Dominance and Societal Effects in Human Resource Practice Transfer

Abstract

This paper investigates how meso-level actors (MeLAs) contribute to human resources (HR) practice transfer in diffusion and adaptation processes, drawing on the System-Society-Dominance-Corporate Effects (SSDC) theoretical framework to interpret the role of MeLAs in the transfer of the Japanese management model to the Indonesian automotive industry. We focus on two issues: i) the way Japanese MeLAs’ training regimes in Japan contribute to the understanding and diffusion of the model and ii) the coordinated strategy of both Japanese and Indonesian MeLAs in seeking procedural influence through intelligence-sharing and lobbying activities over how the Japanese model is adapted in Indonesia. Our research adds to our limited understanding of the significance of MeLAs in processes of diffusion-adaptation in emerging market economies characterized by weak regulatory regimes and asymmetric economic power relations. Drawing on interviews with 75 key informants in Japan and Indonesia, we explore the significance of MeLAs from corporate and labor spheres alongside those of non-corporate MeLAs such as non-governmental and quasi-governmental organizations. The study elaborates the SSDC framework by highlighting MeLAs’ influence in both diffusing conceptions of dominant management ‘best practice’ (dominance effects) and their role – and that of dominance effects – in shaping societal effects that inform how the model is adapted. We theorize the complex processes through which the effects identified in the SSDC framework are experienced by local actors, showing that they are neither monolithic nor mechanical in nature and thereby elaborating the inter-relationship in how dominance effects inform societal effects.