Sustainability in higher education: a systematic review with focus on management education

Sustainability has received increasing attention in management education over the past ten years. This article reviews a decade's worth of research in a systematic analysis of 63 articles published in international higher education and management education journals between 2003 and 2013. The purpose of this article is to map and review the publications based on the analysis according to the following four categories: (1) Types of papers, (2) Challenges, (3) Teaching techniques, and (4) Curriculum orientation. The scientific value of this article focuses on three main contributions to management education. First, while most articles are descriptive, focusing on specific, unique experiences in a given institution or with a particular teaching method or tool, few situate themselves within the broader philosophy and design of management education. The second contribution is an evaluation of the status of sustainability in management education as a field of study. This systematic review highlights the lack of consistency in the concepts used: no stable categories emerge from these articles and very few studies integrate the three levels of educational philosophy – teaching, program design, and learning. Third, this review highlights future directions for sustainability in management education institution-wide. While all articles highlight the need for curriculum change, very few specify how this change could and would be achieved by course design or explicit educational paradigms.