Abstract

The last decade witnessed only a few critical research on the microfoundations of multiculturalism and how they impact Board behaviour in British multinational corporations (MNCs). The purpose of this paper is to critically evaluate the microfoundations of the causal relationship between multiculturalism and board behaviour. We conducted Online Questionnaire Survey involving 318 respondents in 2020 and gathered secondary data from the 2018-2025 Annual Reports of 10 British MNCs. SPSS Multiple regression identifies three relational microfoundations: ‘pluralist-relationship’ has the greatest impact, followed by ‘liberalist-relationship’, and ‘unitarist-relationship’ has the least impact on Board behaviour. Our contribution is three-fold: first, we add to adoption of microfoundations as a theoretical framework for researching multiculturalism. Second, the explicit characterization of the microfoundations of multiculturalism as three predictable relationships demanding deliberate Board behaviour is seminal. Finally, we demonstrate the paradoxical nature of multiculturalism in the context of board behaviour. The implications are three-fold: a/provides a novel framework for bridging theory-practice gaps; b/encourages adoption of multi-theoretic and contextualized approaches for further developing existing theories of multiculturalism; c/operationalizes theoretical and methodological changes required in internationalisation research. Finally, we conclude the paper by highlighting the main summaries, the theoretical implications, areas for future research, and practical recommendations for practitioners.