International Human Resource Management: A Review of Three Texts

This special issue is dedicated to exploring the convergence and divergence of national systems of industrial relations (IR) and human resource management (HRM). Faced with increasingly competitive environments, multinational firms may adapt certain management practices which are then transmitted across countries. Parts One and Two of this special issue have explored the convergence-divergence debate in international human resource management (IHRM) research. We now turn our attention to three texts published in 2004 which attempt to synthesise and integrate IHRM research for researcher, student and practitioner audiences. The two entitled International Human Resource Management are theory-based review texts situating IHRM in the greater context of international management. The first IHRM is the long-awaited second edition edited by Anne-Wil Harzing and Joris Van Ruysseveldt; the other a fourth edition textbook now authored by Peter Dowling and Denise Welch. HRM in Europe: Evidence of Convergence? is edited by Chris Brewster, Wolfgang Mayrhofer and Michael Morley and reports twenty-three European countries' research findings from the Cranet survey. We now review the three texts separately, paying special attention to contributions to comparative IHRM and the convergence versus divergence debate.