Two decades into the 21st century, elite business education remains trapped in a mindset that history no longer matters.
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The financial crisis of 2008, the rise of populism, deepening inequality, and a looming ecological breakdown have all failed to dislodge the core conviction that free markets, rational self‑interest, and shareholder value are the only possible ways to organise the economy and society.
This is not an accident – it is the legacy of an “end of history” paper that has turned business schools into echo chambers of neoliberal orthodoxy.
In two new studies, Re-Purposing Business Schools: Potential, Progress, and Precarity, and The Business School and the End of History: Reimagining Management Education, Ken Starkey & Sue Tempest, and Martin Kitchener issue a combined call to arms. The authors argue that management education must rediscover its lost soul – not through more ranking chasing or accreditation games, but through a radical re‑engagement with the history of its own ideas and the moral imagination of the humanities.
This post is devoted to this matter and unpacks the researchers’ critique and their roadmap for re‑purposing business schools as servants of the public good.
The Business School and the End of History: Reimagining Management Education
Ken Starkey and Sue Tempest · Academy of Management Learning & Education, Vol. 24, No. 1 (2025)
Management education underestimates the importance of understanding the history of ideas for pluralism and reflexivity. The “end of history” thesis (Fukuyama, 1989) – which declared that Western liberal capitalism had no viable alternative – has trapped business schools in a neoliberal time warp. The authors call for raising historical consciousness and re‑engaging with the humanities to reimagine management as a humanistic enterprise.
1. The power of ideas and the “end of history”
Ideas shape practice. In the last quarter of the 20th century, economics won the battle of ideas inside business schools (Ferraro, Pfeffer & Sutton, 2005). Concepts like rational choice, utility maximisation, and efficient markets became dominant. Fukuyama’s (1989) “end of history” thesis gave intellectual legitimacy to the view that no alternative to neoliberalism exists. Business schools eagerly adopted this mindset, turning themselves into carriers of neoliberal ideology.
The result: business schools shifted from educating general managers to training financial engineers – fixated on private equity, hedge funds, and short‑term trading. The case method reinforced a narrow, data‑driven rationality, leaving little room for moral or historical reflection.
2. Social imaginaries: the stories we live by
Drawing on Charles Taylor (2004), the authors introduce the concept of social imaginaries – the background pictures that shape how we imagine our social existence. The dominant Western imaginary is that of self‑determining agents exchanging goods in a mutually beneficial economy. This capitalist imaginary is not a timeless truth; it is a fiction that has become hegemonic. The financial crisis, rising inequality, climate change, and populist backlash all signal that this imaginary is failing. New, more inclusive and humane imaginaries are urgently needed.
- Self‑interest as virtue
- Markets as natural and self‑regulating
- Government as problem
- Profit as sole purpose
- Moral economy, stakeholder governance
- Common good, public value
- Dignity, recognition, care
- Management as moral practice
3. Call to action: history, humanities, pluralism
The authors propose a three‑part manifesto:
- History for consciousness raising. Teach students where core ideas (agency theory, shareholder primacy) came from, and why they are provisional. This creates reflexivity and opens space for alternatives.
- Pluralism in worldmaking. Reject the “monopolistic materialist” view that only one system is pre‑eminent. Embrace multiple versions and visions (Goodman, 1978).
- Bring back the humanities. Literature, philosophy, history – they train critical thinking, moral imagination, and the capacity to see ourselves as bound to others (Nussbaum, 1997). Employers increasingly value these skills.
Key takeaways from Starkey & Tempest
- Business schools are stuck in an “end of history” mindset that dismisses alternatives.
- This mindset is not neutral – it actively shaped the 2008 crisis and prevents meaningful reform.
- Reimagining management education requires teaching the history of ideas and integrating the humanities.
- New social imaginaries – more inclusive, hopeful, and humane – are possible if business schools embrace pluralism.
Re‑Purposing Business Schools: Potential, Progress, and Precarity
Martin Kitchener · Journal of Management Studies (2024)
While Starkey & Tempest diagnose the problem, Kitchener examines the emergent phenomenon of internally‑driven business school re‑purposing. Re‑purposing is a transformational process in which leaders direct all four areas of a business school (teaching, research, internal management, external engagement) toward enhancing the public good by addressing grand challenges. The paper draws on early cases from the UK and France to analyse leadership practices and assess the potential – and precarity – of this movement.
1. Instrumental logic vs. normative purpose logic
Kitchener distinguishes two competing logics:
- Instrumental logic (de‑purposing): Focus on outputs – profit, rankings, graduate salaries, journal lists. Single‑disciplinary teaching, narrow elite partnerships, and a “cash cow” model dominate. This is the prevailing logic in most business schools.
- Normative purpose logic (re‑purposing): Focus on public good and grand challenges. Multi‑disciplinary, stakeholder‑oriented, with purpose statements, Chief Purpose Officer roles, and progress reporting. This logic is emergent but precarious.
2. Selznick’s leadership tasks for re‑purposing
Drawing on Selznick (1957), Kitchener identifies five leadership tasks:
- Stating purpose – a distinctive, inspiring, stakeholder‑inclusive public good statement.
- Organising purpose – establishing a purpose function (CPO) to coordinate aligned innovations.
- Nurturing an institutional core – recruiting and socialising members whose values reflect the purpose.
- Playing the part – leaders internalising purpose and modelling it in their own practice.
- Defending integrity – guarding against purpose‑washing and co‑optation by external stakeholders.
3. Evidence from the UK and France
Cardiff Business School produced the first Annual Public Value Report, measuring progress toward purpose against economic impact, sustainability, and staff attitudes. A key tension: international students are both the largest revenue source and the biggest carbon footprint contributor – illustrating the precarity of purpose.
HEC Paris has re‑purposed over 15 years. Its Society & Organization Institute (Rodolphe Durand) hosts an annual “Purpose Day” showcasing empirical research that purposeful firms perform better through trust, autonomy, and commitment. The undergraduate programme includes a 4‑day outdoor retreat, 4 days of debates with CEOs, 30 hours of community work, a 3‑week blue‑collar internship, and a thesis on purposeful leadership.
The UK’s Chartered ABS (2021) identified seven “purpose‑driven schools” (P‑Schools) that are beginning to transform all four activity areas. However, only 28% of deans responded to the survey – a sign that public good is not yet a priority for most.
4. Precarity and purpose‑washing
Kitchener is candid about the risks:
- Faculty report that purposeful innovations are under‑resourced, yet deans happily report them in accreditations – a form of purpose‑washing.
- At a school called “Civic” (widely believed to be one of the P‑Schools), academics described “neo‑Stalinist organising principles of targets and terror” that damaged workplace democracy (McCann et al., 2020).
- Accreditation bodies, top journals, and conference organisers still reward instrumental, single‑discipline work, not multi‑disciplinary research for public good.
Key takeaways from Kitchener
- Re‑purposing is possible, but it is rare and fragile.
- It requires leadership that views its role as a vocation, not just a management job.
- External pressures (financial, university parent, accreditation) constantly threaten to pull schools back into instrumental logic.
- Purpose‑washing is a real danger – reporting purpose without resourcing it undermines integrity.
- Despite the precarity, early examples from Cardiff, HEC Paris, and seven UK schools show that transformational change can happen.
Complete reference list
Starkey, K., & Tempest, S. (2025). The business school and the end of history: Reimagining management education. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 24(1), Essay. https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2024.0033
Kitchener, M. (2024). Re‑purposing business schools: Potential, progress, and precarity. Journal of Management Studies. https://doi.org/10.1111/joms.13171
Other cited works: Fukuyama (1989); Khurana (2007); Rodgers (2011); Taylor (2004); Nussbaum (1997); Selznick (1957); Ferraro, Pfeffer & Sutton (2005); Chartered ABS (2021); Parker (2018); McCann et al. (2020).
Starkey & Tempest’s essay was accepted by Bill Harley and published online 13 January 2025. Both papers declare no conflicts of interest.
