Abstract:
A recent debate has taken place in International Human Resource Management (IHRM) theory and practice
between the so-called functionalists and the critical approaches. This paper reviews the literature on
mainstream, functionalist IHRM and the critical approaches, and theoretically discusses their fit to emerging
countries' realities and multilatinas experience. The essay's main objectives and contributions are: (a) to argue
that this debate, overly typical of the American-European context, may not be fully applicable to ambiguous and
contradictory contexts, such as most developing countries and, particularly, Latin America; (b) to argue that the
disputes between both functionalist and critical IHRM theorists, in equally richer countries, is inadequate for
other (non-rich-involving) contexts; and (c) to propose redirection possibilities for this debate, particularly, in
Latin America
