Ethical Issues across Cultures - Managing the Differing Perspectives of China and the USA by Pitta - Article Example

Business Ethics across Cultures Article Review In today’s world of complex business culture and environment the purposive entry of business ethics can be said to be carrying an immense significance. In the recent years there has been an expansion in the number of cases in the business world related to fraud, public outrage as well as that of scandals which has intensified the notion of the business ethics to a greater height and that along with that has augmented towards greater corporate responsibilities (Ferrell et al, 2012, pp 4-5). Today’s world is the world of globalization with the free mobility of goods and services throughout the countries with the intra and inter industry trade taking place in rampant. Standing in this complex business process, the difficulty not only lies in the issues related to products, promotion as well as that of place but it is that of the culture. The cultures and that of the expectations related within the cultures are variables which highly affects the business transactions. Thus the maintenance of the business ethics across cultures is highly essential (Pitta et al, 1999, p. 240). The paper focuses on the article review based on two countries viz, China and Russia in contrast with that of the United States and tries to focus on the crux of those articles and the way they try to coordinate the issue of business ethics across culture in them with the scope of optimal learning and incorporating them within the business platform of the home country which can be regarded as a learning procedure. Overview of first article The first article, Ethical issues across cultures: managing the differing perspectives of China and the USA written by Dennis A. Pitta, Hung-Gay Fung and Steven Isberg focuses on the business ethical issues with United States and that of China. The article states that it is bestowed that the marketers of United States of America are well acquainted with the standard of ethics but it can generate ethical conflicts when it is in the expansion path in the Chinese market. With the entry of the smaller US companies in China, there increases the potential for the ethical conflicts and the solution to this is seen in the expansion of the knowledge and the evolution of which will lead to the development of array of managerial guidelines which will be implemented in the realizing the value of the understanding (Pitta et al, 1999, pp. 240-241). Generation of contradictions The nation of China is a diverse nation with diverse cultures and contradictions like the Chinese do not believe in one god rather they believe in sages. This is highly contrasted with the US culture with the belief of one god and also raises the significance of the religion in the country. The major pillars of their belief are highly depended on the facets of Buddhism and Taoism while the Americans are highly conjectured upon the logical reasoning skills with firm belief in effectiveness and efficiency. The Chinese try to fathom the human relationship with the businesses and any investment venture. The Americans separate the business relationships from the personal relationships and they are highly bounded by the rationale of legal contracts as in the business relationships in America are majorly short term and that of the Chinese are usually long term . The Chinese are also bounded by the notion of Subtlety and explicitness and they do not confront vigorously and the attribute of outspokenness is generally dominant and they also pragmatic in the sense that they belief expanding on the existing patterns while the Americans believe in the solution through innovations and different product differentiating schemes. There are many other conflicts but the scope of discussion is limited. The next will be focusing on the dimension of solutions (Pitta et al, 1999, pp. 246- 251) Prospective solutions In the trajectory of solution provision one of the policies which can be applied is that of avoidance as in the problems will dissolve in a dynamic fashion. The incorporation of avoidance is highly useful when the costs of confrontation are high. Another strategy can be that of the application of force with the notion that forcing one party will be imparting the force on the other party’s will and for this purpose, power is highly required as can be said that the importers with the possession of controlled access to the domestic markets can fall in the realms which will be subjected to the demanding of the concessions or specific behaviors of their suppliers. Another important strategy may be attributed towards the incorporation of the combination of education as well as that of persuasion which will be directed towards the provision of the employee safety and that of the operation of an efficient management policy. Another strategy is that of the infiltration which refers to the spread of a specific idea or that of the principle in a society as that of the consumer orientation or an emphasis on product quality and so on. The last prospective solution deals with that of the negotiation and that of collaborations as for example in case of USA agreed in the maintenance of the agreement of the concept that there are not two Chinas namely that of the PRC and that of Taiwan and USA instead maintained a robust diplomatic relation with the PRC government (Pitta et al, 1999, pp. 251- 254). Overview of second article The second article, Comparing business ethics in Russia and the US by Rafik I. Beekun, Yvonne Stedham, Jeanne H. Yamamura and Jamal A. Barghouti concentrates on the comparative survey of around seventy three Russian and ninety two US managers where the study focuses on the difference and similarities in the ethical decision making among the respondents. Various measures like that of Reidenbach and Robin’s (1988) multi-criteria ethics instrument, examinations have been done on whether business people in Russia and the US varied in their judgment regarding the ethical content of the business decisions. Results inferred that the Americans in general possessed a tendency in assessing certain actions as less ethical in terms of application of the utilitarian or justice criteria, and the ethical judgments of the two groups differed by situation and by criteria employed (Beekun et al, 2003, p.1333). Deviation of ethical perspectives between US and Russia The results have found that in comparison in case of the US, the interest of the business ethics exceeds that of any other capitalist country in the world. Russia is newly developing capitalist country and is highly struggling with the evaluation dynamics of the ethical issues which have discouraged investments in the Russian business market. Findings also revealed that the cultural variances might be also regarded as that of the contributing factor in the assessment of the ethical content. The ethical concepts were situation specific and that the Americans were more sensitive to justice and decisions. The Americans follow stricter guidelines in the assessment of the ethics in the dimension of justice. The history of the Russian government states the intrusion in the individuals’ lives and the accrual of information and intelligence about the citizens with the purpose of using that information to oppress citizens explains to some degree the Russian respondents’ reaction to this decision. The experience of the ‘big brother’ show in Russia may have sensitized the Russians towards the situation in which the access to information about the individuals is provided to a third party without the prior approval or the knowledge of the affected individuals. The Americans have been encountered to be equipped with a wider concept of justice with the inclusion of the attributes of equity and fair treatment as well as equality whereas the Russians emphasize on the notion of equality only. The stance of the United States towards the ethical paradigm is much clearer and it has been found that in Russia the ethical perspective is a bit obscure and that there has been more incidence of corruption (Beekun et al, 2003, pp. 1344- 1349). Conclusion The paper circumscribed around the notion of the business ethics across culture with the examples of the countries like that of China and Russia with the backdrop of the ethical structure of business in the United States of America. In case of China it has been found that there has been high difference in cultural parameters with respect to that of the United States and the attributes of avoidance, power, negotiation, compromise and that of educations has been seen to be the potential solutions. In case of Russians it has been found that they are less ethical than the Americans and the business intervention of the Americans in Russia may be deemed to be profitable venture in terms of development of business ethics and establishment of a dynamic business platform. References Beekun et al, (2003), Comparing business ethics in Russia and the US, International Journal of Human Resource Management, 14(8), pp. 1344- 1349, retrieved on August 14, 2012 from: http://www.business.unr.edu/faculty/beekun/Beekun,%20Stedham,%20Yamamura%20&%20Bargouthi.pdf Ferrell et al, (2012), Business Ethics: Ethical Decision Making & Cases, Cengage Learning Pitta et al, (1999), Ethical issues across cultures: managing the differing perspectives of China and the USA, JOURNAL OF CONSUMER MARKETING, 16(3), pp. 240-256, retrieved on August 14, 2012 from: http://home.ubalt.edu/ntsbpitt/ethics.pdf Read More