HRM in China After the Asian Financial Crisis : Beyond the State Sector

The nationwide radical restructuring of ownership and corporate governance in China in the 1990s led its firms to adopt more market-oriented management systems. This article examines the consequent evolution of people-management practices in twenty Chinese township and village enterprises located in Southern China. The research was undertaken in the wake of the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and suggests that, compared with other countries' experiences in the region, the impact of the economic downturn in China was only marginal. The main findings pinpoint how human resource management practices in such firms developed more as a response to the longer-term challenges of an increasingly competitive economic and business environment.