Teaching social responsibility through empathy: Integrating lived experiences of the socially disadvantaged in management education

Business schools are increasingly expected to equip students with competencies to drive social responsibility in business, alongside attainment of professional knowledge and technical skills. Yet how students learn about social responsibility and build agency to address complex social problems remains a developing area of scholarship. Through case study research, we report insights from integrating the lived experiences of the socially disadvantaged into management education at an Australian business school. We argue that integrating lived experiences of the socially disadvantaged is an effective experiential approach for enhancing affective empathy around social problems and transforming students’ ability to address complex social issues. In doing so, we contribute to mainstreaming lived experience pedagogy in teaching social responsibility.