ABSTRACT
Concepts of organizing and managing people, managing change and managing resources have to come from somewhere. They cannot just appear from nowhere. The ‘cultural’ concept of ‘human resource management’ and its almost universal spread appears to represent globalization at the highest peak of Western pre-eminence in the world: or more accurately America's postwar pre-eminence described by Boyacigiller and Adler (1991). Even up until the current date, human resource management is often presented as a ‘given’, while recognizing that there are comparisons to be made across industrialized countries with different institutions. Yet this approach is becoming less viable.
