Debra Satz's research has focused on the ethical limits of markets, the place of equality in political philosophy, theories of rational choice, democratic theory, feminist philosophy, and issues of international justice. Her work has appeared in Philosophy & Public Affairs, Ethics, Journal of Philosophy, and World Bank Economic Review.

Satz is a professor of philosophy and, by courtesy, of political science. She has directed Stanford's Ethics in Society Program for a decade and will become director of the Stanford Center on Ethics in Fall 2008. She is affiliated with several other interdisciplinary programs, including Public Policy, the Center for Social Innovation at the Graduate School of Business, the Haas Center for Public Service, the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity, the Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality and the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Environment and Resources. She teaches courses in ethics, social and political philosophy, and philosophy of the social sciences.

Satz is known for her inspiring teaching and her leadership of the Program in Ethics and Society, and received the Walter J. Gore Award for Excellence in Teaching, Stanford’s highest teaching award, in 2004. She also co-founded and teaches in the Hope House Scholars Program, through which incarcerated women and volunteer faculty examine personal experience in the context of ethics, moral philosophy and social justice.

Satz is now the Senior Associate Dean for the Humanities and the Arts.