Session 3: Describing Culture PDF

Session 3: Describing culture Culture is shared, learned, systematic and organized. In this tutorial, we investigate what this means and how culture is expressed in ways of doing, thinking, and being. We also look into the differences and similarities of national cultures and organizational cultures...

Session 3: Describing culture Culture is shared, learned, systematic and organized. In this tutorial, we investigate what this means and how culture is expressed in ways of doing, thinking, and being. We also look into the differences and similarities of national cultures and organizational cultures and how these interact. Chapter 2 Goals of the chapter: 1. Explain the concept of culture 2. Outline the characteristics of societal culture 3. Illustrate the sources of societal culture 4. Discuss the debates around the concept of culture 5. Express the relationship of culture to social groups PARTICIPATE, AND THAT'S AN ORDER! Cultural background may influence the attitudes and behavior of individuals. While this affects everyone who lives with people from other cultures around them - and that is virtually everyone on the planet - it especially affects international managers, who must constantly interact with and make decisions involving multiple others from different cultures. In chapter 1, we suggest that culture has a broad influence on how international managers see their world, on what they do, and on what others expect of them. But what exactly is culture? ★ Culture consists of patterned ways of thinking, feeling and reacting, acquired and transmitted mainly by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievement of human groups, including their embodiment in artifacts; the essential core of culture consists of traditional (i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and especially their attached values. ★ Culture affects the psychology of individuals. It is demonstrated in shared ways of doing things, unstated assumptions, tools, norms, values, habits and so on. It affects how people perceive the world and their social contacts, beliefs, attitudes, roles and values. ○ Values: a person's principles and beliefs about what is important in life. ○ Roles: the expected behavior associated with a particular situation or position in a group. FEATURES OF CULTURE Based on these definitions, we can begin to understand how cultural issues influence global management. THREE main characteristics of culture Culture is SHARED Culture is LEARNED Culture is SYSTEMATIC and ORGANIZED Culture Is Shared A first characteristic of culture is that it is shared by members of a particular group. Shared in this case, means that most members have similar mental programs enabling them to immediately understand the basic values, norms or logics that underlie what is acceptable in a society. For example when the US national anthem is played, US people know how to stand and where to put their hands. Logic: A particular mode of reasoning viewed as valid Culture affects mental programming at an intermediate level based on experiences shared within a particular Society. This does not mean that everyone in a society knows everything about it, not that people from the same culture will behave identically. In contrast to cultural norms, there are assertive people in Japan and shy people in the US. Culture is only one of the number of factors that affect how people act. Some mental programming comes from universal characteristics of human nature and some from unique personalities developed through individual experiences. Three Levels of Mental Programming At the broadest level, all human beings share certain biological reactions. For example, we eat when we are hungry. At the narrowest level are the personality characteristics that are unique to each of us as individuals. Culture affects mental programming at an intermediate level based on experiences shared within a particular society. Society: An enduring and cooperating social group whose members have developed organized patterns of relationships through interaction with one another. Individuals within a society share an institution for many of these cultural understandings, an intuition that is not shared by outsiders. Members of any society are more familiar with values and understanding sthat are shown by its heroes than with those of the heroes of other societies. Individuals living in a society cannot choose whether or not they are familiar with the central cultural values and norms of their society. They learn their culture, whether they want to or not. Thus, culture is a collective phenomenon involving the mental programming that we share with others in our society. Culture Is Learned A second characteristic of culture is that it is gained through the process of interacting with the social environment (mainly other people) and learning from it. Over time, the people in a society develop patterned ways of interacting with their environment. Culture Is Systematic and Organized A third characteristic of culture is that cultures are not merely random assortments of attitudes, customs and behaviors but integrated coherent systems. Each culture is an organized system of interrelated values, attitudes, beliefs and meanings that determine behavioral responses to a cultural group’s environment, to other people and to other cultural groups. To understand a particular facet of a culture, it is necessary to understand its context. Defining Culture Our working definition is that culture is a set of knowledge structures, consisting of systems of values, norms, attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral assumptions that are shared by members of a social group (society), that are embedded in institutions, and that are learned from previous generations. Consistent with this definition, culture can be described as having three levels: artifacts and creations, values, and basic assumptions. The only part of culture above the surface is cultural artifacts, which include all the visible features of a culture such as its architecture, language technology, clothing customs, literature and music. Just below the surface are the culture’s espoused values, which are consciously held and which provide explanations for the visible features. Deep below the surface are the underlying assumptions shared by the culture, the ultimate source of values, artifacts and behavior. These basic sources shape members of the culture’s beliefs, perceptions, thoughts and feelings at an unconscious level and are taken for granted by them. Because of this, the culture’s effects are often not apparent to members and go unnoticed by international managers. Why Cultures Differ and Persist There are so many factors that contribute to cultural variation that we can’t consider them all. However, anthropologists have derived a set of assumptions about how cultures interact with the environment, and these show how societies confront and solve common problems. These characteristics are summarized in Box 2.3. ★ If international managers can understand something about how other cultures have emerged, are maintained, and are changed, they may be able to anticipate the reactions of people who have grown up in these cultures to them and to the surrounding globalizing conditions. BOX 2.3 ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT SOCIETY’S INTERACTIONS WITH THE ENVIRONMENT There are a limited number of common human problems for which all peoples at all times must find solutions. For example, every society must decide how to feed, clothe, house, and educate its people. There are a limited number of alternatives for dealing with these problems. All alternatives are available to a society at all times, but some are preferred over others. Each society has a dominant pattern of value orientations (beliefs about what is appropriate and how one should behave) but also has numerous variations or alternative patterns. In both the dominant profile and the variations there is an ordered preference for alternatives. In societies undergoing change, the ordering of preferences may not be clear. Survival and the Emergence of Cultural Norms Many cultural characteristics originally developed to aid the survival and safety of group members in their environments. Another important example is the different attitudes that people in different climates have toward time. Language Language plays a prominent role in the spreading and maintenance of cultural characteristics. Because people think in particular languages, language defines the way they view the world, determining how a society enables its members to represent their environment. Some features of language are related to how people view the world. Even the way we think about time may be influenced by language. Language, therefore, is an artifact of culture that helps to perpetuate its values, attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral routines. Because we use language to interact with others, it is powerful in shaping behavior and in perpetuating beliefs and habitual, cultural, patterns of interaction Religion and Ideology Religious traditions are closely related to cultural values. They can have a cultural influence through the content of their belief systems, the structure of their beliefs and rituals, and the identities that they promote. Identity (ies): The understanding a person has of himself or herself, their self-concept. Religious groups have long competed with countries as a basis for social identities that shape people’s choices about who they are most willing to work, trade, or fight with. Governments are often originally designed to protect a group that has a common religious and cultural history. Social identity: A person's sense of who they are, based on their group memberships. The extent to which religion influences the cultural profile of a society depends on the following: The extent to which a particular religion is dominant or state-sanctioned The importance that society places on religion The degree of religious homogeneity and fervor in the society The society’s tolerance for religious diversity Due to deeply rooted religious beliefs, international managers engaging with business people from cultures that are strongly influenced by religion may face particular difficulties in some business dealings. Although christianity has the largest number of adherents worldwide, its percentage of followers is projected to be relatively stable in the near future with Muslims and Hidus who have the higher birth rates, representing an increasing percentage of the world population. Other Factors Numerous other factors contribute to cultural variation and persistence: Climate, topography, and the indigenous economy affect traditions and behavior in the primitive heritage of modern societies, as in our previous Kikuyu of Kenya example. Proximity and topography affect the exchange of culture among societies because barriers, such as mountains and oceans, limit the potential for cross-cultural interaction. Economic systems and technology affect the exchanges between cultures and hence the transfer of culture. Political boundaries (also discussed ahead) define areas where there is more or less interaction among cultures Culture and Institutions Institutions are the structures and activities that provide stability to a society; they consist of the family, educational, economic, religious, and political systems. Institutions that support a society’s cultural orientation typically include a governing group that rewards desired behavior and punishes unacceptable behavior and organizations that teach and promote desirable behaviors. Once a cultural pattern is established, it is very resistant to change, even when surrounding circumstances change. Debates Surrounding the Concept of Culture There are a number of debates regarding the concept of culture. The issues raised are important to international managers because they affect the usefulness of the concept of culture for allowing managers to understand, explain and predict behavior in organizations. The issues in question are: National cultures The convergence or divergence of cultures Organizational cultures Cultural modification or acculturation ○ Acculturation: cultural modification of an individual, group or people by adapting to or borrowing traits from another culture. National Cultures A key factor affecting managers is the extent to which a nation has its own distinctive culture. Can we, for example, generalize about the cultural characteristics of US, German, Taiwanese and Puerto Rican people 0 or is there so much variation within each group that generalization is impossible? Multiple cultures can exist within a country and the same cultural group can span many countries. There is potential conflict between national unity and cultural fragmentation: So do national cultures really exist? A powerful argument in favor of national culture is that because nations are political entities, each has its distinctive form of government and its own legal, educational and employment relations systems, and these all reflect a cultural consensus. Additionally, most nations use one or a small number of official languages. For managers, the laws and regulations of sovereign nations govern the activities of their firms. Therefore, for international managers, understanding culture at a national level is logical. But if, for practical purposes, the concept of national culture is adopted, two major issues arise. 1. First, we may ignore the large number of subcultures that exist within some nations: In reality, differences often observed between subcultures within a country that are not obvious to the outside observer but are apparent to local nationals may be as big as differences between countries. 2. Second, we may ignore the individual variations that exist within national cultures — the effects on people of their unique life experiences, gained in various local and global cultural groups that, within a national culture, provide even more diversity. While acknowledging these differences, we nevertheless believe that understanding national culture brings advantages to the international manager. Convergence, Divergence or Equilibrium Some people believe that cultures around the world are becoming more similar. Is this true or are they becoming more different? Because national culture is related to other societal factors, such as political, legal, educational, and labor relations systems, some experts suggest that the rapid technological and economic development around the world (characterized by globalization) has a homogenizing (making more similar) effect on culture. We call this the convergence theory of national cultures — the view that all cultures are converging to be more similar. The argument that cultures are converging hinges on the fact that nations are not static but develop over time with changes such as the expansion of education, increased occupational diversity, urban intensification and mass communication. ○ Good example is the European Union which contains 27 European countries and exercice many common trade regulations , with other principles and rules across all of them An interesting response to the idea of cultural convergence has been seen in many developing countries where people take action to distinguish themselves from the West and to assert their cultural uniqueness. ○ Political leaders often worry about the growth in self-centeredness “individualism” and the erosion of civil harmony that they associate with western-style modernization. ○ This may explain why China asserts significant control over the internet and blocks websites that the government considers offensive. Mcdonaldization: even mcdonalds is limited to cultural factors - they exists almost everywhere and actually fulfill different social functions in different parts of the world Organizational versus National Culture In some ways, the social characteristics of organizations resemble the cultural characteristics of societies. This awareness came partly because it seems that the huge competitive success of Japanese organizations was due to factors of Japanese culture, such as the sense of service to others and people taking collective responsibility for performance. ○ Could this success be limited by mimicking or manipulating a culture within an organization? ○ For example, could the organization develop a set of values related to its objectives such as high levels of customer service or beliefs in the organizations vision for growth that all employes shared? The idea of an organization having its own culture raises two question about cultures and its influence: 1. How are national culture and organization culture related? a. How are they similar or different? 2. To what extent does an organizational culture moderate or negate the effect of national culture? Organizations have cultural-like qualities in that they can attract and select a subset of a society;s member who have already adopted the organization's values and socialize or indoctrinate members into the organization's way of doing things.  ★ Organizational culture involves attitude, beliefs, values and expectations that organization members hold in common and behaviors that they commonly exhibit. ★ Organizational culture is often described as an internal attribute of the organization that is socialized: To teach and enforce behavior that is acceptable to a group or society. ○ Socially constructed ○ Historically determined ○ Holistic ○ Difficult to change ★ For example: Walt Disney after his death, the values of fun and wonder that he originally developed in the Disney organization continue to be firmly established in the staff of today. We distinguish between organizational and national culture because people enter organizations after their national cultural values, attitudes, and fundamental beliefs have been developed, whereas organizational practices are learned through workplace socialization. The focus on behavioral norms - how we do things here - as the fundamental element of organizational culture demonstrates and amplifies distinction between organizational culture and societal culture. Organizational cultural practices such as goal-setting programs and workmates going out together after work have different implications depending on the national culture in which they occur. Organizational norms tell people how they should behave in a particular situation, whereas societal culture tells the inherent meaning of the situation. How compatible is organizational culture with national culture? National or societal-level culture influences the relationship of an organization’s culture to its outcomes. In summary, organizational culture is different from national culture and is composed of different elements. In addition, entry to and transmission of organizational culture occurs differently to national culture. Individuals are only partially involved with an organizational culture but are totally immersed in their national culture. Overall, the best way to consider the influence of these forces on behavior in organizations is to think of organizational norms operating within and together with societal culture Acculturation and Biculturalism Acculturation concerns the psychological and behavioral changes that people experience because of contact with different cultures, particularly people who relocate from one culture to another. Acculturation can also occur on a larger collective scale where a whole group (e.g., Turkish immigrants in the Netherlands or the nation of Japan when controlled by the United States after WWII) undergoes change.The gradual process of psychological acculturation during immigration results in changes in individuals’ behavior, identity, values, and attitudes. Acculturation: Cultural modification of an individual, group, or people by adapting to or borrowing traits from another culture. Additionally, some individuals with the experience of living in multiple cultures acculturate to such an extent that they are able to function very effectively in more than one culture. These so-called Bicultural individuals have, through living in another culture or having intensive daily interaction with people who are culturally different, developed so much cultural flexibility that they can adjust their behavior to the immediate cultural situation. Bicultural: Individuals who have dual cultural identities. A society’s culture is resistant to change and its resistance is typically too strong for a work organization to overcome. However, this does not mean that cultures are static. One way that cultures change is through the process of acculturation as large groups migrate from one society to another and mutual adjustments occur. Culture and Social Groups A key aspect of culture is that cultures are associated with specific groups of people. When we identify ourselves with a particular social group, we place boundaries around our group (ingroup) and define non members as out-groups. Groups are about differentiation. ★ In-group/out-group: Social group to which a person psychologically identifies as being a member. By contrast, an out-group is a social group with which an individual does not identify. Our membership in a cultural group helps to determine how we perceive ourselves — our self-identity — and also how others perceive us. Thus, the categorization of individuals into different groups results in a number of assumptions about both the in-group and out-group members, such as different beliefs about in-groups and out-groups, attitudes toward in-group and out-group members, and behavior directed at particular cultural groups. When categorized in a group, individuals are thought to be more similar in their beliefs and behavior, their behavior is thought to convey less information about them as individuals, and the group is believed to be more important because of their behavior than their individual characteristics. When people refer to national groups, such stereotypes of cultural groups are prevalent ○ Stereotype: A widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person.  UK citizens believe that European migrants are “taking our jobs” and getting large British welfare benefits. Categorization of individuals into different groups results in a number of assumptions about both the in-group and out-group members such as different: beliefs about in-group and out-groups attitude toward in-group and out-group members behavior directed at particular cultural groups When categorized in a group individuals are thought to be more similar in their beliefs and behavior their behavior is thought to convey less information about them as individuals the group is believed to be a more important because of their behaviot than their individual characteristics The in-group/out-group boundary that results from categorization affects how individuals select, structure and process social information. Typically, categorization results in comparison of our own group with other cultural groups resulting in intergroup bias, which can be either positive or negative but usually favors one’s own group. In-group Bias and Prejudice To maintain our self-image, we favorably compare the attributes of our own group (the in-group) with those of out-groups. Therefore, we consistently discriminate in favor of the group(s) with which we identify. Prejudiced judgments about members of out-groups relate to beliefs about the character of these groups. These often negative attitudes toward out-group members are based solely on their membership in a particular group. Ethnocentrism The attitude that reflects the categorization of cultural groups is encapsulated under the term ethnocentrism. Ethnocentrism: An attitude that one’s own cultural group is the center of everything and all other groups should be evaluated with reference to it. ○ What goes in our culture is natural and correct and what goes on in other cultures is unnatural and incorrect ○ Our own in-group customs ate universally valid ○ Our in-group norms, roles and values are correct Examples of ethnocentric attitudes in management include beliefs that the way businesses is conducted in one’s own country is the only way to be effective, that people of one;s own culture are naturally better suited to almost any management job and that the role of women in management is only correct as it exists in our own culture. Questions for discussion 1. What are the main features of any culture? 2. Where does societal culture come from? 3. Why do cultures differ and persist? 4. Some people compare culture to an iceberg, what does that mean? 5. Are societal cultures becoming more similar or more different around the world? 6. Is the concept of national culture useful for international managers? 7. What are the main differences between societal and organizational culture? 8. What does culture have to do with social groups? With our self-identity?