What does it mean to decolonise and diversify the curriculum?

Decolonisation and diversification are similar but conceptually distinct ways of broadening the curriculum to incorporate alternative forms of knowing and participating in higher education.

Decolonisation within higher education emerged from campaigns such as ‘Rhodes Must Fall’, ‘#Liberate My Degree,’ and ‘Why is My Curriculum White?’ (Hall et al., 2022; Bhambra et al., 2018) which highlighted the dominance of Eurocentric, patriarchal perspectives in academic knowledge systems (Heimer & Joshi, 2021). Decolonisation involves recognising these constraints, disrupting dominant frameworks by exposing their biases, and making room for alternatives (Choat et al., 2024; Shahjahan et al., 2022).

Diversification, on the other hand, originates in approaches to inclusive education, and involves broadening and adding to existing resources to ensure approaches better reflect a wider range of identities (Everett et al., 2023).

Our view is that both decolonisation and diversification are important and complementary. First, we are mindful of critiques that diversification can ‘dilute’ or ‘tame’ the radical aims of decolonisation when the two are merged uncritically (Allen & Girei, 2024; Gopal, 2021). Second, we recognise that educators and students engage with DDtC from a range of perspectives and starting points. For some, diversification provides an accessible entry route into inclusive practice; for others, decolonisation offers a more radical framework for systemic critique. This plurality is especially important in a business school context, where questions about whether—or even why—we should decolonise are often contested (Chapain et al., 2025). By holding space for both approaches, the BEACON model acknowledges these challenges while also encouraging constructive engagement across different positions.

Why do they matter?

Our commitment to decolonisation and diversification is both principled and evidence-based. On the one hand, this is about fairness and inclusivity: creating curricula that reflect multiple ways of knowing rather than reinforcing a narrow, Eurocentric canon. On the other hand, our research shows that students actively value this approach. In our interviews and pilot project, students consistently reported that they wanted content and learning environments that reflected the diverse perspectives found in global business environments and did not automatically default to Western framings. Staff also emphasised that embedding both diversification and decolonisation enriched student learning and supported more critical engagement with disciplinary assumptions.

Development of the BEACON model

The BEACON model has been developed by a project team comprising Minjie Gao and Alison McFarland (KBS academics), Heather Wu and Hana Shiraishi (KBS students), and Charlotte Haberstroh (King’s Academy education specialist). It is grounded in multiple sources of evidence:

• A literature review of decolonisation and diversification in higher education and business education.
• A pilot project where two core KBS undergraduate modules were re-designed based on DDtC principles, with staff working in partnership with students to embed inclusive practices and evaluate changes.
• Semi-structured interviews with 14 KBS academic staff and 17 students (UG and PG) to gather broader insights into views on inclusive education across KBS.
• Feedback from workshops and informal conversations with business school colleagues.

These data informed the structure and content of the model, including the five principles of practice and four domains of change. We also sought feedback on how an inclusive education initiative should be implemented and supported. Staff consistently asked for a tool that offered clear starting points, practical suggestions, and enough flexibility to accommodate different interests. The grid structure of the BEACON model was designed to achieve these goals by being practical and accessible. However, staff also emphasised that DDtC should be meaningful, sustained and non-tokenistic, which led us to integrate the Navigation component of the model, with its foundational pillars and supporting mechanisms.

The project was funded by KBS Innovative Education Fund, KCL Race Equity and Inclusive Education Fund, King's Undergraduate Research Fellowship, and the KBS Research Skills and Career Accelerator Programme

References

Allen, S., & Girei, E. (2024). Developing decolonial reflexivity: Decolonizing management education by confronting white skin, white identities, and whiteness. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23(2), 246-264.

Bhambra, G. K., Gebrial, D., & Nişancıoğlu, K. (2018). Decolonising the university. Pluto Press.

Chapain, C., Lateano, A., Ndibalema, R. and Surman, E. (2025) Decolonising a Business School in Context: From theory to practice (Case Report). London: Sage.

Choat, S., Wolf, C., & O’Neill, S. (2024). Decolonising economics and politics curricula in UK universities. Studies in Higher Education, 49(9), 1504-1518.

Everett, S., Carden, R., & Linton-Williams, K. (2023, September 13). Decolonisation and diversification of the curriculum in UK business schools. Chartered Association of Business Schools. https://charteredabs.org/insights/opinion/decolonisation-and-diversi-cation-of-the-curriculum-in-uk-business-schools

Gopal, P. (2021). On decolonisation and the university. Textual Practice, 35(6), 873-899.

Hall, J., MacDonnell, J., McConnell, C., & Jones, J. (2022). Student–staff partnerships for diversifying and decolonising the higher education curriculum. Equity in Education & Society, 1(3), 327-341.

Heimer, R., & Joshi, N. (2021). Decolonising from the ground up: A report on curriculum diversification. King’s College London Department of Geography.

Shahjahan, R. A., Estera, A. L., Surla, K. L., & Edwards, K. T. (2022). “Decolonizing” curriculum and pedagogy: A comparative review across disciplines and global higher education contexts. Review of Educational Research, 92(1), 73-113.