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In a world of supercapitalism, the tensions between business and public interests are expected to rise, thereby calling corporations to assume new roles in society. In response to this trend, corporations will be in demand of an innovative kind of leadership exercised at all levels by a new breed of ethical, reflective and creative decision-makers. Among the qualifications involved in developing the leadership skills of these decision-makers, the MBA stands out as a world's leading one. However, empirical research conducted in English and French business schools indicates that MBA curricula are not typically designed to provide participants with a broader understanding of leadership that could fully engage them in their learning experiences. To improve this situation, MBA lecturers and curriculum developers need to broaden their educational agenda by means of a reconceptualisation of leadership studies. Drawn from the empirical findings mentioned above and the work of Barnett on criticality, this paper proposes a pedagogical framework for leadership studies that involves three levels of leadership criticality combined with the three domains of critical beings. The objective is to provide a basis for the development of appropriate learning activities that will encourage MBA participants to strive towards developing themselves as critical beings namely, to think and act in such a way that the societal imprint of corporations will be more "attuned" with the ideals of democracy, social justice, and sustainable development.

This article aims to provide insight into MBA lecturers' curriculum interests in relation to the topic of leadership. Central to this inquiry is the exploration of MBA lecturers' beliefs and expectations of leadership learning. An attempt is made to categorize the purpose of leadership study in five English and French MBAs by investigating lecturers' assumptions about what counts as a leadership success in the corporate world. Guided by the work of Habermas on human knowledge interests, the main value of this inquiry is to provide research-based evidence of the prevailing interests in the teaching of leadership in MBA curricula. The analysis reveals that, although driven by different pedagogical motives, the majority of MBA lecturers are not committed to providing participants with a full understanding of leadership that might serve people and society beyond mere business ends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]