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International global competition often requires firms to assign expatriate managers to oversee operations abroad. The destinations of such assignments are increasingly characterized as violent and unstable (Hounta and Lehmann, 2015; Schulz and Camp, 2018), because the number of high-risk countries across the world continues to grow. Terrorism and other forms of violence have become a new reality for many organizations (Fee and McGrath–Champ, 2017). Increasingly, international companies and their staff have become targets of attacks, creating challenges to personal safety and well-being, building a barrier to corporate success (Czinkota et al., 2010; AXA's World of Work Report, 2017). Evidence shows that internationally mobile employees hold reservations towards assignments in countries perceived as high-risk or hostile (Wagner and Westaby, 2009; Wang and Bu, 2004). The proximity to terrorist threats or other high crime and violence is a serious stressor associated with negative work-related outcomes (Howie, 2007; Mainiero and Gibson, 2003; Ramirez et al., 2016; Reade, 2009).
Although a plethora of researchers have studied the consequences of hostile environments (HE) and have focused on domestic work contexts (Beutell et al., 2017), little is known about international work settings. Understanding the various factors and stakeholders contributing or hindering expatriation success is critical for organizations. It is not only their responsibility to ensure the safety and well-being of their employees, but also better management of expatriation into HEs should be seen as an important prerequisite to recruiting, deploying and retaining internationally mobile staff (AXA's World of Work Report, 2017; Claus, 2011). Being a timely issue of practical relevance might explain recent increases in empirical studies focussing on the nexus of HEs and international work.
Expatriation, regardless of context, is a professional endeavour that involves stakeholders other than the expatriate and the assigning organization. Stakeholders here play a major role in the success or failure of assignments (Takeuchi, 2010). Although many studies have identified relevant stakeholders, a systematic mapping of important stakeholders and their stakes in the assignment process is lacking for traditional expatriation (Hippler and Morley, 2017) but also in HEs. Because of this and the fact that research has been carried out at multiple levels (Bader et al., 2019a), we apply a multi-stakeholder perspective (Takeuchi, 2010) and develop a framework that captures key stakeholders...