Evolution of Employment and Industrial Relations practice: The Nigerian Experience

This study examines the transfer of the British Voluntarist employment relations practice (ERP) to Nigeria through colonialism; this transferred employment/industrial relations replaced the Nigerian Paternalistic ERP. In most cases transfers of management practices by the colonial masters were done with the help of the multinational companies; in the Nigerian case the multinational company was the Royal Niger Company. This was achieved through in-depth descriptive and historical case study of the transfer of the British Voluntarist ERP to Nigeria. A review of the literature of most transfers of management practices revealed that the impact of culture on the successes or failures of such transfers are at best underplayed. In an attempt to bridge this gap, this study relying on descriptive and historical sources explored the impact of culture on the transfer of management practices with special reference to employment/industrial relations practice. The findings confirmed that all groups of people no matter how ‘uncivilised’ have their own management practices built around their culture and that it will be problematic to devised a template of any management practice in a cultural area with the intention of transferring such to another cultural area.