The degree courses, like the faculty, are interdisciplinary and unite Business Administration, Economics, Sociology and Law. They are geared towards looking at business and social issues from different perspectives. Research and teaching are linked as part of an application-oriented methodological education. In the BA in Social Economics, some study places are reserved for students without a school leaving certificate giving right of entry to higher education (Abitur). The faculty has over 70 years of experience in ensuring entry-friendly studies – for students with and without an Abitur.

The faculty maintains a wide range of exchange programmes with universities all over the world. The International Office is the point of contact for students and organises the exchange programmes. In addition to Erasmus+, there are opportunities for this through contacts with subject-specific partner universities, e.g. for the Bachelor’s in Social Economics with Kyungpook National University Daegu (South Korea) and for the Master’s in "Interdisciplinary Public and Non-profit Studies" with the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs in Tbilisi (Georgia).

University of Oslo (Norwegen); Ecole de Management Strasbourg (Frankreich); National Taiwan University, COSS (Taiwan); Georgien Institute of Public Affairs, Tiflis (Georgien); Università di Bologna (Italien); Linköpings Universitet (Schweden); Università degli Studi di Trento (Italien); Kyungpook National Daegu (Südkorea)

Numerous relevant databases are available from the faculty's library. These include the financial and company databases Refinitiv Workspace and Wharton Research Data Service. The faculty has an excellently equipped research lab with a high level of expertise in planning, designing and conducting experiments and surveys. Databases and the research lab can be used for teaching (esp. methods training) and for final theses. The faculty’s E-Learning Office competently supports the topic of digitalisation in studies and teaching.

Under the motto "Innovating and cooperating for a sustainable future", the University of Hamburg was awarded the title of University of Excellence. It therefore stands for cutting-edge research. The faculty contributes in a variety of ways to topics of sustainability, for example in the faculty research centre "Centre for Sustainable Society Research" and in the Excellence Cluster "Climate, Climate Change, and Society". Another focus area is health economics research (including participation in the Hamburg Centre for Health Economics). Further research takes place in profile initiatives such as "Work and Social Change".

The university's start-up service and transfer centre supports start-up projects from the idea to the start-up. The university participates in the "Startup Port", an association of seven universities in the metropolitan region that gives students the exclusive opportunity to take part in courses on the topics of start-up and entrepreneurship. The topic of "Innovation" has recently been significantly strengthened in teaching, including in the curriculum of the Master's degree in "Innovation, Business and Sustainability". In addition, a professorship for Academic and Innovation Research was created.

The faculty is interdisciplinary in its composition and teaching and addresses the interactions between business and society from various, complementary perspectives. For example, through the German Research Foundation Research Group (DFG-KFG) "Futures of Sustainability", it contributes the economic and social science perspective to sustainability issues and thus plays an important part in the university's mission statement within the excellence strategy: "Innovating and cooperating for a sustainable future".