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International Business

notes 3.1.2 culture, society and the nation-state

We have defined a society as a group of people that share a common set of values and norms, that
is, people who are bound together by a common culture. However, there is not a strict one-to-one
correspondence between a society and a nation-state. Nation-states are political creations. They
may contain a single culture or several cultures.
At the other end of the scale, we can speak of cultures that embrace several nations.

3.1.3 Determinants of culture

The values and norms of a culture do not emerge fully formed. They are the evolutionary product
of a number of factors, including the prevailing political and economic philosophy, the social
structure of a society and the dominant religion, language and education (see Figure 3.1).
We will discuss the influence of social structure, religion, language, and education. While factors
such as social structure and religion clearly influence the values and norms of a society, the
values and norms of a society can influence social structure and religion.
figure 3.1: Determinants of culture

Religion

Social Structure Political
Philosophy
Culture Norms
and Value
Systems

Language Economic
Education Philosophy

3.1.4 social structure

A society’s “social structure” refers to its basic social organizations. Two dimensions are
particularly important when explaining differences between cultures. The first is the degree
to which the basic unit of social organization is the individual, while groups tend to figure
much larger in many other societies. The second dimension is the degree to which a society is
stratified into classes or castes. Some societies are characterized by a relatively high degree of
social stratification and relatively low mobility between strata (e.g. Indian) while other societies
are characterized by a low degree of social stratification and high mobility between strata (e.g.
American).

Individuals and Groups

A group is an association of two or more individuals who have a shred sense of identity and who
interact with each other in structured ways on the basis of a common set of expectations about
each other’s behaviour. Human social life is group life. Individuals are involved in families, work
groups, social groups, recreation groups and so on. However, while groups are found in all
societies, societies differ according to the degree to which the group is viewed as the primary
means of social organization. In some societies, individual attributes and achievements are

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