Charles Koch Foundation (CKF) Executive Director Ryan Stowers has succeeded Art Pope as board chair for the Institute for Humane Studies (IHS). Pope is the chair CEO of Variety Wholesalers and the John William Pope Foundation.
Stowers will continue in his role at CKF.
As board chair, Stowers will help carry out IHS’s mission to advance the classical liberal vision of a good society: a tolerant and pluralistic place in which intellectual and economic progress are the norm, and where individuals and communities flourish in a context of openness, voluntary and peaceful cooperation, and mutual respect.
“Never before has the need for the ideas that underlie widespread human progress been more pressing, and IHS is building and bridging the scholarly communities that are finding common-ground, bottom-up solutions to society’s most pressing challenges,” Stowers said.
A CKF grantee, IHS is a nonprofit organization that achieves its mission by connecting and supporting graduate students, scholars, and public intellectuals across the ideological spectrum engaged in the critical conversations shaping the 21st century. IHS also offers an integrated suite of programs and events that feature scholars who are driving progress in the scholarly and public conversations most relevant to liberal democratic societies.
Dr. F. A. “Baldy” Harper, a former Cornell University economics professor, founded IHS in 1961. As part of a generation that witnessed the rise of totalitarian dictatorships, Harper wanted to establish an institute devoted to research, education, and facilitating a greater understanding of human affairs and freedom in order to enhance peace, prosperity, and social harmony.
Stowers became involved with IHS more than two decades ago when he was a graduate student at Utah State University.
Read IHS’s full announcement.