Berle XVIII: Climate Risk and the Corporation
October 31-November 1, 2025
Theme
Berle XVIII is co-organized by Madison Condon and Chuck O’Kelley. Our theme for Berle XVIII is “Climate Risk and the Corporation”.
As writing and thinking about climate change requires tackling the topic from many angles, Berle XVIII aims to be highly interdisciplinary and generative. Invitees include leading scholars from across disparate fields including law, finance, science, politics, and economics. Sessions will center the corporation and its relation to climate change, particularly in the context of corporate governance and financial regulation.
Sessions will consider corporations’ role in the green transition as well as their ability to adapt to escalating physical climate impacts. Topics may include developments at the intersection of climate change, corporate finance, liability regimes, financial modeling, securities regulation, and more. The category of “corporation” is meant to include corporations of all sizes and stripes, and participants may choose to focus on particular types, such as banks, insurers, fossil producers, or green energy companies.
Contributors to the symposium may choose to address the topic from many perspectives, and may consider such questions as: What role do financial institutions play in adaptation? How can we improve financial assessments of climate impacts? What are the opportunities and limitations of using corporate governance reform to hasten the green transition? Is the corporation the appropriate focus for green energy policy, as compared to a public ownership model? Are reforms to accounting rules required to meet the climate challenge? What reforms, including of risk modelling regimes, might encourage pro-social investment practices and combat asocial and anti-social investment decision making?
Scholars are invited to employ political economy as well as law-and-economic methods, and to use the symposium as an opportunity to expand their work and their scholarly networks in new directions.
