ABSTRACT
This chapter argues the case for integrating the liberal arts into management education so that the existing curricula emphasis on technological and analytical acumen is balanced with skills of critical thinking and ethical intelligence necessary for managerial judgement. It focuses on undergraduate business programmes, even though the plea for the stronger adoption of liberal management education applies equally to postgraduate programmes in management education, including the Master of Business Administration. The goal in management education should be to provoke the development in the student of what one would call “criticality”, creativity and analytical ability as well as an ethical, social and cultural ordering of the world. Thus, a management education student would be forced to go well beyond the study of business functions to also be a student of history, politics, cross-border communication and cultural exchange. The chapter explains how a liberal management education model has evolved in the context of Singapore Management University.
