Abstract:
Contemporary organizations have become composite structures of any number of nationalities and cultures. The forces of globalization have forced organizations to begin internationalizing by establishing production sites in other countries. This trend became increasingly common as the twentieth-century progressed and technological resources improved (Robertson & White, 2008). Current scholarship on the issues faced by international organizations has left a number of potentially important variables unexamined, such as the number of members of a cultural group versus their structural position within the organization. It has also raised an equally significant number of questions that must be answered, such as how organizational cultures are affected by internal cultural tensions and potential group muting. This research aimed to uncover the tensions present at the site of an international organization and the resulting organizational culture that developed from those tensions. Interview data was collected from a Japanese international organization comprised of a wide variety of national cultures. That data was qualitatively analyzed using thematic analysis and the constant comparative method. Muted group theory was used to analyze the negotiation of cultural voice within the organization through the identification of resistance strategies. Organizational culture theory was utilized to uncover the elements of the organization that contributed to its discursive environment. Findings revealed that members of the Japanese national culture along with native English speakers expressed the most muting, but the organizational culture encouraged cultural expression, alleviating internal tension.
