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Living and working together internationally is, by its very nature, synonymous with great diversity. This is one of the major challenges of our time for organizations and their employees, both locally and internationally, in a context marked by the imperatives of environmental, economic, and digital transitions, as well as corporate social responsibility (CSR).

In this thematic issue, we want to explore international management from the perspective of responsibility, in response to the often privileged perspective of performance. Our aim is to gain a better understanding of how responsible behavior emerges and evolves, especially in these times of post-pandemics, crises, and major environmental and social challenges facing humanity. For this thematic issue, we have therefore invited contributions that, through the prism of international and comparative management, examine the individual and organizational behaviors that are eminently responsible at the international level and are therefore recognized as such.

International perspectives on organizational behavior and responsibility

In Anglo-Saxon research, international organizational behavior is a clearly identified and recognized field called International Organizational Behavior. This fertile field, whose origins can be traced to authors such as Nancy Adler (1990), encourages an openness to the analysis of organizational behavior across national borders. On the one hand, this trend has made it possible to conduct comparative analyses of cultures and the impact of cultural diversity on organizational behavior in both private and public organizations (Chanlat and Pierre, 2018; D’Iribarne, 1989; Hofstede 1980; Mouillot and Bartel-Radic, 2020; Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, 2004). On the other hand, it has spawned truly intercultural work in the sense that it analyzes the management of international organizations and teams, with an emphasis on intercultural skills as a necessary condition for successful interactions (Hajro and Pudelko, 2010). For a long time, cultural diversity was seen as an obstacle, a difficulty for management. In the last decade or so, however, calls for a more positive and constructive approach have multiplied (Bausch, Barmeyer and Mayrhofer, 2021; Stahl and Tung, 2015). While cultural diversity thus embraces the paradox (Lewis, 2000) of managing both difficulty and wealth, its management is still poorly understood. A fruitful contemporary current approaches it through boundary spanning, studying the actors who “build bridges” across these boundaries, as well as the activities they carry out (Bartel-Radic and Munch, 2023; Schotter, Mudambi, Doz and Gaur, 2017).

Nearly 30 years ago, languages and linguistic diversity were considered a forgotten factor in international management (Marschan, Welch and Welch, 1997). Today, research on language diversity (Church-Morel and Bartel-Radic, 2016) is the subject of a productive and fully established stream within international management research communities (Brannen, Piekkari and Tietze, 2014). In particular, this research examines how language diversity affects professional interactions, organizational processes and work outcomes (Piekkari, Gaibrois and Johansson, 2022). Several recent journal articles and books describe the state of this line of research (Brannen and Mughan, 2017; Karhunen, Kankaanranta, Louhiala-Salminen and Piekkari, 2018; Lecomte, Vigier, Gaibrois and Beeler, 2023; Tenzer, Terjesen and Harzing, 2017). Current topics of interest include linguistic diversity and virtual work (Taylor, 2021), power (Tienari, 2023), international mobility (Back and Piekkari, 2024), and refugees (Hokkinen and Barner-Rasmussen, 2023). Most research in this area currently focuses on the responsible management of diversity.

Organizational responsibility, often summarized under the term CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility), is a rich, ambivalent concept and therefore complex to define. It is the subject of lively debate (Chapple and Moon, 2007; Payaud and Martinet, 2010; Pesqueux, 2009) and questions the impact, positive or negative, of organizational behavior on stakeholders (Freeman, 1984). The latter have become increasingly important, both externally and internally, for example, in the spotlight of scandals that have hit multinational organizations with irresponsible behavior (Daudigeos, Roulet and Valiorgue, 2020) or in the implementation of ambitious HR policies of inclusion (Mouillot, Drillon and Montargot, 2018). The recent and current crises may thus be an opportunity to rethink organizational responsibility as a field of research, in the organizational behaviors it supports, its practices and concepts (Crane and Matten, 2021). This may include, for example, redefining organizational priorities and the risks associated with unfulfilled responsibilities. International management research is increasingly called upon to play its part in contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs; UN 2015) and in the face of humanity’s “grand challenges’’ (Buckley, Doh, and Benischke, 2017; Montiel, Curvo-Cazurra, Park, Antolin-Lopez, and Husted, 2021).

The COVID pandemic and the crises it continues to generate have served to highlight the global aspect of CSR, the obvious interdependencies between organizations and states, and the collateral damage of irresponsible organizational behavior. The current context is clearly an opportunity to rethink responsible governance at the global level, as part of an intelligent articulation of organizations with each other, with governments and with civil society (Campbell, 2007), in the service of transnational public interest objectives. The question of the social impact of the policies and actions of multinational companies, particularly in a crisis or post-crisis context, has been the subject of some research (Asshidi, Bartel-Radic and Dessaigne, 2022), but deserves much further development. In particular, it is necessary to reflect on the organizational problems inherent in the deployment of CSR by organizations on a global scale (Pestre, 2014). Indeed, successful international collaboration relies, among other things, on the intercultural skills of individuals interacting internationally (Bartel-Radic and Giannelloni, 2017; Chevrier and Segal, 2011) and on the collective intelligence within multicultural teams (Earley and Mosakowski, 2004). These issues can be addressed by mobilizing different approaches to CSR (functionalist, strategic, political, and institutional). In particular, the institutional (Campbell, 2006, 2007) and political (Scherer & Palazzo, 2011) approaches allow for an international analysis of the factors contributing to responsible global governance.

The “grand challenges’’ facing humanity, such as preserving climate and biodiversity, reducing hunger, or dealing with plastic waste, can only be addressed through international cooperation among a wide range of actors: individuals, companies, institutions, and public authorities (Ferraro, Etzion, and Gehman, 2015). However, collaborations between multinational corporations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are complex and often fraught with mistrust (Berger et al., 2004). Nevertheless, these collaborations have been gradually developing since the 2000s, including through BoP projects in emerging markets (Hussler and Payaud, 2019) and the development of CSR by multinationals that draw on the skills of NGOs (Jamali and Keshishian, 2009). The field of international management is now making a significant contribution to management research on “grand challenges’’ within an established research conversation (Gariel and Bartel-Radic, 2024).

The epistemological approaches adopted in research on these topics are diverse, as Romani, Barmeyer, Primecz and Pilhofer (2018) show: positivism has long dominated the field (Hofstede, 1980; Wolf, 2006), and interpretivism has often taken the opposite view (D’Iribarne, 2009; Chevrier, 2009). The (post-)positivist paradigm approaches cultural diversity as a barrier, whereas interpretivism sees it as a richness. Postmodernism (Fougère and Moulettes, 2007; Magala, 2009) and the critical approach (Romani, Mahadevan, and Primecz, 2018; Spicer, Alvesson, and Kärreman, 2009) have produced fewer publications, but are nonetheless meeting with a growing response. In terms of research methods, while quantitative methods have long dominated the field of international affairs, qualitative methods, especially case studies, have also gained increasing popularity and recognition (Nielsen, Welch, Chidlow, et al., 2020). Less commonly used methods include action research, experiments, or research that combines quantitative and qualitative methods (Asshidi, Bartel-Radic and Taylor, 2024; Bartel-Radic and Munch, 2023; Cuervo-Cazurra et al., 2016).

CSR is being democratized to the point of becoming the spearhead of many actions and even organizational strategies. However, the representations of such contributions remain deeply unstable and scattered, sometimes to the point of threatening their very raison d’être and credibility. This thematic issue of Management International invites contributions that approach cultural diversity from the positive, constructive angle of a richness for organizations and society (Bausch, Barmeyer, and Mayrhofer, 2021)-which by no means excludes, on the contrary, contributions from the critical paradigm (Romani, Mahadevan, and Primecz, 2018). These approaches make it possible to explore and investigate methods of inclusion that aim to support diversity in all its international and multicultural components.

Presentation of the articles in this issue

This thematic issue contains six research articles, one research note and two book reviews. The first three deal with management tools and approaches in the service of responsibility and ethics, while the next three deal with managerial and financial management in the face of the notion of risk. Four articles use qualitative methods and two use quantitative methods.

Management approaches and tools for ethics and responsibility

Formalization and Functions of Ethics in Multinational Enterprises: A Systems Approach

In this first text, Hamza Asshidi discusses ethics in multinational companies. This concept has become essential for these organizations, which are increasingly devoting tools to it, but whose contours remain too poorly defined. The article explores the nature and functions of ethical tools (code of conduct, values and training) through a multiple case study of 19 multinational companies, including 30 interviews and secondary data analyzed on NVivo (Gioia, 2021). To be effective and virtuous in guiding employee behavior, these ethical tools must be seen as management tools, articulated in highly formalized, internationally uniform, multi-instrument ethical systems. A poorly formalized ethics system is more likely to serve the purpose of anticipating and managing legal or image risks than to guide behavior in a more ethical direction.

Responsible management of local employee absenteeism in a mining company in Burkina Faso: the role of intercultural skills

In this second article, Florent Song-Naba and Baouindsida Hermann Bonkougou analyze the role of intercultural skills as a tool for responsible management of absenteeism among locally recruited staff at a mining company in Burkina Faso. The results show that the mobilization of intercultural skills by managers makes it possible to go beyond the binary logic of “economic responsibility” versus “ethical responsibility”, and thus to make CSR part of an instrumental profit-maximization strategy, without overshadowing the socio-economic needs of populations living near mining sites. The result is a management style in which sanctions and threats of dismissal are not the preferred responses to curb absenteeism among local workers.

Participatory projects and their impact on immigrants’ integration in France: empowering by doing

The third article, co-authored by Noémie Domingues, Eunice Cascant, Catherine Mercier-Suissa and Nancy Ottaviano, draws on the literature on empowerment and participation to understand how participatory initiatives promote the socio-cultural and economic integration of immigrants. The research is based on an analysis of a French housing facility located in Paris. Data was collected through interviews with four sub-groups, observations and document analysis. Their research shows that participatory projects act on the psychological empowerment of immigrants. They also encourage other stakeholders to modify their habits to implement more inclusive practices. The authors emphasize the importance of the arts as communication drivers and means of reverse power relations. Finally, the article presents a model of empowerment through participatory initiatives.

Responsibility in the face of risks and crises

The following three articles, written in English, deal with management and financial management in the face of risk and crisis. Two of them analyze cultural contexts in the Middle East.

Analysis of the primary responsibilities of team leaders in the extreme Iraqi context

For this fourth article, Rabee Fares and Marc Valax have analyzed how team leaders adapt their management style in extreme contexts, places where social tensions are high; the case of Iraq is here mobilized as representative of such situations. This research is based on the High Leader-Member Exchange (H-LMX) theory, according to which the quality of the exchange relationship between leaders and team members influences their commitment and effectiveness. Through qualitative research, the study reveals a high level of LMX in wartime Iraq, where interviewees, who were leaders in their organizations, shared their experiences of the primary responsibilities they faced without the support from supervisors during extreme events. Despite the dramatic context surrounding this reflection, this article demonstrates that the influence of leaders on their teams was key to achieving operations and increased performance.

An Empirical Study of Unethical Earnings Management Behaviors in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) listed firms

The fifth article, proposed by Badih Kazma and Marc Valax, presents an empirical rationale and supporting study that reveals how executives, especially in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) listed companies, resort to unethical earnings management practices in times of financial loss and financial distress. Using a quantitative approach, this study analyzes 120 listed companies, mobilizing the Modified Jones (1995) Model to estimate earnings management as a dependent variable. Regression analysis is employed in this research to explore the impact of independent variables. The authors find that managers in the six GCC countries engage in earnings management through both positive and negative discretionary accruals. In particular, the results reveal that factors such as consolidation, financial distress and performance significantly influence earnings management practices.

In Search of Sustainable Successful Traders in Times of Crisis

In the sixth and final article of this thematic issue, Emmanuelle Patricia Kleinlogel, Marianne Schmid Mast, Karl Frauendorfert, Robert Gutsche and Alexandru Rif focus on the recurrent global crises of recent decades. These crises were mainly caused by management failures in various organizations, especially in the financial sector, such as the stock market crash of 2000 or the scandal involving dishonest traders at UBS in 2011. These crises are linked to excessive risk-taking by traders and investment and risk managers. Identifying high performance individuals who are also socially responsible is a challenge. Here, the authors set out to address this issue by investigating the personality traits that characterize responsible and successful traders to improve personnel selection procedures with cross-cultural applicability. The results show that being conscientious and intelligent, while at the same time being inclined to take financial risks, are significantly associated with responsible trading performance.

Research note and book reviews

In a research note, Anne Bartel-Radic, Frédéric Prévot, Franck Barès and Gabrielle Alie review the 135 articles published in Management International between 2009 and 2023 that address the topics covered in this thematic issue. A descriptive analysis reveals the methodologies used, the dominance of environmental, social, or governance topics, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) addressed, and the fields studied. The articles were then classified according to the seven themes covered by the journal Management International (Barès and Alie, 2024). Finally, a thematic analysis of the article abstracts was conducted, resulting in ten clusters of articles addressing responsibility in various terms.

In line with the spirit of this thematic issue, a review of the book Societal Change and Organizations: Theoretical and Practical Benchmarks for Preparing Organizations for the World (“Mutations sociétales et organisations: Des repères théoriques et pratiques pour préparer les organisations au monde”; Renaud, Bernard, Bonache, Burkhardt-Bourgeois, and Vignal, 2023) was written by Hamza Asshidi. This book provides a rich, multifaceted examination of the relationship between organizations and societal changes of all kinds through the lens of management science.

A second book review, by Anne Bartel-Radic, focuses on the book 80 tales of DBA impact (Kalika, Platt, Branger, and Closse, 2023). This book presents the experiences of DBA graduates from all continents, strongly related to the theme of responsibility in international management. The 80 tales illustrate how a DBA, i.e., doctoral research conducted by managers, promotes personal development, responsible management practices, ethical behavior, and sustainable development.

Research perspectives for responsible international management

The articles in this thematic issue all take a positive approach to management and international diversity, in the service of corporate responsibility towards stakeholders and society at large. We are pleased with this and hope that these articles will have the widest possible distribution and impact.

It should be noted that all the articles in this thematic issue deal with the social and governance aspects of corporate responsibility, through the characteristics of responsible leaders and the management tools and methods that enable responsible management of organizations. However, there are no articles on corporate environmental responsibility, even though multinational companies in particular have a key role to play in the fight against climate change, pollution and the destruction of biodiversity. We strongly encourage more research in the field of international management on these issues, and hope that this thematic issue is just one of many steps toward more responsible international management.