Cultural dimensions approach and anti-essentialist perspectives about cultural complexity (Essay Sample)

Option 1: Cultural Dimensions Approach vs. Anti-essentialist Perspectives Student’s Name Instructor’s Name Institutional Affiliation Date Option 1: Cultural Dimensions Approach vs. Anti-essentialist Perspectives Cultural Dimensions Approach In today’s world, culture is largely regarded as the way of life embraced by a group of people. However, various scholarly definitions have been embraced over the years to express culture and its meaning. Taylor (1871) defines culture as a complex entity which consists of the beliefs, art, laws, and customs, and further includes all other capabilities that are acquired by the virtue of a person being a member of a society. Bennett (1998) regards culture as shared and learned patterns of behavior, beliefs and values, while Benedict (1943) further insists that culture is not given at birth but is learned newly from the older people by each generation. There has been significant research on culture in effort to understand its relation and influence to behavior. The cultural dimensions approach is an essentialist approach on culture. According to Shaules (2007), culture leads to people behaving and acting in a specific way, making it a causal agent. Furthermore, Holliday (2000) describes people as being passive recipients of aspects of culture and they can either deviate or conform to the given and associated cultural standards. Understandably, this essentialist view contributed significantly to Geert Hofstede development of the dimensions of culture. The cultural dimensions view explains why some behaviors are more common and some less common in different cultures. Hofstede conducted a research on more than 100,000employees of multinational corporation IBM in approximately 40 countries (Jandt, 2007). Hofstede sought to explore the dimensions in or through which different cultures vary, and the concluded dimensions have been used to describe different cultures. These dimensions include: individual-collectivism, masculinity-femininity, power distance, uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation against short-term (Jandt, 2007). The different dimensions significantly explain how people in different cultures behave, and explores the values they treasure. The individualism-collectivism dimension encompasses the definition of peoples’ definition of self, and relation to others. Understandably, an individualist culture is where an individual’s interests outweigh those of a group or largely, a community. An individualist culture would have loose ties between individuals, and people are protective of their own interests thus look after their immediate families first (Jandt, 2007). Contrarily, in a collectivist culture, the group interests are more preeminent over the individual interests. The collectivist culture encompasses groups in which people are integrated and ensure loyalty to the group. Understandably, in individualist cultures, goals are set with little or no consideration to groups, but accommodation may be given to immediate family members. In individualist cultures, people are largely defined by their accomplishments, and their lifestyle. On the other hand, collectivist cultures emphasize interdependent relationships among the people. The US ranks highly in the individualism rankings while countries like Colombia and Ecuador are more collectivist (Jandt, 2007). A nation’s wealth and level of individualism are linked in that; richer countries have higher individualism levels. Countries with higher birth rates tend to embrace collectivism more. Furthermore, countries that embrace Confucianism tend to be more collectivist, while countries with cold climates tend to embrace individualism. Kim and Choi (2005) give a relationship between the individualism-collectivism and Hall’s context theory, where he determined that the high and low context communication is associated with individualism and collectivism. Masculinity vs. Femininity is also a dimension in which cultures differ. Hofstede labels masculine cultures as those that show a distinction between what men and women are expected to do. Hofstede further made an observation that women’s social roles vary slightly in various cultures compared to men’s. Most feminine cultures allow for more overlapping social roles for men and women in the society (Jandt, 2007). Masculine cultures emphasize on assertiveness, competition and material success while feminine cultures emphasize on quality of life and interpersonal relationships. In feminine cultures, women have more ‘say’ in matters number of children thus they determine family size. The dimension of power distance largely entails how much power is in the society and the distance it is distributed within the society. The dimension has it that in societies or cultures where there is less power distance, then everyone has an access to power, in comparison to societies with more power distance. In high power distance cultures, people are expected to show respect to those of higher statuses. High power distance is associated with cultures where power is concentrated among few members, and thus the societies are more authoritarian (Jandt, 2007). Countries and organizations that have high power distance, exhibit wide gaps in salaries. Large population has a link to high power distance while national wealth has lower power distance. The fourth dimension involves the discomfort experienced by people whenever they feel unclear about things or happenings. Hofstede (2009) explains that the feeling is expressed in terms of nervousness, and further establishes the need for written and unwritten rules. Cultures that have strong uncertainty avoidance are aggressive, emotional, and compulsive; while those with weak uncertainty avoidance are less aggressive, relaxed and unemotional. In cultures with high uncertainty avoidance, people are driven and focused, rules are needed and punctuality is embraced (Jandt, 2007). However, in low uncertainty avoidance cultures, only necessary rules are present and people work hard only when necessary. Long-term orientation vs. short-term orientation largely refers to how futuristic one is with goals. This dimension was advancement to Hofstede’s work which was done by Bond et al. in 1988. It was initially termed as Confucian work dynamism and includes values like persistence, thrift, and order in relationships. Having long-term orientation would see a society embrace savings, persistence and willingness to be under a chosen purpose (Hofstede & Bond, 1988). The opposite is true for short-term orientation which would see more spending due to social pressure, thus less saving among people and a preference for faster results. China ranks highly in terms of long-term orientation while countries like Nigeria rank lower (Hofstede & Bond, 1988). This can be seen in preference for fast success and the willingness to work hard among the people. Anti-essentialist Perspectives Contrary to the Hofstedan cultural dimensions approach, researchers have established other perspectives to analyze and explain the differences in various cultures. The Hofstedan understanding of culture defines and categorizes culture in the different dimensions established. However, non-essentialism views culture as a movable concept that is integrated by different people at different times to suit a particular purpose like politics and science (Holliday, 2000). From the anti-essentialist perspective various arguments are put forward against the essentialist perspective of cultural dimensions. In the understanding of this paper’s context, the Hofstedian model is used interchangeably with the cultural dimension framework, referring to the quantitative approach in which culture is measured and defined. One of the greatest arguments against the Hofstedian model is the understanding that the Hofstedian model takes the notion of national culture. National culture is a product of nationalism which was significantly prominent in the 19th century in Europe (Holliday, 2011). Therefore, national culture is a social construct, and is majorly promoted through media and education. The culture therefore can be accommodated by people who find security in it through the generalization. The major effect of this is the assumption of national homogeneity. It is inappropriate for a study to assume national uniformity, especially for and in a study that has been constantly linked to its discovery (Holliday, 2011). The fact that the members of the corporation filled their responses through questionnaires, the differences that would occur would be from the national culture differences. The respondents would ideally respond with different opinions, but they would then be treated as the repercussions of the national cultures. Therefore, the effect is a failure of analysis, and a triumph of faith directly emerging from the assumption of national culture. Another critique offered for the Hofstedian model is the method of analysis used. Hofstede’s findings emerge from analysis conducted from specific texts encompassing fixed-choice questions as questionnaires were used. Researchers raise significant questions like whether the questions were comprehensive enough or whether the questions were leading an biased towards a specific agenda. Furthermore, it is unclear on whether the various questions have a bearing on the different national cultures. Taras et al. (2009) raise concern on the data collection methods indicating that self-questionnaires have their significant weaknesses including; receiving incorrect feedback as respondents give socially desirable answers in this case they might have given responses that fit their national culture. This is especially the cases for questionnaires that ask sensitive questions. Taras et al. (2009) further argues that the total sample size in the Hofstedian research looks suitable on books, but the distribution across countries is hi...