| Item Type |
Conference or Workshop Item
(Paper)
|
| Abstract |
Despite recent efforts to integrate business ethics more holistically within management education, citizen ethics remain largely underexplored within international educational initiatives, such as the UN Principles for Responsible Management Education (UN PRME). In the absence of an educational introduction to citizen ethics, business students gain limited exposure to their future roles as economic actors, namely as citizens, members of organizations and as consumers and investors (Ulrich & Maak 2000, 11). This is particularly remiss, given the potential of business schools and other management-related higher education institutions to shape the mindsets and skills of future leaders, and to act as powerful drivers of sustainability and responsibility (UNPRME 2022).
As a result, a chasm often emerges between in class learning and personal engagement, when business students complete their studies and enter the professional world and society at large. In this paper, we review current approaches to responsible management education and posit service learning as a potential means for further developing citizen ethics, to promote life-long learning that goes beyond the confines of the classroom. Based on a text analysis study of 47 UN PRME Sharing Information on Progress (SIP) reports from 18 universities and schools of applied science in Switzerland between 2014 - 2021, we find that management education on citizen ethics remains limited.
To date, extant literature on responsible business school education has largely focused on the integration of mandatory ethics courses within business school curriculum (Swanson 2004, 43), conceptions of global citizenship (Lilley, Barker & Harris 2014; Burgess-Wilkerson, Hamilton, Garrison & Robbins, 2018), and corporate citizenship education (Prinsloo, Beukes & de Jongh 2006, 197). More recent efforts have explored disciplinary based rationalizations for moral disengagement on topics of responsibility within the business school environment (Blasco 2022, 178) and interpretations of responsibility among management educators (Shah & O’Reilly 2022, 1).
Yet despite notable efforts by the United Nations Principles of Responsible Management Education (UNPRME) initiative to incorporate socially responsible practice and pedagogy within business schools, success has been limited (Shah & O’Reilly 2022). Within the sheltered environment of the classroom and among likeminded peers, students may find success; yet when met with ethical dilemmas in the workplace, questionable legislation in their role as citizens or greenwashing as they act as consumers and investors, former students may struggle to implement the principles espoused in the classroom. Therefore, we aim to address this through the following research questions, namely, how do business schools and other management-related higher education institutions currently support the development of citizen ethics within responsible business education curriculum? And how can they better support the development of citizen ethics among students, so as to ensure greater implementation in practice?
To address this challenge, we propose service learning as a means through which higher educational institutions can support business students in developing citizen ethics to further the integration of the UN Principles for Responsible Management Education. Building upon John Dewey’s longitudinal and lateral aspects of experience (1938, 44), we argue that his concepts of situational learning, inquiry and reflective thinking can be extrapolated, so as to facilitate the development of citizen ethics through service learning. For Dewey, growth and development occur along an experiential continuum, through situational learning (Giles & Eyler 1994, 79). Similarly, to meet the challenges future business graduates will face as citizens, members of organizations and as consumers and investors, responsible business education cannot solely be derived from the classroom; rather experience and critical thought are necessary to drive actionable change and a long-term commitment to sustainable and responsible business practice. |
| Authors |
McDonald, Catherine & Becker, Ingrid |
| Language |
English |
| Subjects |
business studies
Responsibility and Sustainability e.g. SDGs |
| HSG Classification |
contribution to scientific community |
| Date |
28 October 2022 |
| Event Title |
Ben:edu Conference 2022: „Kooperationen zwischen Zivilgesellschaft und Hochschule – Gute Praxis“ |
| Event Location |
Switzerland (virtual attendance) |
| Event Dates |
October 28th 2022 |
| Contact Email Address |
catherine.mcdonald@unisg.ch |
| Depositing User |
Catherine McDonald
|
| Date Deposited |
28 Nov 2022 10:13 |
| Last Modified |
28 Feb 2023 12:41 |
| URI: |
https://www.alexandria.unisg.ch/publications/268144 |
“PRME’d for Citizen Ethics: Service Learning Lessons for Responsible Management Education”
![[img]](http://www.alexandria.unisg.ch/style/images/fileicons/oa_orange.png)
