Bio


Sarah A. Soule is the Morgridge Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Graduate School of Business. Her major areas of interest are organizational theory, social movements, and political sociology. She has written two recent books, the first with Cambridge University Press, entitled Contention and Corporate Social Responsibility, and the second with Norton, called A Primer on Social Movements. She is the series editor for the Cambridge University Press Contentious Politics series. She is a member of the founding team of the new journal, Sociological Science, an open access journal that is disrupting academic publishing. She has served on a number of boards of non-profit organizations, is currently a member Board of Advisors to the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the Stanford d.school) Fellowship program, and is currently serving on the faculty advisory board to the Stanford Center for the Advancement of Women’s Leadership. She has taught a number of courses with the Stanford d.school, and is the Faculty Director for the Executive Program on Social Entrepreneurship at the Graduate School of Business. She has served as a judge for the Center for Social Innovation Fellowship program, and for the Tech Awards (Tech Museum of Innovation). Her research examines state and organizational-level policy change and diffusion, and the role social movements have on these processes. She has recently published papers on how protest impacts multi-national firm-level decisions regarding divestment in Burma, and on how advocacy organizations learn new strategies and tactics from those with which they collaborate. She is currently working on a study of how protest affects the outcomes of shareholder resolutions, and another study of how advocacy organizations innovate. She has published a book with Cambridge University Press, entitled Contention and Corporate Social Responsibility. Recent published work has appeared in the American Journal of Sociology, Administrative Science Quarterly, the American Sociological Review, Organizational Studies, the Strategic Management Journal, and the Annual Review of Sociology.

Academic Appointments


  • Professor, Organizational Behavior
  • Professor (By courtesy), Sociology

2024-25 Courses


Stanford Advisees


All Publications