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Human flourishing as a foundation for a new sustainability oriented business school curriculum: Open questions and possible answers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Bernard McKenna  and
Roberto Biloslavo
Bernard McKenna
Affiliation:
The University of Queensland Business School, St Lucia, QLD, Australia
Roberto Biloslavo
Affiliation:
Faculty of Management, University of Primorska, Koper, Slovenia
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Abstract

Because ‘doing business’ significantly contributes to altering the Earth's atmosphere and depleting limited natural resources, business education should be re-oriented so that global sustainability is the core and economic sustainability a subset. The neo-Aristotelian foundation of this paper proposes eudaimonia (human flourishing) as a teleology, and divides human activity, particularly learning into technē (practical utilitarian skills) and phronesis (experience, insight, and intuition). By developing intellectual, affective, and moral virtues, business students can attain a meta-virtue of phronesis, which provides a potential capacity to deal with uncertainty, mutability, and duality of human life and development. The principles of social practice wisdom provide the basis of a proposed sustainability curriculum.

Keywords

business educationeudaimoniaphronesissustainabilitytechnēwisdom
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Management & Organization , Volume 17 , Issue 5: Educating for Sustainability and CSR: What is the role of business schools? , September 2011 , pp. 691 - 710
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press and Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management 2011

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