A similar pattern developed in Japan after the Second World War. Japan
developed a ‘dual’ industrial sector with giant national and multinationalWrms in
the primary sector and small- to medium-size subcontractor and supplierWrms
in the secondary sector. Primary sectorWrms developed a distinctive employment
system with highly developed and formalized ILMs featuring lifetime employ-
ment, seniority wages, extensive job rotation, and enterprise unions (Shirai 1983 ).
Powerful personnel departments were created to administer these ILMs. According
to Hirano ( 1969 ), these Japanese personnel departments had more authority and
range of responsibilities than the personnel departments of the leading American
companies in Japan. In the secondary sector, on the other hand, personnel
programs in JapaneseWrms were far more informal and less developed. In the
1980 s the Japanese economy experienced a ‘productivity miracle’ and many foreign
observers concluded that a large part of the explanation resided with the ability of
the Japanese HRM system to foster loyalty, cooperation, and hard work. Books
and articles on Japanese management practices proliferated and now it was the
Americans and Europeans who were trekking to Japan for plant tours and man-
agement seminars. Largely lost from sight, however, was the fact that many of the
pillars of the Japanese management model were imported from America, includ-
ing not only the scientiWc management and total quality management principles of
Taylor and Edwards Deming but also the unitarist ‘goodwill’ employment model
pioneered by leading American writers and practitioners of industrial relations in
the 1920 s (Kaufman 2004 a; Wren 2005 ).
In Europe, by way of contrast, HRM only slowly recovered and developed from
the disasters of the Second World War, even as European industry rebounded.
F. T. Malm ( 1960 ) wrote a survey of personnel management in Europe. He observed
that ‘personnel administration does not have the professional status in Europe
it enjoys in the United States, except for the United Kingdom’ ( 1960 : 77 ). With
respect to Europe, he provided this overview ( 1960 : 72 ):
Many European enterprises do not appear to think in terms of an integrated personnel and
industrial relations program. In some countries, the social welfare approach to employee
relations problems has received special attention. In others, the ‘personnel department’
turns out to be the ‘lohnbu ̈ro’ or payroll oYce having no concern with basic personnel
problems. In still another, the ‘personnel oYcer’ saw his function as that of a records
manager.... In the United States, modern consideration of personnel staVdepartments
emphasizes the variety of functional roles: advisory, service, coordinative, and analytical (or
‘control’). European personnel departments are often limited to the ‘service’ concept, and
have too low status and recognition to permit eVective participation in problem solving
and policy formulation.
Malm went on to observe that ( 1960 : 79 ), ‘The most serious and basic of the
problems aVecting European personnel administration are those in executive
development and management education... The problem in much of Europe is the
lack of a professional approach to management.’ He also noted, however, that a more
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