
Monday, May 20, 2024 – Tuesday, May 21, 2024
On Campus
Current models of industrialization and consumption are degrading the environment and polluting the world, causing 9 million premature deaths per year. In this conference, we challenged the Stanford community and external partners to brainstorm solutions for three major sources of pollution while emphasizing their effects on human health: coal-fired industry, wildfires, and plastic. Jumping off from successful interdisciplinary work underway in each area, we put forward a solutions-oriented interdisciplinary research agenda to foster a healthier and more sustainable future.
Friday, May 17, 2024
12:00am – 11:59pm
On Campus
This conference brought together leading academic scholars, sustainability-focused entrepreneurs [aka ecopreneurs] and business leaders working on and interested in scaling sustainability innovation to share their perspectives and experiences.
Thursday, May 09, 2024 – Friday, May 10, 2024
On Campus
This two-day conference convened scholars, researchers, and practitioners whose work focuses on the convergence of climate change, environmental disasters, and human mobility.
Thursday, April 18, 2024 – Friday, April 19, 2024
On Campus
Sustainability Conference on Water as Sustenance
Wednesday, April 03, 2024
12:00am – 11:59pm
Online
Stanford’s first Business, Government, and Society Forum will take place on Wednesday, April 3, 2024. Our theme for the day is Responsible Leadership in a Polarized World.
Monday, March 18, 2024 – Tuesday, March 19, 2024
On Campus
We explored how environmental justice scholarship is needed to create just, ethical, and resilient solutions for sustainability for the world’s most challenging social-environmental problems.
Thursday, March 14, 2024 – Friday, March 15, 2024
On Campus
The Pacific Ocean connects us and binds us to a common future as we rise to meet the challenges of climate change and provide for communities across island and coastal nations in a sustainable way. During this conference we explored these connections and define pathways for working together to promote resilience and shape a sustainable future for all.
Thursday, February 22, 2024 – Friday, February 23, 2024
On Campus
This conference brought together scholars from across campus and elsewhere who have done work illuminating human thinking and action related to the environment and sustainability.
Thursday, February 08, 2024 – Friday, February 09, 2024
On Campus
We featured research on organizations, and their role in bringing about a more sustainable future.
Monday, December 11, 2023
12:00am – 11:59pm
On Campus
The Watershed Restoration Conference showcased cutting-edge research associated with watershed research, presented by some of the leading researchers on restoration in California, but with global relevance. The conference aimed to synthesize biological, geological, hydrological, and most importantly, Indigenous sciences on watershed restoration toward a socially and environmentally sustainable future.
Thursday, November 30, 2023 – Friday, December 01, 2023
On Campus
As society struggles to better align behavior with sustainability goals, there is an increased role for marketing to encourage behavioral change. This can be accomplished by influencing both public perceptions of sustainability and promoting the development and marketability of products and services that work toward social goals but reduce strong consumer preference tradeoffs that might come with some sustainability solutions.
Wednesday, November 29, 2023
9:00am – 5:00pm
On Campus
The purpose of this conference is to identify promising ideas that support on-the-ground disruption and outstanding challenges for AI researchers seeking to advance the operational needs of businesses and organizations, to explain the state of the art, and to distinguish fantasy from reality. An important goal is to foster meaningful engagement between scholars and practitioners in AI for operations, such as customer service, marketing, sales, logistics, healthcare, workflows, and human resources, and operations for AI, such as risk assessment and governance for the ecosystem of software, hardware, and human-generated content.
Thursday, November 16, 2023
12:00pm – 1:00pm
On Campus
This hybrid event was co-hosted by Stanford Graduate School of Business and the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy.
Monday, November 13, 2023 – Tuesday, November 14, 2023
On Campus
At this conference, we convened sessions to address carbon capture and storage challenges and solutions.
Thursday, November 02, 2023
4:30pm – 6:00pm
On Campus
This event was co-hosted by Stanford Graduate School of Business and Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
Monday, October 23, 2023 – Tuesday, October 24, 2023
On Campus
This conference focused on the politics and the economics of environmental problems and regulation.
Friday, June 02, 2023 – Saturday, June 03, 2023
On Campus
We explored innovations that have the potential to significantly advance both groundwater science and the emerging field of adaptive groundwater management.
Thursday, May 25, 2023 – Friday, May 26, 2023
On Campus
This conference investigated the roles of civil society actors, such as nonprofits, activists, community organizations, and philanthropists, in sustainability.
Friday, May 19, 2023 – Saturday, May 20, 2023
On Campus
We designed this conference to facilitate dialogue, knowledge exchange, and collaboration to create a sustainable toolkit to cultivate positive habits for our future and a sense of shared prosperity.
Saturday, April 29, 2023 – Sunday, April 30, 2023
On Campus
This conference summarized the state-of-the-art in exploring Earth’s seafloor, examine the most promising future directions of these technologies, and highlight applications for understanding hazards and increasing sustainability.
Friday, April 28, 2023 – Saturday, April 29, 2023
On Campus
This conference brought together leading academic scholars working on climate science.
Friday, April 14, 2023 – Saturday, April 15, 2023
On Campus
This conference brought together climate scientists and engineers from academia, government, and the private sector, as well as scholars who use climate science to inform policy and decision-making.
Friday, April 07, 2023 – Saturday, April 08, 2023
On Campus
We explored how environmental justice scholarship is needed to create just, ethical, and resilient solutions for sustainability for the world’s most challenging social-environmental problems.