Expatriation and Repatriation in MNCs: A Taxonomy • 239 EXPATRIATION AND REPATRIATION IN MNCs: A TAXONOMY Human Resource Management, Summer 2002, Vol. 41, No. 2, Pp. 239–259 © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/hrm.10034 Yehuda Baruch and Yochanan Altman The challenge of the management of expatriates and repatriates has never been more timely nor urgent: globalization has forced expatriation into the corporate agenda, confronting us with an array of questions on HRM strategy and practice. We propose that a wide range of current think- ing and practice may be conveniently grouped into a taxonomy of five organizational options, each advancing a different set of expatriation relationships: Global, Emissary, Peripheral, Profes- sional, and Expedient. A framework outlining the main configurations of these options generates a generic model for expatriation at the organizational level. This forms the principal part of the article, followed by a comprehensive discussion and implications for practice. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Introduction With the advent of globalization, the num- ber and extent of business representatives crossing international borders has turned from a trickle into a torrent that dominates the agenda of human resource departments. Economic and social factors are working to increase global competition and global op- erations, and subsequently an acceleration of traffic in expatriation and repatriation (cf. Laurent, 1986; Porter, 1989; Porter & Tansky, 1999). The concept and practice of global- ization have been studied extensively, and increasingly so, including the human re- source aspects of it. Expatriation—the clearest manifestation of globalization from an HR perspective (Brewster & Scullion, 1997; Porter & Tansky, 1999; Selmer, 1996)—calls for theoretical framing. In the United States alone, some 100,000 employees are sent overseas each year (Mandell, 1994) at an estimated cost of $250,000 for an executive and family (Hiltorp & Janssens, 1990; Ioannou, 1995). Similarly, the figure for Europe was put at three to four times one’s annual salary, discounting reloca- tion costs (Zetlin, 1994). Much of the research on expatriation and repatriation is concerned with individuals (cf. Arthur & Bennett, 1995; Baruch, 1995) or the meta-organizational: strategic, environmental, and political (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1989; Hu, 1992; Perlmutter & Heenan, 1974; Porter, 1989). There is an evident lack of conceptual work at the organizational operational level. Few authors have focused on the organization as the unit of study in international HRM (for exceptions, see Adler & Boyacigiller, 1996; Buckley & Casson 1998; Hendry, 1996; Por- ter & Tansky, 1999). We have now reached a stage of theory development that calls for some preliminary theoretical assertions. We will not succeed in sorting out the discrepancies and