MNCs: Challenge the Crisis

Provide global economic competition and the related restructuring of most contemporary workplaces present huge challenges for our understanding of the world of work in the current phase of globalization. Multinational Corporations (MNCs) are at the forefront of the movement of capital, productive capacity and know-how and jobs across borders and within international supply chains. The analysis of their behaviour is critical for understanding the dynamics of management and business in developed and developing economies. The methodological challenge is daunting: how to capture key trends in the management of multinational firms and understand these trends relative to the institutional and organizational characteristics of these firms in comparative contextual context?

On the basis of a survey with the most senior MNC managers dealing with employment practices in their national operations (both domestic- and foreign-controlled), this conference will proceed to international comparisons, with similar surveys in several countries.