Critical thinking and university social responsibility: the importance of the teaching role

Abstract

The objective of this article is to reflect on the relationship between critical thinking and university social responsibility. Documentary research was carried out deploying epistemological operators that allowed an integrative and purposeful analysis. The results confirm that critical thinking is a dynamic process of university social responsibility, which must be understood from a strategic and holistic perspective given its importance for sustainable human and social development. It was possible to show that the teacher plays a primary role in the systemic development of university social responsibility and that precisely their social responsibility in education involves generating critical thinking in students. It concludes by recognizing the importance of university social responsibility as a criterion of educational quality, and as the main link between the university and society, for which it should be considered as a transversal axis in the mission, vision, objectives, and values of the university organizational context.