Malaysia as model: Policy transferability in an Asian country

This article uses a case study of public human resource management (HRM) in Malaysia to explore policy 'transferability', proposed as a refinement of Dolowitz and Marsh's policy transfer framework. HRM in the Malaysian civil service is found to be relatively performance-orientated, th...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Public management review 2007-06, Vol.9 (2), p.211-229
Main Authors: McCourt, Willy, Foon, Lee Meng
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Affirmative Action
Affirmative action programs - Malaysia
Civil Service
Civil service - Malaysia
Development Policy
History
human resource management
Human Resources
Linguistics
Malaysia
Malaysia - Labor sector
performance management
Personnel management
Policy studies
Policy Transfer
Prime Ministers
Public administration
Public management
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Summary:This article uses a case study of public human resource management (HRM) in Malaysia to explore policy 'transferability', proposed as a refinement of Dolowitz and Marsh's policy transfer framework. HRM in the Malaysian civil service is found to be relatively performance-orientated, though that is qualified by the Government's affirmative action policies. Malaysia's approach is attributed to factors that have their roots in Malaysia's history: the pervasive respect for authority, the ethnic mix, its Anglo-Saxon orientation, the successful economy, the National Development Policy of 1990 and the personal role of former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed. These factors suggest that public management is both shaped and constrained by its historical roots. The case suggests that successful policy transfer requires an understanding of those roots, especially when there is a significant distance in cultural, political, economic or linguistic terms between the countries transferred from and to.
ISSN:1471-9037
1471-9045
DOI:10.1080/14719030701340358