Rethinking the Cultural-Negotiation Link
Robert J. Janosik
Robert J. Janosik
This article is about 4 ways to analyze negotiation culture.
Culture as Learned Behavior
Developing valid generalizations
Often focuses on what negotiators do, rather than what they think
Little analysis of when, why and how
Good for producing a list of do's and don't
Culture as a Shared Value
Begin with a description of a controlling concept or value assumed to be embedded in the culture and derive from that observation a series of predictions about how a participant in that culture will behave in negotiation
Thinking precedes action, and one's thinking patterns derive from one's cultural context
Search for a central cultural value that distinguished a group
id est: "amae" – indulgent dependency, "wa" – the maintenance of harmony, and "shinyo" gut feeling are some of the components of the Japanese value set
Soviet and Chinese communists are seen as deceptive, dissimulated, ridgid, non-accommodating, and hostel
Good for producing a list of do's and don't
Culture as a Dialect
Looks more at individual variation and changes over time
i.e. Japanese negotiation style (probe/push/panic)
Allows for the resolution of several persistent questions concerning the observed lack of uniformity in the negotiating behavior among the participants of a particular culture
More academic
Culture – in –Context
Most complex
Reflects the cominant current understanding of the relationship between behavior and ideas
"System theorists" say human behavior cannot rest on single causes, but several interdependent sources must be accounted before achieving relatively complete understanding of human behavior
The individual's personality, culture, values, age, gender, religion, and social context…
Very academic
