The evolution of cross-cultural research in management studies, 1960-2008

We offer a thorough assessment of cross-cultural research in the field of management over the last about five decades. Drawing on a sample of 317 articles published in 40 leading management journals between 1960 and 2008, we employ four dimensions of analysis to initially assess each individual decade and then explore the overall evolution of the examined literature over the entire time period. Our findings reveal that: (a) cross-cultural management research has gradually shifted its focus over time; (b) more integration is needed among the different research strands; (c) some subfields have been pioneers (i.e. marketing and human resource management), whereas others have been laggards (i.e. operations management); (d) some topics (e.g. the homogeneity of domestic culture), although largely discussed, need to be investigated further.