The University of Southern California has announced the establishment of the USC Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy, which will be housed in the USC Price School of Public Policy.

University President C. L. Max Nikias and Arnold Schwarzenegger, former governor of California, made the announcement Sunday.

The new institute's bipartisan Board of Advisors includes international leaders in business, public service and education.

Schwarzenegger will chair the Board of Advisors and serve as inaugural holder of the Governor Downey Professor of State and Global Policy at USC, named after a former California governor and co-founder of USC.

According to the press release, initial members include Henry Cisneros, the first Hispanic-American mayor of San Antonio and Bill Clinton's secretary of Housing and Urban Development; Vicente Fox, who served as president of Mexico 2000-2006; Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, chair of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; George Shultz, economist and statesman who served as U.S. Secretary of State 1982-1989; Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann; and Kandeh K. Yumkella, director-general of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization.

The USC Schwarzenegger Institute will focus on the responsibility of leaders to transcend partisanship to implement policies that most benefit the people, with five priority areas: Education, energy and environment, fiscal and economic policy, health and human wellness, political reform.

The institute will be co-led by Bonnie Reiss, who will serve as global director, and Nancy Staudt will serve as academic director. It will be funded by an initial gift from Schwarzenegger, as well as a commitment to raise an endowment with non-profit and nonpartisan interests.

The institute's first public event will be a one-day symposium on Sept. 24, 2012, held at the USC campus. The event will focus on the importance of post-partisanship in the modern policymaking world.