Here’s what I mean: if I have a universalist orientation, that fact alone can make me insensitive to cultural difference. If I’m universalist, I will tend to believe there’s one set of principles to live by — everywhere in the world. That is a stance that undermines what intercultural sensitivity is all about.

This shows up all over the world when universalists are present. Think of imperialism and colonialism: it’s no accident that the main perpetrators have been nations with largely universalist orientations.

Universalists can be slow to see a need for intercultural consulting, coaching and training. What value could these services possibly add, if things are the same the world over? Or, in a weaker version: if everyone in the world wants the same things?

In his insightful book Business Leadership in China, Frank Gallo offers the following from Yi Min, Director of Global Leadership and Organization Development, Lenovo Group:

[For] foreigners to be successful here, they must understand Chinese culture and learn to incorporate the wisdom from this ancient culture into their business practices. Foreign leaders who just try to impose their Western practices here will be seen as arrogant and foolish and they will not succeed. Quoted in Frank Gallo, Business Leadership in China: How to Blend Best Western Practices with Chinese Wisdom, Singapore: Wiley, 2008, p. 24.

Unfortunately many Westerners do simply assume that there is just one way to manage, and it can be hard to convince them otherwise. Even the top management experts of the West are far from immune, according to Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner:

Management gurus like Frederick Taylor, Henri Fayol, Peter Drucker, Mike Hammer, James Champy and Tom Peters have one thing in common: they all gave the impression, consciously or unconsciously, that there was one best way to manage and to organize. (Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Diversity in Global Business, Second Edition, New York: McGraw Hill, 1998, pp. 13-14.)

Therefore, if there is one “dimension of culture” for Westerners to identify and work on first, it might be on loosening our default universalist standards in favor of a more particularist perspective, which will open up the possibility for genuine intercultural understanding.

All societies give certain of their members higher status than others, signaling that unusual attention should be focused upon such people and their activities. While some societies accord status to people on the basis of their achievements, others ascribe it to them by virtue of age, class, gender education, and so on. The first kind of status is called achieved status and the second ascribed status. (Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Diversity in Global Business, Second Edition, New York: McGraw Hill, 1998, p. 105. Emphasis in original.)

One of the probes used to get at this difference is the following statement, which participants were asked to answer with a number from 1 (“strongly agree”) to 5 (“strongly disagree”):

The most important thing in life is to act in the ways that best suit the way you really are, even if you do not get things done. (p. 107)

The percentage of participants disagreeing with the statement (i.e., answering 4 or 5) for China is 28, and for the U.S. 75 (p. 108).

Americans are conditioned to evaluate people based on what they accomplish. While race, class, gender, and other social categories matter a lot, as they do everywhere, the expressed ideal that we are all “created equal” carries great cultural weight. “Created equal” means equal opportunity — to get things done.

Americans chafe at the notion that someone would be accorded status based on factors unrelated to accomplishing things. What does it matter that you went to a fancy school, or have a flashy pedigree? Prove to me who you are by showing me what you can get done.

In China, factors such as age, gender, and rank matter much more than they do in the U.S. Hierarchies are more rigid. This causes problems for Americans who either aren’t aware of this, or who stubbornly resist it.

Societies which conduct business have developed two major orientations towards nature. They either believe that they can and should control nature by imposing their will upon it, as in the ancient biblical injunction “multiply and subdue the earth”, or they believe that man is part of nature and must go along with its laws, directions and forces. The first of these orientations we shall describe as inner-directed.…The second [as] outer-directed.… (Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Diversity in Global Business, Second Edition, New York: McGraw Hill, 1998, p. 145. Emphasis in original.)

Differences between the U.S. and China show up starkly in responses to the following:

A. What happens to me is my own doing.

B. Sometimes I feel that I do not have enough control over the directions my life is taking.

The percentage of people answering A is 39 for China (second only to Venezuela, at 33) and 82 for the U.S. (fourth highest after Norway (86), Israel (88), and Uruguay (88)). That’s a pretty big difference, and it plays out all across the board when Americans are doing business in China. To take but one major example, see these earlier posts on contracts: it’s hopeless and counterproductive to think we can control the future, which is in essence what a contract seeks to do. This difference also shows up frequently in people’s explanations for why things do or don’t happen.

For instance, one of our children’s caregivers once didn’t show up at a certain place and time to meet our family. Frustrated, I called her to find out what had happened. Her explanation was that “Beijing has a lot of intersections.” How could she be expected to find the right one? Of course my “inner-directed” American brain went nuts, seeing this as merely an excuse, and a lousy one at that.

The problem for the American in China is that our inner-directedness is just one particular way of thinking of things. Be ready for explanations that seem odd, even maddening. Using words like “unaccountable” or “irresponsible” will get you nowhere. Showing anger will only set you back. Instead, work hard to see an outer-directed orientation as a legitimate way of viewing the world, on equal footing with yours.

There are no quick and easy prescriptions here. One thing is certain, though: your chances of success will be much greater if you’re ready for this than if you’re not.

The dimension is called “specific” versus “diffuse,” with Americans toward the “specific” side and Chinese toward the “diffuse” side. The metaphor of a peach versus a coconut helps explain the dimension.

Think of a peach. Its soft flesh makes it easy to cut into and to separate into “specific” areas. This is meant to capture two things. First, that it’s easy to make entry into the life of someone from a “specific” culture — though not too deeply, as you’ll soon run into the pit. Second, that people from “specific” cultures tend to have many distinct groups of people that they do different things with, with some but overall little overlap: your golf buddies, the people you work with, etc. Americans, as “specific” people, thus end up having relatively superficial relationships with a large number of people — just as Francis Hsu and Fei Xiaotong noted about America.

The “diffuse” coconut is hard to crack. Once you’re in, though, you’re in everywhere. Diffuse cultures tend to mix business and personal. If you’re in my in-group, you’re in my in-group, period, regardless whether the relationship began as a work relationship or as a personal relationship. Relationships are hard to get going, but once they’re going, they go deep — just as Francis Hsu and Fei Xiaotong noted about China.

If you’re an American in China, and if you’re not prepared for these differences, you’re liable to make serious missteps. The divide between “business” and “personal” that we like to keep hermetic in the U.S. is much more porous in China. You will find yourself being invited to social functions that might not seem appropriate for business. Remembering that China is “diffuse,” and that your Americanness has trained you to be “specific,” can help you overcome your automatic resistance to such affairs, and help you succeed in China.

As with any of these dimensions, we shouldn’t take them too seriously by themselves. They’re best thought of as useful guidelines that capture high-level differences among cultures.

Fei, whom we heard from once before, spent academic year 1943-44 in the United States, during the closing phase of World War II. He observed that America is a “land without ghosts,” which became the title of a collection of essays by Chinese visitors to the U.S. (Land Without Ghosts: Chinese Impressions of America from the Mid-Nineteenth Century to the Present, ed. R. David Arkush and Leo O. Lee, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1989). His own childhood, filled with ghosts, stood in stark contrast to ghostless America. He wrote:

How could a ghost gain a foothold in American cities? People move about like the tide, unable to form permanent ties with places, to say nothing of other people.…

Outside the family there is certainly much social intercourse, but dealings with people are always in terms of appointments. On my office desk is an appointment calendar marked in fifteen-minute intervals with a space for a person’s name beside each. Apart from business there are various kinds of gatherings, but if you go to one you will find it is no more than social pleasantries: a few words with this person, a few words with that one — it is hard even to remember their names. I cannot say all Americans pass their lives like this. But I once asked a fairly close acquaintance how many friends he had whom he could drop in on at any time without a previous engagement. Counting on his fingers, he did not fill one hand.…

…[Americans'] movements are so easy and they have contacts with so many people, that there seldom comes about the kind of relationship I had with my grandmother, living interdependently for a long time, repeating the same scenes, so that these scenes came to seem an inalterable natural order. Always being on the move dilutes the ties between people and dissolves the ghosts.…

In a world without ghosts, life is free and easy. American eyes can gaze straight ahead. But still I think they lack something and I do not envy their lives. (pp. 179-181)

If we combine this with the notion, from last Friday’s post, that culture goes extremely deep within us, we get a picture of Americans as thoroughly conditioned to form a certain kind of fleeting relationship with a great many individuals over a lifetime. We will naturally import these habits into our dealings with China, and this gets us into trouble.

In 1971, anthropologist Francis Hsu published the intimidatingly titled “Psychosocial Homeostasis and Jen: Conceptual Tools for Advancing Psychological Anthropology” (American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 73, No. 1, pp. 23-44). In the essay he sketches out a model for understanding differences between the psychologies of Chinese and Westerners.

He uses this image (p. 25) to make his point:

Hsu places special emphasis on Layer 3:

The need for Layer 3 is literally as important as his requirement for food, water and air. This is what basically gives the individual his sense of well being. Sudden loss of inhabitants in Layer 3 may be so traumatic as to lead to aimlessness and to suicide. (p. 29)

Hsu goes on to claim that through the development of intimate family ties, the Chinese have an abundance of Layer 3 companions, leading to “psychosocial homeostasis” — a state of relative stability and contentment.

He contrasts this with Westerners, whom he sees as having few people in their Layer 3. Instead, most Westerners have a relatively rich Layer 1 and Layer 2, and they will recruit people into their Layer 3. The problem is that these relationships are naturally unstable; as a result, Westerners have difficulty populating their Layer 3, leading to a general lack of psychosocial homeostasis. Hsu claims many effects of this, including the Western need to conquer.

While the claims may be a bit grandiose, I’ve found this a useful framework. What I like most about Hsu’s model is that it gives us something more concrete and explanatory than a broad cover term like “collectivism.” It’s not just that “Chinese are group-minded.” It’s more nuanced than that, and Hsu shows us how. The model also seems to explain a number of Chinese behaviors that I found confusing when I first arrived in China. I could never understand why, for instance, nobody seemed to do anything alone. Didn’t they value their personal time? And why wouldn’t they leave me alone when I was shooting baskets late in the evening? I deduced that for the Chinese, “alone” meant “lonely.”

In the intervening years I’ve gained much more appreciation for the Chinese love of company. When in China I’m still pulled at times by my automatic American hermiting instincts. But when I can push through those, the rewards of the human connection are great and enduring. This is a lesson for all of us from the West who have business in China.

]]> http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/09/17/ph-balance/feed/ 6 http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/09/16/now-thats-what-i-call-individualism/ http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/09/16/now-thats-what-i-call-individualism/#comments Thu, 17 Sep 2009 01:25:10 +0000 Jason Patent http://www.jasonpatent.com/?p=799 On an email list I subscribe to, we’ve been discussing stereotypes, and how Americans often conflate “generalization” with “stereotype,” leading to a reluctance to talk about groups at all, for fear of dishonoring individuality. Back when I was designing a research project several years ago, I wanted to look into differing ways Chinese and Americans had of thinking and talking about racial categories. Given my experience in China of people freely sharing their opinions about the traits of China’s ethnic groups, I felt free to ask whatever I wanted. So I created a question in Chinese. Back-translated into English, it goes:

China is a multi-ethnic country, consisting of Han, Mongolian, Hui, Tibetan, and many other ethnic minorities. Do you believe that the abilities and natures of all ethnic groups are the same?

中国是一个多民族国家,象汉,蒙,回,藏,以及各个少数民族。你觉得每个民族的能力和天性都一样吗?

As I expected, these (highly educated) natives of China dove right into China’s different ethnic groups and all the stereotypes that are commonly held about the groups.

With the Americans I felt the need for kid gloves. It’s just not okay to be explicit about racial stereotypes in the U.S., or even to admit their existence — especially on a college campus. So instead of translating the Chinese question into English, I came up with a new, very different question in English:

There are stereotypes about certain ethnic groups in the United States. Some claim, for instance, that because few African Americans play volleyball, that this says something about abilities possessed by certain ethnic groups. Is there any truth to such stereotypes?

It’s almost painful to read. It feels like I’m literally walking on eggshells, carrying a tray of the finest crystal champagne glasses filled to the rim with Dom Pérignon. And sure enough, even with this ginger wording, the Americans were halting and hesitant in their discussions. For example:

A: Each person has talents that they can contribute to a body.

B: Right. More of an individualist…instead of having a broad label of being a part of a certain ethnic group, it’s more that each person brings a certain set of skills or interests to the table.

A: Yeah, and that each one is unique, not that we have to include everyone in every particular aspect of life, because that’s not where each individual person fits.

B: The way to look at it would be, you know, to basically, to break away this whole concept of the ethnic group. You’d have to look at people as having their own separate sense of values, or each individual as having a sense of special value, or interests. Everyone’s different in that sense, yeah.

I’ve written plenty about individualism, and I’ve called into question the sacred cow that Americans are “individualist” and Chinese are “collectivist.” Here, though, I think there’s a lot of validity to the claim that Americans are “individualist.” It’s meant in a very specific sense: the American belief — faith, really — that each human being has something unique to contribute to the world, and that this uniqueness must be honored (see also earlier posts on dreams). This sense of individualism is so strong that, as we can see from the excerpt, even the notion of group membership can be deemed offensive.

Now, there are all sorts of issues that come up as far as the eggshells go, and the equating of “stereotype” with “generalization.” That’s worth addressing another time.

]]> http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/09/16/now-thats-what-i-call-individualism/feed/ 0 http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/08/25/still-dreamin/ http://www.jasonpatent.com/2009/08/25/still-dreamin/#comments Tue, 25 Aug 2009 04:10:20 +0000 Jason Patent http://www.jasonpatent.com/?p=454 Dreams are, as I claimed near the end of last Friday’s post, alive and well in China. If we needed any more evidence that dreams hold appeal in China as they do in the U.S., we’ve got some. First, this piece from Time, about lawyer Xu Zhiyong, who was arrested under false-seeming pretenses, and has just recently been released.

The original Chinese Esquire series referenced in the Time piece is here (in Chinese only). It seems Chinese Esquire is using the power of dreams, along with fashion photography, to narrate a thoroughly modern Chinese man.

This kind of “modernity” highlights the shift, in certain young and “fashionable” circles in China, to a more future-based orientation. Dreams are by definition grounded in the future. The “pragmatic” aspects of Chinese culture in which we find resistance to dreams are, in contrast, based in the past: long and bitter experience has shown that the whims of the world can and do thwart the best of human intention and effort.

In an earlier post I wrote of Hoftede’s concept of “time orientation.” I mention it here because the drag of China’s deep past upon dreams can be formidable. And still we have the portraits in Chinese Esquire of China’s modern dreamers. No wonder so many Westerners return from China scratching their heads at the contradictions and the complexity. And while what I’m about to say is to some degree true of every place, and while I’m not nearly the first to say it, China defies all our efforts to put it into tidy boxes.

Not only do the Chinese feel no interest in that which belongs to the “public,” but all such property, if unprotected and available, is a mark for theft. Paving-stones are carried off for private use, and square rods of the brick facing to city walls gradually disappear. A wall enclosing a foreign cemetery in one of the ports of China was carried away till not a brick remained, as soon as it was discovered that the place was in charge of no one in particular. It is not many years since an extraordinary sensation was caused in the Imperial palace in Peking by the discovery that extensive robberies had been committed on the copper roofs of some of the buildings within the forbidden city. (Arthur H. Smith, Chinese Characteristics, New York: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1896, p. 111)

What could be more “collective” than “the public”? What could be more “individualist” than neglecting “the public” in favor of “the self”? The complexity of culture can boggle the mind. We just need to be sure we minimize the bad decisions we make as a result.

A society with a differential mode of association is composed of webs woven out of countless personal relationships. To each knot in these webs is attached a specific ethical principle. For this reason, the traditional moral system was incapable of producing a comprehensive moral concept.…

The degree to which Chinese ethics and laws expand and contract depends on a particular context and how one fits into that context. I have heard quite a few friends denounce corruption, but when their own fathers stole from the public, they not only did not denounce them but even covered up the theft. Moreover, some went so far as to ask their fathers for some of the money made off the graft, even while denouncing corruption in others. When they themselves become corrupt, they can still find comfort in their “capabilities.” In a society characterized by a differential mode of association, this kind of thinking is not contradictory. In such a society, general standards have no utility. The first thing to do is to understand the specific context: Who is the important figure, and what kind of relationship is appropriate with that figure? Only then can one decide the ethical standards to be applied in that context. (From the Soil: The Foundations of Chinese Society: A translation of Fei Xiaotong’s Xiangtu Zhongguo, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992, pp. 78-9. Translated by Gary G. Hamilton and Wang Zheng.)

Westerners in China will fail if you adhere rigidly to your universalist moral standards. If you can’t complexify how you relate to ethics, China is not for you. This emphatically does not mean that you must “sell your soul” or do anything you find repugnant. But it is true that you must consciously and consistently be willing to question many of your most deeply held beliefs, and walk a very fine line between remaining 100% “true to yourself” and doing things you might regret. There are no easy answers. But a bone-deep commitment to success will go a long way toward revealing that fine line and helping you walk it.