Globalisation and IHRM: partners in comparative perspective?

Abstract

Heuristically oriented, for pedagogic purposes, globalisation and international personnel management and development trajectories are examined from a comparative perspective. The

Valores de la Economía Social: Gestión de Recursos Humanos y Sostenibilidad

“…La actual situación económica, financiera y tecnológica está fuertemente condicionada por el proceso de globalización que está sacudiendo a nuestra sociedad. Globalización que ha traído consigo importantes transformaciones en los procesos organizativos de las empresas, así como en los mercados donde éstas operan y que además han modificado la forma de trabajar y de estructurar nuestra vida social y familiar (Perkins, 2003). Es por tanto que las organizaciones actuales no pueden seguir funcionando con los mismos principios y valores que hace años: la sociedad ha cambiado haciéndose más diversa y heterogénea.…”

A review of international human resource management: Integration, interrogation, imitation

“…If defined in terms of the worldwide flow of capital, knowledge and other resources concomitant with increasing growth in the scope and scale of competition, the globalization of business, with its emphasis on the interconnection of international product markets (Harzing 2002), increases the requirement for understanding ways in which multinational enterprises (MNEs) may operate effectively. While the determinism of such an increase may be questioned (see Perkins 2003), a major aspect of this understanding is based in the field of international management and its dimension of international human resource management (IHRM) (Dowling 1999; Schuler et al. 2002).…”

“…The dominance of naïve empiricism (after Cray and Mallory 1998) and the search for an integrative, all‐encompassing theoretical base has led to the neglect of diverse voices. Although Perkins (2003, 462) has questioned ‘optimistic’ and ‘uncritically functionalist’ notions of globalization and has suggested that IHRM may be perceived as globalization's ‘junior partner’ (Perkins 2003, 461), scholars in IHRM have, by and large, failed to engage with important social and structural questions. Such questions include those related to the difficulties of managing across national borders, the consequences of cross‐national shifts in employment for a nation's social security obligations and the potential for globalization to have destructive effects on national employment and identity (e.g.…”

“…Guillén 2001). Other questions have to do with the very constitution of globalization as a discourse that may privilege particular positions, depending on whether it is presented as beneficial and civilizing, destructive in terms of democracy or the natural environment, and present now or exaggerated and only partial (Fiss and Hirsch 2005; Perkins 2003).…”

“…While the determinism of such an increase may be questioned (see Perkins 2003), a major aspect of this understanding is based in the field of international management and its dimension of international human resource management (IHRM) (Dowling 1999;Schuler et al 2002). In this paper, we review and critique the development of IHRM in the context of calls for greater integration in its theoretical and research emphases from within the field, and of postmodern and postcolonial perspectives from without.…”