The Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University began as the Kenan Ethics Program in the fall of 1995 with a five-year grant from the William R. Kenan, Jr. Fund for Ethics.

In July 1999, after a thorough review of the Kenan Ethics Program’s accomplishments, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust committed to long-term support, establishing a $10 million endowment managed by the William R. Kenan, Jr. Fund for Ethics. In recognition of this change, the Kenan Ethics Program became the Kenan Institute for Ethics.
The Institute celebrated its new status in January 2001.

The Kenan Institute for Ethics is one of four Kenan institutes in North Carolina along with the Frank Hawkins Kenan Institute for Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts at the N.C. School of the Arts and the William R. Kenan, Jr. Institute for Engineering, Technology and Science at N.C. State University.

The Kenan Institute for Ethics is one of seven signature interdisciplinary institutes at Duke University along with the Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy, the Social Science Research Institute, the John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute, the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, the Global Health Institute, and the Institute for Brain Sciences.

The Institute is housed administratively and fiscally within the Office of the Provost.

The Institute has an external Advisory Board, chaired by the President of Duke University, and an on-campus Faculty Council.

Professor Elizabeth Kiss became the program’s first director in January 1997.  In August 2006, Professor Kiss left the Institute to become the President of Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Ga.

After a national search, Provost Peter Lange appointed Professor Noah Pickus the Institute’s new Director in July 2007.  Professor Pickus served as the Institute’s Associate Director from 2004 to 2006 and as Interim Director from 2006 to 2007.