Teaching Corporate Social Responsibility, Human Rights and Corruption: A Survey of 343 Faculty
at the Top 20 Business Schools in the Financial Times Global MBA Rankings

Robert J. Hanlon; Stephen Frost

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Teaching Corporate Social Responsibility, Human Rights and Corruption: A Survey of 343 Faculty at the Top 20 Business Schools in the Financial Times Global MBA Rankings

Robert J. Hanlon

University of British Columbia, Canada

Stephen Frost

City University of Hong Kong, China

Volume 10: 2012, pp. 5-46: ABSTRACT

This paper aims to test whether business schools are teaching business students about corporate social responsibility, human rights and corruption. The purpose is to understand if a business school environment facilitates or impedes the learning experience of business ethics. Grounded in constructivist learning theory, we hypothesize that business schools are ineffective learning environments for teaching human rights. A questionnaire was then disseminated to 2,852 business teachers at the top 20 Financial Times Global MBA ranked business schools concerning human rights and corruption. Findings suggest that the majority of the 343 respondents hold a narrow understanding of human rights and corruption. In fact, educators are contributing to a learning environment that struggles to incorporate any meaningful or explicit study of human rights and corruption. We conclude that without a greater commitment to teaching the ethics behind human rights and corruption in business school, graduates will continuously fail to understand how their business decisions could negatively impact the communities in which they work.