Strategic human resource management in context: A historical and global perspective

This symposium provides a new perspective for strategic human resource management (SHRM) scholarship by expanding the contexts in which this scholarship has typically been framed. In the first paper, Kaufman evaluates SHRM scholarship within the United States from a historical and cross-disciplinary context. The second paper, by Festing, discusses the concept and practice of SHRM in Germany, a dominant economic power among developed nations and Europe. Liang, Marler, and Cui focus on China and examine how strategic human resource management is unfolding in a turbulent but hugely influential emerging economy. In describing strategic human resource management practices across these broader macro contexts, the papers in this symposium provide new directions for future theoretical and empirical research on SHRM.