International Contexts

Considering a variety of national contexts provides a greater awareness of how historical, cultural, economic, and political systems shape WLC. Furthermore, studying mul­tiple national contexts can provide a deeper understanding of how navigating WLC at individual, relational, and organizational levels can (re)shape these broader systemic contexts.

Of course, other nations are studied as well, and by considering WLC in these con­texts, scholars have acknowledged the impor­tance of taking a macrosocietal perspective (several edited books address numerous countries; see also Blyton, Blunsdon, Reed, & Dastmalchian, 2006; Haas, Hwang, & Russell, 2000; Poelmans, 2005). This broader systemic perspective includes factors related to the economy (e.g., income), policy (e.g., welfare and health), history (e.g., immigra­tion), and culture (e.g., values and attitudes). In a comparative study of 20 countries in the Anglo world, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe, Spector et al.

In thinking about the transformation of WL problems at the macrosocietal level, WLC should explore (and challenge) cultural ide­ologies related to work, gender, time, and so on since cultural differences clearly affect the relationship between the causes and conse­quences of WLC. Wieland (2011) notes that the discourse of excess—“one can never do enough”—is especially influential in shaping the ways in which U.S. Americans work and live; it results in an excessive model of career that has destructive consequences for individu­als, organizations, and societies (Wieland et al., 2009). While shifting cultural values is a daunting task, making small changes in the ways we speak about work and life can alter our WL constructions (Tracy & Rivera, 2010). Given this contextualization of WLC within macrosocietal structures, we turn now to how organizations intersect with WL possibilities.