Timothy Fort (vitae, pdf)
George Washington University Business School

Timothy L. Fort is the Lindner-Gambal Professor of Business Ethics at George Washington University Business School and an Academic Advisor for the Business Roundtable Institute for Corporate Ethics.

Fort formerly served as an Associate Professor of Business Law and Business Ethics at the University of Michigan. In 2003, he was given the Award for Academic Leadership by the Beyond Grey Pinstripes report. This report, constructed by the Aspen Institute and the World Resources Institute is the most prominent ratings initiative for corporate responsibility and Professor Fort was recognized for his leadership in academic research and pedagogy. In addition to this award, he is the former holder of the Bank One Corporation Assistant Professor of Business Administration at the University of Michigan. In 1998, he was named the Outstanding Junior Faculty Member of the Academy of Legal Studies in Business ("ALSB"). The ALSB has awarded him, individually or with co-authors, three Outstanding National Conference Proceeding Paper Awards, six Distinguished National Conference Proceeding Paper Awards, two Ralphe Bunche Awards for best International Paper, a Holmes-Cardozo Award for best overall conference paper, and a Ralph Hoeber Award for Research Excellence.

His co-author of the The Role of Business in Fostering Peaceful Societies published by Cambridge University Press in 2004.  He has authored two other books to be published later this year: 21st Century Corporate Responsibility; Beyond Disciplinary and Geopolitical Boundaries from Cambridge University Press and Profits, Prophets, and Passion: Globalization's Amplification of the Uneasy Relationship Between Religion and Business from Yale University Press

Oxford University Press published his book, Ethics and Governance: Business as Mediating Institution, in 2001. His work has also appeared in Business Ethics Quarterly, Journal of Business Ethics, Business & Society, Business & Professional Ethics, Notre Dame Law Review, Journal of Corporation Law, Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, Cornell International Law Journal, American Business Law Journal, and the Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics, and Public Policy. He serves on the editorial boards of The Academy of Management Review, Business Ethics Quarterly, and American Business Law Journal.

With Professor Cindy Schipani, he launched a Corporate Governance and Peace Initiative through the William Davidson Institute. He formerly served as co-Director of the Corporate Governance and Corporate Social Responsibility Area of the Davidson Institute and as co-Director of the Michigan Business School's Center for Corporate Governance and Sustainable Peace. His presentation of his research and business on sustainable peace was used by The World Bank as a video program delivered to participants of the 2003 meeting of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. He has also facilitated an interactive, Internet-base dialogue and education program concerning the extent to which businesses can contribute to sustainable peace and has offered two programs already with the World Bank on the topic of business and peace.

His work focuses on the legal and ethical frameworks necessary to regularize ethical business behavior with particular attention to how businesses can be constructed as communal “mediating institutions” that match neurobiological human capabilities with communal sizes necessary for enhancing ethical behavior, how a teleological goal of sustainable peace is a realistic contribution for businesses and an orienting mission that requires responsible business behavior, and finally, how commercialization of technology and science raises new sets of challenges for ethical business behavior enhancing even further the need for businesses to be mediating institutions with an ultimate aim of contributing for sustainable global security.