The International Initiative
Historic Encina Hall will be reconfigured and renovated to house Stanford’s international studies community.
Thinking Through a World of Change
In the last two decades, one of two superpowers has collapsed, and the ability to cause mass destruction has expanded to a record number of countries and even individuals. The list of countries with failing governments also is growing, and many observers feel that institutions such as the United Nations have reached the limits of their ability to provide order. Moreover, even effective governments no longer can—or arguably should—manage the traffic of ideas, money, disease, and violence that now connects individuals. Each of these changes is fundamental. Together, they pose unprecedented challenges and opportunities.
With change the only constant, institutions at all levels of society must reassess what they do and how they do it, and Stanford is no exception. The ideas that Stanford generates and the leaders we train influence international policies and organizations. But because of their complexity, today’s problems do not conform to yesterday’s academic categories. We believe that real progress now requires a new level of cooperation among faculty in the full range of disciplines represented on campus. Making such collaboration the rule, rather than the exception, constitutes a historic shift in how universities pursue teaching and research.
At Stanford, this shift has been underway for some time. Research and teaching on nuclear proliferation, state corruption, HIV/AIDS, and a host of other issues already connect scholars in Stanford’s world-class schools of business, Earth sciences, education, engineering, humanities and sciences, law, and medicine and centers and institutes. But as international problems become more interconnected, Stanford can and must do more by expanding this multidisciplinary approach dramatically.
In 2005, the university launched the Stanford International Initiative to promote collaboration throughout the campus on three themes:
- Pursuing international security
- Improving governance locally, nationally, and internationally
- Advancing human well-being at the individual level
In each of these areas, the initiative funds new faculty research, new courses for students, and new outreach to policymakers and the public.
This initiative, along with two others in human health and environmental sustainability, are at the heart of the university’s efforts aimed at bringing the university’s resources to bear in seeking solutions to intractable global problems.
“Universities of Stanford’s power and reach have a central role to play in framing key international issues and offering solutions.”
— Coit D. “Chip” Blacker
Co-chair, The International Initiative
Director, The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
The Olivier Nomellini Family University Fellow in Undergraduate Education
“Many universities have world-class programs. Very few have Stanford’s depth in so many different fields.”
—Elisabeth Paté-Cornell
Co-chair, The International Initiative
The Burt and Deedee McMurtry Professor, School of Engineering
Chair, Department of Management Science and Engineering