Exploring Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion in Multiethnic Settings : A Context-Sensitive Approach

Organisations, worldwide, have introduced human resource management (HRM) and equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) policies to address the inherent disadvantages experienced by employees with diverse social identities in different national contexts. In this study, we draw on McCall’s comparative intersectional framework and Chadwick’s narrative methodologies on materiality and voice, to investigate employees’ experiences of EDI policies in a multiethnic setting. Vignette and interview data were obtained from employees in two banks, in the ethnically extremely diverse country of Nigeria, and analysed. Our findings suggest that EDI policies require a universal, widely acknowledged, core alongside specificities reflecting the context in which the EDI is to be enacted. Furthermore, we integrate and build on intersectionality, materiality, and voice to nuance and challenge EDI approaches and mutually supportive HRM policies in the Global South that may, in turn, have implications for the Global North and, particularly, multinational companies.