1 / 25

Culture and Differences in Culture

Culture and Differences in Culture. Chapter Three. Last week: Political economy. Political systems: They differ radically from one country to the next The ease of doing business varies with the system You have to understand the rules where you are

magee-valdez
Download Presentation

Culture and Differences in Culture

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Culture and Differences in Culture Chapter Three

  2. Last week: Political economy • Political systems: They differ radically from one country to the next • The ease of doing business varies with the system • You have to understand the rules where you are • Level and nature of economic development also differs radically from one place to the next • Gross National Income (GNI) and Purchasing Power Parity GNI measure the differences

  3. Today: Culture and cultural differences

  4. What is Culture? “The collective programming of the mind which distinguishes one human group from another” - Hofstede

  5. Components of Culture:One standard approach • Values – basic attitudes about what is important • Norms – social rules • Society

  6. Culture, Society, and the Nation State • There is not a strict one-to-one correspondence between a society and a nation state • Nation State: • Is a political creation • May contain a single culture or several cultures • Canada • India • Multi-tribal African nations

  7. Societies contain subcultures • ethnic cultures • business or professional cultures

  8. The Determinants of Culture

  9. Social Structure • Social structure refers to its basic social organization • Two dimensions that are particularly important include: • The extent to which society is group or individuallyoriented • Degree of stratification into castes or classes

  10. Religious and Ethical Systems • Religion: a system of shared beliefs and rituals that are concerned with the realm of the sacred • Ethical systems: a set of moral principles, or values, that are used to guide and shape behavior • Most of the world’s ethical systems are the product of religions • Among the thousands of religions in the world today, four dominate in terms of numbers of adherents: • Christianity with 1.7 billion adherents • Islam with 1 billion adherents • Hinduism with 750 million adherents • Buddhism with 350 million adherents

  11. Religious and Ethical Systems

  12. Religions are hugely important, but Prof. Hill may not be too expert on them • I am not holding you responsible for the information about specific religions on pp.96-105 • But the sidebars on ‘Islamic capitalism’ and ‘McDonald’s and Hindu culture’ illustrate well how religion interacts with business

  13. Language • Spoken • Verbal cues • Language structures perception of world • Unspoken • Body language • Personal space

  14. Be alert for unexpected meanings of ‘silent language’ • Colors • Blacksymbolizes death in U.S. • White indicates death in Asia • Purple indicates death in (some situations in)Latin America • Gestures • Sideways head movement that means ‘yes’ in Greece looks like negative ‘no’ head shake in U.S.

  15. Culture in the Workplace • Four dimensions of culture • Power distance – the extent to which people are comfortable with inequalities of power and wealth • Uncertainty avoidance - the extent to which people accept ambiguous situations and tolerate uncertainty • Individualism versus collectivism - this dimension focuses on the relationship between the individual and his/her fellows within a culture • Masculinity versus femininity - this dimension looks at the relationship between gender and work roles

  16. Work-Related Values for20 Selected Countries

  17. Problems with Hofstede • Assumes one-to-one relationship between culture and the nation state • Research may have been culturally bound • Survey was of IBM employees, conducted by Europeans and Americans • Survey respondents were from a single industry (computer) and a single company (IBM)

  18. Other scholars have proposed many other dimensions of culture, but none have been shown more significant than the first three Hofstede developed

  19. Cultural Change • Culture evolves over time • Since 1960s American values toward the role of women have changed • Japan moved toward greater individualism in the workplace • Globalization will continue to impact cultures around the world

  20. Managerial Implications • Cross-cultural literacy • You need to understand differences between cultures • Culture and competitive advantage • Some cultures make business easier than others • Culture and business ethics • As we’ll see, cultural differences create big ethical issues

  21. Looking Ahead to Chapter 4 • Ethics in International Business • Ethical Issues in International Business • Ethical Dilemmas • The Roots of Unethical Behavior • Philosophical Approaches to Ethics • Ethical Decision Making

More Related