ASSESSING THE IMPORTANCE OF CULTURE IN CONFLICT RESOLUTION
Culture permeates all components of conflict resolution such as the understanding of the problem, the choice of a strategy, and the handling of the process. However, cultural awareness, if necessary, is not enough to solve the conflict.
Going beyond this methodological postulate, some of the well- known literature on negotiation and conflict resolution such as The Art and Science of Negotiation (Raiffa, 1982) or Getting to Yes (Fisher and Ury, 1981) simply ignores culture. It is in itself an implicit judgment on how unimportant this dimension is for these authors. When considering explicit critical views on the relevance of culture as a causal variable, Zartman observes that it is often used as a convenient residual category to explain negative outcomes when nothing else works (Zartman, 1993). It also has the advantage of not putting into question the ability of the negotiator himself in case of failure.Avruch (1998) discusses this issue in contrasting two basic views on culture in conflict resolution. On the one hand, we have Burton (1987) who considers culture as unimportant because all humans have similar needs which are nonnegotiable and which humans strive to fulfill. On the other hand, we have Lederach (1995) who sees culture as providing the logic by which people reason. Kimmel, addressing cultural awareness, ascribes the cause of the phenomenon of minimization of the importance of culture to the fact that people tend to believe that basic patterns of behavior are universal because “all adult humans are in some ways basically alike” (Kimmel, 2000:162). Thus, Americans typically believe that everyone is basically alike and that people have the same essential needs as they have. Then, differences among people are believed to be individual, not cultural. This assumption is denounced by Kissinger (in Diplomacy, 1994) as “crusading universalism,” when referring to the US underlying political culture in foreign affairs (Wanis, 2005: 125).
A skeptic such as Zartman (1993: 17), considering the current state of research on international negotiation, regards the understanding of its effects on the process as “tautological, [...] and its role in the process basically epiphenomenal.” Culture tends to be defined tautologically. When culture is related to independent variables, these variables end up being cultural too. If, for instance, social structure is claimed to determine culture, at the same time, it is a cultural product. The view according to which culture has a real but feeble influence is also advocated by Gulliver (1979: 64). Culture mainly colors behavioral expressions of a strategic nature.
Basing their findings on case studies, Faure and Rubin (1993) observe that in time of crisis, when stakes are high, tensions exacerbated by culture may matter the most. The Middle East case provides a classic example of such a situation. Lempereur and Colson (2004) observe that experimental works tend to show that the results reached by a pair of negotiators of the same culture are rather identical whatever the culture is. This would lead to conclude that no culture is more effective than another in solving problems. However, a reservation could be brought up in the very concept of value creation. In addition, outcomes reached by pairs of different cultures are lower than those obtained by pairs of homogenous cultures. The difficulty in intercultural settings appears in a clear way, thus demonstrating the importance of culture.
In fact, as underlined by Elgstrom (1994), while raising the issue of the “internal validity” of culture as the relevant determinant, it is extremely difficult to precisely assess the relative influence of each major variable operating in the negotiation process. Outcomes can also be determined by other variables such as structural or process variables and it would not make sense to turn culture into the unique explanatory variable of a whole and often complex process. As shown by Druckman et al.
(1976) in a study of bargaining behavior of Indians, Argentineans and Americans, culture does matter in determining behavior but other factors such as age, gender, and environment also play an important role, paving the way to multicausal models. The cultural component of a negotiation situation enters in a game of mutual influences with other components such as the structural and the strategic dimensions. The reality of a situation is never made of totally distinct, autonomous categories and its ultimate rationale borrows from the various interactions happening among these three dimensions.Structural aspects are, for instance, widely conditioned by the social culture. Thus, legal frameworks and administrative ways of intervention are influenced by values and habits related to the culture in which they are embedded. Similarly, strategic behaviors are part of a range of choices narrowed by the possibilities offered by the law of the country and by the social norms to which actors abide. Thus, not any kind of move is allowed in a negotiation, and a number of “rules of the game” should be followed, reducing accordingly the margin of maneuver of the negotiators (Faure et al., 2000). In the same way, all that is culturally conceivable is not strategically feasible because of the nature of the interaction (common project or division of a resource) and the goals that are targeted reduce the field of what is possible. Lastly, from another angle, the strategic component, when often repeated or in the process of institutionalization, generates culture through the new norms that are set up.
AspointedoutbyWeiss (1999: 69), in alet- ter to the editor concerning an article he published on “culturally responsive strategies” (1994), Fukushima, discussing negotiations with Americans, has suggested three variables that “may be much more important than cultural familiarity: the purpose and context of the negotiation; the position of the counterpart in his or her organization; and the general disposition of the counterpart to negotiating with Americans.”
Although quite open to the possible importance of the cultural dimension, Elgstrom (1994: 295) insists on the danger of having behaviors “ascribed to cultural factors, while, in fact, action is prescribed by the distribution of power, that is a structural phenomenon.” For instance, he draws from his own research that Tanzanian negotiators seldom rejected an offer of foreign aid but not in the same way, as Japanese negotiators would hesitate to give a flat “no” as an answer.
It should rather be attributed to the weakness of the Tanzanian bargaining position (Elgstrom, 1990).Ross (1997) provides explanations for the very limited role conceited to culture by political scientists. One reason is simply the risk of transforming hopes for a rigorous analysis into “just so” accounts. Culture also offers a political discourse masking more serious differences dividing groups. Finally, employing the concept of culture may lead one to involve oneself in a series of controversies already deeply dividing anthropologists, such as relativism, the importance of searching for generalizations, the possibility of comparison and the role of psychological mechanisms in cultural explanations.
Another stream of critics with, for instance, Winham (1980), tend to emphasize the limited number of situations in which culture matters. In complex, multilateral, and highly professionalized negotiations, national cultures lose their importance or even relevance as explanatory factors. A strong objection to the importance of culture in negotiation and conflict resolution is raised by a number of psychologists who tend to consider that individual variables are by far the most important, and that personality is the leading force in the interaction process. The answers to this can only be found in real case studies and might even provide a different answer each time. In addition, and this restriction cannot be easily lifted, it is sometimes very difficult to draw a line between cultural variables and personality variables. If we consider, for instance, risk-taking behavior, it may belong to both sets and only a specific investigation within a case study will enable the researcher to draw an accurate conclusion.
CURRENT RESEARCH ON CULTURAL ISSUES IN CONFLICT RESOLUTION
The first systematic observations made on culture as an object of study per se goes back to the founders of modern anthropology such as Tylor (1871), Linton (1936), and Benedict (1934).
However, cross-cultural approaches providing concepts for comparing cultures only took place with Hall (1976), then Hofstede (1980). Further on, Hofstede refined and expanded his theory. New comparative research-finding appeared with Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars (2000) aiming to build cross-cultural competences. Exploring meaning-making, they define five axes along which people may position themselves: universalist/particularist, spe- cific/diffuse, inner directed/outer directed, synchronous/sequential in using time.Establishing systematic comparison between cultures is a much more difficult task than it could appear a priori because behind the same words, there can be very different realities. For instance, the Chinese concept of negotiation does not strictly overlap with the Anglo-Saxon concept (Faure, 1995a). The Chinese concept refers to a situation of conflict while the Anglo- Saxon concept is much wider and includes any type of divergence. This observation also applies to negotiation exercises and simulations, for a cooperative game in one culture can be viewed as a competitive game in another culture. Cooperation and competition correspond to semantic sets that vary according to cultures. As a consequence, experimental subjects will understand the implicit rules of the game differently. Then, comparing performances will not be totally relevant and the conclusions drawn can be strongly biased.
Research on international negotiation is also influenced by the cultural conditions of its development. Ways of looking at objects and ideas are culturalized, framed by given concepts and contemporary problematiques. Are the scientific means we possess today adapted to identically study a negotiation carried out in Manhattan and in Timbuktu? One cannot be fully positive about this issue.
The current bulk of research on cultural issues in conflict resolution is predominantly North American and demonstrates very little interest in non-US literature on the subject (Dupont, 1994).
Again, culture comes into the picture to influence researchers on negotiation behaviors as well as negotiators’ behaviors.As underlined by Weiss (1995), bodies of work on negotiation have developed outside the USA, for example in France, TheNetherlands, Sweden, Argentina, and Russia. Indigenous research on international negotiation has even been carried out in unexpected places, such as Nepal or China (Faure, 1995c).Research on international negotiation focusing on cultural variables or integrating cultural components in its models and paradigms has been very recently started and is still largely in the making. Four main streams of investigation can be distinguished: national negotiation styles, case studies, experimental psychology on specific variables, and comparative/integrated approaches.
National negotiating styles refer to negotiation practices as observed within diplomatic activities or business discussions. The Chinese negotiator is a strong object of interest (Fang, 1999; Faure, 1998, 1999a, 2000b, 2000c; Frankenstein, 1986; Kirkbride et al., 1991; Pye, 1982; Solomon, 1999). The Japanese negotiator has also raised considerable interest for US research (Blaker, 1977; Graham, 1993). Using a set of common characteristics, Casse (1982), then Weiss and Stripp (1985, 1998), compared six cultures putting the emphasis on negotiation conception, cultural predisposition and typical ways of acting for each negotiator. Salacuse (1991), directly addressing the negotiation activity, identifies ten factors that strongly characterize negotiating styles, each of them consisting of two opposite poles such as negotiating goals (contract vs relationship), global attitude (win-win vs win-lose), time sensitivity (high vs low), and emotionalism (high vs low).
A second approach has been based on case studies done in domains such as diplomacy (Cohen, 1991; Dupont, 1993; Elgstrom, 1992; Jonsson, 1979; Kimura, 1980; Smyser, 2002; Snyder, 1999; Wittes, 2005), business (Blaker, Giarra and Vogel, 2002; Chen, 1999; Faure, 1998; Li, 1999), anthropology (Gulliver, 1979), and environmental issues (Sjostedt, 2003). The purpose is to draw analysis contributing to a better understanding of the mechanisms used in these different situations to solve a difficult problem.
A third category of research concerns social psychology and resorts to experimental settings. The point is to know to which extent a pre-selected variable plays a role in a built-up negotiation situation. Among the representatives of this approach are Jehn and Weldon (1997), Adair and Brett (2004), Leung (1997), Graham, Mintu and Rodgers (1994); Graham (1983, 1984, 1993); and Kirkbride, Tang and Westwood (1991).
A fourth stream aims by various means, such as comparative methods, to draw observations and conclusions of a more general reaching. Among those integrative attempts can be mentioned anthropological-oriented works (Avruch, 1998; Faure, 2003; Nader and Todd, 1978; Zartman, 2001). Other scholars have drawn their findings from materials from international business (Salacuse, 1991; Weiss, 1993), or from putting into perspective several types of investigations (Faure and Rubin, 1993; Fisher, 1980; Kimmel, 2000; Wanis, 2005). For instance, Salacuse (1991) divides the negotiation process into three phases, each of them having a particular objective and a specific rationale. Similarly, Cohen (1991) scrutinizes the impact of different negotiation styles during various stages of the conflict resolution process.