Culture and the desire to study it
It is difficult to imagine a time at which human beings were entirely satisfied with the conditions of their lives. It is equally hard, if not impossible, to conceive of a state of affairs either natural or cultural to which every person or group would give its unqualified assent. In fact, the most archaic narratives from mythologies to founding religious texts, to the earliest histories of world civilizations, are full of conflict, opposition, and revolt against established order. Since the beginnings of documented human association, human culture and its implicit critique seem to have developed hand in hand. While the discourse of philosophy and that of cultural critique have not always been identical throughout human history, traditions nonetheless can be traced to a common set of fundamental concerns. They also share certain important assumptions and terminological distinctions, and they have borrowed insights, concepts, and methods from one another. Especially at the level of methodology and operative concepts, each tradition have always intersected in certain areas, at times to a greater or lesser degree depending on the specific approaches in question and the particular historical period being considered (Surber, 1998).
Most of all, however, for neither philosophy nor cultural critique can the received views of common sense or general opinion be taken at face value: No culture can be regarded as self-justifying in the face of theoretical inquiry and no human institution can be considered immune to change through further human activity. Perhaps the most significant implication of these developments for the understanding of culture is that the meaning of the term has come to be increasingly discourse specific rather than discipline- or theory-specific. It is probably now more informative to know in what discursive practice a given author or researcher is engaged than to ask with what discipline they are involved, of which academic department they are a member, or what particular subject matter interests the researcher (Surber, 1998).
Postmodern mainstream or appreciative cultural studies are an emergent institutional and cultural form that facilitates the required liberal modifications of pedagogical and other institutions. Its post disciplinarity corresponds to the postmodern liberal politics of identity, which requires modes of knowledge flexible enough to manage the contradictions of post-welfare state capitalism. This argument, however, should not be read as supporting the existing disciplines, which is to say the existing intellectual division of labor and segmentation of knowledge (Katz, 2000). If explanation or theory only extends to the point at which identities are affirmed unproblematically, thereby allowing the category of experience to be introduced, then it becomes possible to produce flexible institutional sites that can reconcile opposition with the needs of dominant institutions in a populist manner, leading to merely local changes (Katz, 2000). Culture is the way people, nations or organizations live. The study of culture revolves around the patterns of global activity. The desire to study culture created an interest on people such as Globe and Hofstede to publish studies on culture and dimensions of it.
Hofstede and his 5 dimensions
The worldwide investigations of work-related attitudes by Hofstede have resulted in the identification of five dimensions: individualism-collectivism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity –femininity and long term vs. short term orientation. These dimensions have been extended to a variety of other contexts that include social interaction, teacher-pupil relationships; expression of mental disorder and experience of psychotherapy Individualism-collectivism has acquired its own momentum and is being actively investigated as a major variable of social psychology between and within cultures (Draguns, Lee & McCauley, 1999) Personality variables, identified within a culture, could be applied in cross-cultural comparisons. Conversely, dimensions derived in multicultural research projects could be investigated for their relevance and usefulness closer to the home base. They could be useful for within-culture investigations of individual differences (Draguns, Lee & McCauley, 1999).
The collectivist versus individualist contrast does not constitute the only source of difference in culturally mediated self-experience Hofstede has made unusual efforts to elaborate the conceptual nature of his dimensions. Such extensions have also been made by others (Draguns, Lee & McCauley, 1999). Individualist cultures are those where individuals are loosely connected, and everyone looks after their own interests or those of their immediate family. Individualists have personal goals that might or might not overlap with those of their in-groups, but where there is a conflict, they put their personal goals first People in individualistic societies feel autonomous, and members of these societies emphasize their desire to look only for themselves. In such cultures the stress is on an individual’s goals, while emotional dependency is emphasized and people prefer a loosely-knit social framework. Individuals in such societies are keen to detach themselves from family, community and religion: they change friends and marital partners readily, while rational principles and norms form the basis of interaction. In collectivist societies, the group is all-important, and there is a need for group solidarity and shared activity .The group now dominates, obligations and duties can override personal preferences (Goodwin, 1999).
While collectivist societies are keen to protect and aid their in-group members, they are not necessarily so helpful to those outside this group. Group boundaries are explicit and firm, with collectivism representing in-group egoism. Relationships are of prime importance, even when they are personally very costly and marriage links families, rather than just mere individuals. A second of Hofstede’s dimensions, power distance, is also widely discussed in the cross-cultural literature. Power distance represents the extent to which members of a society accept that power in institutions and organizations is distributed unequally and examines prevailing norms of inequality within a culture and the degree of respect and deference given to those in superior positions. People in high distance cultures see power as a basic fact of society, and stress coercive power. Those in low distance societies believe power should be only used when it is legitimate. Hofstede’s third dimension, masculinity versus femininity, reflects a preference for achievement, heroism, assertiveness, and material success as opposed to a preference for relationships, modesty, caring for the weak, and the quality of life. Masculinity/femininity concerns the relative emphasis on achievement and interpersonal harmony, and is concerned with the social implications of being male or female. Feminine cultures stress quality of life, nurturance, warm personal relationships and fluid sex roles. In masculine cultures competition, success and performance are more prevalent values, and there is a greater emphasis on sex-role differentiation (Goodwin, 1999).
Hofstede’s fourth dimension, uncertainty avoidance, reflects the extent to which members of a culture feel threatened by uncertain or unknown situations. In high uncertainty avoidance cultures, what is different is dangerous: in low uncertainty avoidance cultures, what is different is curious. Uncertainty avoidance concerns planning and stability as a way of dealing with life’s uncertainties: those high on uncertainty avoidance have a strong desire for consensus, and deviant behavior is unacceptable. The last dimension is long vs. short term orientation, in this orientation the focus is on society’s time horizon. In this dimension the study is focused on determining the importance being attached to the future compared to a nation’s past and present state. The issues being resolved in this dimension includes persistence, shame and others (Goodwin, 1999). Hofstede’s dimension of culture came from his cross cultural studies. The dimensions were able to give its own division of cultures and its differences or similarities.
Why did Hofstede group some countries together?
Difference theory has only arisen as a self-conscious idea within the last few decades. Socially and politically it has often appeared under the rubric of multicultural and identitarian debate. However, its relation with multiculturalism still remains unclear. Some have seen it as a radical option within multiculturalism; for others it is simply a synonym for multiculturalism; others, again, use it as a synonym for the more capacious concept of pluralism. The idea of multiculturalism has made increasing inroads over the last three decades. It made its first hesitant appearance in Australia, New Zealand and Canada during the 1970s, particularly with changes in immigration laws (Haddock & Sutch, 2003). Multiculturalism begin to make a critical appearance in European debate after 1989, though whether this is the same idea as appears in North America or Australia is a contentious point. Nevertheless, some still see the lifetime of effectual multicultural politics as comparatively short (Haddock & Sutch, 2003).
Multicultural environment creates a society that can have different opinions and ideas on how to do certain things. The multicultural environment provides the society an opportunity to mix various cultures to create a better culture. The colleagues and customers from different cultures provide ideas and inputs unknown to the group. They provide newer ideas that can help a group or society survive in its changing environment. The colleagues and customers from different cultures should be treated with appropriate amounts of fairness and respect. As in many areas debated by technocrats, the idea that the language to be maintained or planned suffers from inherent deficits is very widespread. These deficits are usually framed in terms of those criteria which in the past were used to distinguish languages from dialects or patois. The latter often lacked a proper name, a writing system, standardization, were incapable of expressing modern ideas, and lacked political power and/or official recognition. To maintain languages, it is argued, one needs to equip them with all the paraphernalia that real languages have (Mühlhäusler, 1996).
A multilingual nation could not afford fully to develop languages and it would quite simply be beyond the powers even of an affluent country with a much smaller number of languages, such as Australia, to afford a program of this type. There are more favorable conditions in formerly monolingual countries such as Fiji or New Zealand (Mühlhäusler, 1996). Having various culture and language in a country can be a good for bad thing for studies, depending on what is the purpose of the study. To gather more information for his studies, Hofstede tried to group some countries together; he determined the qualities of every country and set it apart with other countries having the same qualities. Hofstede grouped some countries together because he wanted to compare and analyze the culture of countries that can speak the same language. For him it was easier to group together countries that speak the same or at least similar languages. The groupings helped Hofstede determine similar and different characteristics of various countries that share the same language. The groupings helped Hofstede compare the countries speaking with a similar language but a different culture.
Globe and its studies
The Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness (GLOBE) research program was initiated in 1993 as a cross-cultural investigation of leadership and national culture. The primary objectives of the project were to determine the universal and culture-specific leader behaviors and organizational practices that contribute to effective leadership; the influence of societal and organizational culture on effective and universally accepted leader behaviors; and the effect of violations of cultural norms relating to leader behaviors and organizational practices. To date, the project has brought together about 170 investigators from 62 countries in a unique cooperative research effort (Murphy, Pirozzolo & Riggio, 2002). In the course of the past five years, data have been collected from approximately 17,000 individuals in 825 organizations in three industries. It is noteworthy that GLOBE is an investigation primarily of organizational leadership, and not leadership in general. At the first conference of GLOBE in 1994 at the University of Calgary, Canada, co-investigators from 38 countries concurred on a definition of leadership as the ability of an individual to influence, motivate, and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of organizations of which they are members (Murphy, Pirozzolo & Riggio, 2002).
Globe or Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness program was made to study leadership that is affected by culture. Leadership can affect the organization and the way it moves to achieve its goal. With poor leadership and leadership styles the company tends to have a harder chance to achieve its goals. The leadership styles vary upon the characteristics of different individual in a firm. A person’s leadership style may not conform to the criteria of the subordinates. In using leadership styles one must first know how to influence the subordinates so that together they can work to achieve their goal. Leaders still have to be equipped with communication skills for them to help a company achieve its goal. Leadership skills help in directing the company into a better path. Leadership is an important skill needed by managers. These concepts help the managers to maintain order in the organization. With leadership and communication skills the managers can ease any internal problems and they can make sure that the subordinates stay in line.
Leadership helps the managers to analyze the problems of the company and find immediate solutions to it. Through leadership skills the manager can find solution for the dismal performance by the subordinates. Lastly Leadership helps the manager determine actions that can counter threats from competitors. Communication skills give the manager a way to know possible threats from competitors. Leadership skills give the manager ideas on how to counter these threats. For GLOBE leadership can be affected by one’s culture and principles. The GLOBE studies aims to prove that transformational leadership can be used to make one an outstanding leader. GLOBE’s findings prove that there are universal characteristics such as Integrity, charisma, and being one with the group. These characteristics are used for one to be a good leader.
Limitations on the studies of GLOBE and Hofstede
The studies of Hofstede and has limitations, one is the small use of samples. The samples were not enough to prove that the results were representative and general to the all nations studied. Time was a limitation because the culture of the nation studied would have changed over some other time. The result of the study that is based on the culture of the nation at a certain time cannot be the same with the result at another time. One of the major problems for the study is getting negative feedbacks from the participants. Some of the people might accept the purpose of the study but some might be offended by it (Barrick, Ryan & Schmitt, 2003). Some people might also question the importance of the study to their organization or the country they live in. Another problem for the study is to create changes not all people would be willing to accept. Not all people can accept sudden changes in a short span of time.
How the studies would be done differently
The studies would be done differently through taking a look at a larger number of respondents in a country. This would reduce the questions of the validity of the study; this would also strengthen the results of the study. Getting a larger number of respondents in a country would entail a much appropriate figure on the data (Anderson 1998). The study would be done differently through focusing on cultural traits that are more prevalent, this would make the data needed easier to find and it would lessen the time used in gathering data.
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