Expatriates' willingness to learn the host country language: The role of superiority and inferiority

Despite the emerging stream on language issues in multinational companies (MNC), little research has focused on the host country language competence of expatriates working in MNCs' foreign subsidiaries. I explore how expatriates react differently to the learning of host country language, particularly on their perception of the difficulty of learning the host country language. 55 expatriates and their local colleagues in 9 Nordic MNCs' subsidiaries were interviewed in China in 2006, 2007 and 2012. My findings demonstrate that there is a superiority-inferiority relationship between expatriates and host country employees in MNCs. Such power relationship influences expatriates' development of host country language competences.