To promote human development and flourishing and the creation of just and sustainable workplaces, HRD professionals need a better understanding of the political and economic forces shaping organizational realities. We need new models, grounded in an updated understanding of the political economy of labor and workforce development. This essay offers a brief critique of the current models and discusses alternative ways of thinking about political and economic mechanisms that can promote human flourishing, equity, and sustainability. We offer suggestions for how HRD researchers and practitioners can use this new lens to develop interventions and advance scholarship.
AlagarajaM.WilsonK. (2016). The confluence of individual autonomy and collective identity in India: A narrative ethnography using an Indian–US sociocultural lens. Advances in Developing Human Resources, 18(1), 26-37. https://doi.org/10.1177/1523422315615090
2.
BieremaL. (2010). Implementing a critical approach to organization development. Krieger Publishing Company.
3.
BravermanH. (1974). Labor and monopoly capital. Monthly Review Press.
4.
CrawfordM. (2009). Shop class as soulcraft: An inquiry into the value of work. Thorndike Press.
5.
CumbersA.McMasterR.CabaçoS.WhiteM. J. (2020). Reconfiguring economic democracy: generating new forms of collective agency, individual economic freedom, and public participation. Work, Employment and Society, 34(4), 678-695. https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017019875935
6.
DahlR. A. (1985). A preface to economic democracy. University of California Press.
7.
FenwickT. (2011). Developing who, for what? Notes of caution in rethinking a global H (R) D: A response to Kuchinke. Human Resource Development International, 14(1), 83-89. https://doi.org/10.1080/13678868.2011.542900
HaakestadH.FribergJ. H. (2017). Deskilling revisited: labour migration, neo-Taylorism and the degradation of craft work in the Norwegian construction industry. Economic and Industrial Democracy, 41(3), 630-651. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831x17735671
10.
HayekF. (1948). Individualism and economic order. University of Chicago Press.
11.
HendersonR. (2020). Reimagining capitalism in a world on fire. Public Affairs.
12.
HillR. B.KuchinkeK. P.ZinserR. (2013). (Re-)Connecting workforce education and human resource development. Human Resource Development Review, 12(1), 3-10. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484312468424
13.
KleinP.HolmesR. M.FossN.TerjesenS.PepeJ (2021). Capitalism, cronyism, and management scholarship: A call for clarity. Academy of Management Perspectives, Published Online First. https://doi.org/10.5465/amp.2019.0198
14.
KuchinkeK. P. (2010). Human development as a central goal for human resource development. Human Resource Development International, 13(5), 575-585. https://doi.org/10.1080/13678868.2010.520482
15.
KuchinkeK. P. (2013). Education and work: A review essay of historical, cross-cultural, and disciplinary perspectives on vocational education. Educational Theory, 63(2), 202-219. https://doi.org/10.1111/edth.12018
16.
LewisT. (2007). Braverman, Foucault and the labor process: framing the current high-skills debate. Journal of Education and Work, 20(5), 397-415. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639080701814315
McNallyM. (2010). Enterprise content management systems and the application of Taylorism and Fordism to intellectual labour. Ephemera: Theory & Politics in Organization, 10(3–4), 357-373. https://doi.org/10.7939/R3R20S91D
19.
NussbaumM. (2011). Creating capabilities: The human development approach. Belknap Press.
20.
ReichR. (2020). The system: Who rigged it, how we fix it. Alfred A. Knopf.
21.
RiggC.StewartJ.TrehanK. (2007). Critical human resource development: Beyond orthodoxy. Prentice-Hall.
22.
SenA. (1999). Development as freedom. Alfred Knopf Press.
23.
SenA. (2009). The idea of justice. Belknap Press.
24.
SlobodianQ. (2018). Globalists: The end of empire and the birth of neoliberalism. Harvard University Press.
StewartJ.CallahanJ.RiggC.SambrookS.TrehanK. (2014). Realizing the critical in CHRD: strategies for research and practice. Human Resource Development International, 17(4), 379-383. https://doi.org/10.1080/13678868.2014.932084
27.
SuttonS. G.ArnoldV.HoltM. (2018). How much automation is too much? Keeping the human-relevant in knowledge work. Journal of Emerging Technologies in Accounting, 15(2), 15-25. https://doi.org/10.2308/jeta-52311
28.
SwansonR.A.HoltonE. (2009). Foundations of human resource development (2nd Ed.). Berrett-Koehler.
29.
SwansonR. A. (1995). Human resource development: performance is the key. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 6(2), 207-213. https://doi.org/10.1002/hrdq.3920060208
30.
VeenA.BarrattT.GoodsC. (2021). Platform-capital’s ‘app-etite’ for control: A labour process analysis of food-delivery work in Australia. Work, Employment and Society, 34(3), 388-406. https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017019836911
31.
VincentS.BamberG.J.DelbridgeR.DoellgastV.GradyJ.GrugulisI. (2020). Situating human resource management in the political economy: Multilevel theorising and opportunities for kaleidoscopic imagination. Human Resource Management Journal, 30, 461-477. https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12328
32.
YorksL. (2004). Toward a political economy model for comparative analysis of the role of strategic human resource development leadership. Human Resource Development Review, 3(3), 189-208. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484304266260
