Reflections on the Integration of Ethics Teaching into a British Undergraduate Management Degree Programme

This paper is concerned with the incorporationof ethics teaching into an undergraduatemanagement degree. It is argued that thecontribution of this teaching to the overallprogramme can be understood in terms ofparticular characteristics common to bothmanagement/organisational studies modules andthose in ethics. These characteristics reflecta model for degree curriculum design concernedwith organisational processes in general, aswell as an institutional culture favourable tocritical perspectives on the subject matter.The emphasis on generic processes distinguishesthis curriculum from those which focus more onfunctional areas of business organisations. Thepaper considers these contrasting models forcurriculum design, the question of moduleevaluation, the institutional context, therationale and content of the ethics modules,and their relationship to other elements of thedegree programme. It concludes with aparticular emphasis on the case for a criticalperspective in business ethics teaching.