To What Extent Do Non-western Approaches in International Relations Continue to Be Marginalized - Essay Example

? To what extent do non-western approaches in international relations continue to be marginalized? Contents 0 Introduction 2.0 Saudi Arabia: a general overview of culture 3.0 International relations in Saudi Arabia: a communicative perspective 3.1 Hofstede’s and Trompenaar’s models in Saudi Arabia 4.0 Stereotypes of Saudi Arabian business 5.0 Transformation of business practices in the East 6.0 SWOT analysis of international relations in Saudi Arabia 7.0 Conclusion and Recommendations 1.0 Introduction There is a centennial gap between western and non-western approaches in business. It is always hard to tell how to conduct business globally in the modern world, because there are many different perspectives for various activities. There is a clear tendency of globalization and hybridity and in order to promote business internationally, there is a need to focus on different peculiarities or a cultural background of the country. Non-western countries have different paths of development in comparison with the western world. This can be explained by philosophical, religious and social differences between these two different parts of the world. Nevertheless, if there is a clear intention to do business globally, there is a need to penetrate into the depths of the non-western country’s culture and consider the way international relations are reflected in the country. In order to trace the peculiarities of international relations development in a certain country from the non-western world, it is relevant to focus our attention on one particular country. Saudi Arabia is positioned as a country with a strong cultural background and different spheres of human lives and activities are in close relation to the cultural specifics of the country. The Western world hardly accepts Saudi Arabia “as is” and there is a need to clarify numerous peculiarities of the country in order to reach a harmonious reflection and result in business (Zuhur, 2005). Saudis are on their way to a more open and friendly international relations development. There is a need to implement changes in this country (Idris, 2007, p. 37). It is on behalf of the western partners to respect cultural peculiarities of Saudi Arabia. It is an open road for the foreign business partners to introduce some changes in the Western world’s attitude to Saudi Arabia. From the international perspective, eastern and western countries have come across numerous difficulties in their cooperation because of a lack of a holistic vision of the way to do business. Saudi Arabia is interested in investments and the Western world is on the way of a constant enrichment. So, why not to unite their efforts and cooperate in the name of the world’s society success and enrichment? Besides investments, Saudi Arabia is looking for a foreign labor force and the country is on the way of development and innovations. It has numerous natural resources, which may be converted into favorable and useful financial gains for the world’s society (Chronology: Saudi Arabia, 2003; 2001). There are great international perspectives for further cooperation between Saudi Arabia and other countries. 2.0 Saudi Arabia: a general overview of culture In order to see the core differences between the western countries and the non-western world, it is relevant to find a root of these differences. The first barrier for this country is their language, because Arabic is wide-spread, but at the same time English plays a great role in this country as well. One can come across Turkish, Urdu and Farsi in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, it is possible to talk about a multilingual nature of the country. This fact may be rather attractive for the international partners. Concerning religion in the country, it is a well-known fact that there are two basic pillars of it in the country: Qur’an and the Prophet Muhammad. Saudis are very religious people and that is why those activities, which can be potentially criticized from the perspective of their religion, would be discarded for sure. Moreover, the international business partners should take into account that Saudis pray 5 times a day and have weekends on Thursday and Friday. They have also their holy month of Ramadan. They also do not drink and smoke. Therefore, the abovementioned cultural and religious peculiarities are relevant to the rest of the Muslim world and that is why, the way these countries do their businesses differ greatly from what we have in the western world. There are strong family values and traditions in this country and that is why it is very important to show respect to older people. Moreover, Saudis respect recommendations of their relatives and friends and even in business they can change their decisions in case they are influenced by their close people. 3.0 International relations in Saudi Arabia: a communicative perspective Currently, there is a great interest to international transfer (ITT) approach in the international relations. Different spheres of international businesses, governments and others parties involved are greatly concerned about rationalization of the international economy. The multinational companies are on their way to crossing numerous international borders and presenting their production globally. There is an evident growth of high-technology and in order to reach success internationally, it is relevant to develop technical and educational potential of the different societies. Therefore, Arab world is very much focused on potential growth and development of their labor force. It should be mentioned that there is a need for “shifting from simple import substitution and purchases of off-the-shelf turnkey plants, to promotion of endogenous technological development as the basis of future internationally competitive domestic enterprises” (Thompson 1994, p. 3). In case an integrative component of technological advancement is embedded into the complex and challenging context of Saudi Arabia, the Western world should work hard in order to cooperate with this “culturally-oriented” business (Abbas, 1995, p. 7). There is a need to outline the basic cultural peculiarities, reflected by Saudis in the context of their cooperation with the Western world. First of all, there is a need for economic independence desire of the country, further international support and promotion and the understanding of a political pluralism acceptation etc (Idris, 2007, p. 38). There is a great medieval influence on the modern business peculiarities in Saudi Arabia. To be patient and loyal are two integrative components for Saudis. Therefore, it is possible to talk about conservative international relations in this country. Very often a lack of creative potential in the country and the conservative principles are evident in the principles of seniority in business. For example, it is relevant to listen to senior managers; a strict hierarchy of organizations and other factors prove the incongruence with the business conduct in the western world. There is a need to claim that nonverbal factors exert a great influence on Saudi Arabia behavior internationally. The international partners may also take into account such important factors as punctuality and respect for Saudis. There are two important researchers, focused on cultural peculiarities of business doing, such as Hofstede and Trompenaars and their theoretical developments are of crucial importance for clarifications of the international behavior of Saudi Arabia internationally. 3.1 Hofstede’s and Trompenaar’s models in Saudi Arabia Hofstede outlines the following important factors, which should be taken into account by the international partners in the process of their cooperation. This is a scale of indices. The first one is a Power Distance Index (PDI) focused on power distribution within the organization; Individualism (IDV), determining the relation of an individual to other employees within the organization; the Masculinity index (MAS) identifying gender roles’ distribution; Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) underlining country’s/organization’s attitude to uncertainty; Long-Term Orientation (LTO) index underlines the organization’s goal-orientation (Hofstede, 2001). Therefore, it is possible to outline the way these indices reflect business peculiarities of Saudi Arabia. In terms of PDI signifies there is a clear dominance of the principle of seniority in the country. IDV reflects individual nature of business conduct among Saudis. MAS outlines that there is an evident marginalization of women in the country and the dominant role of males. UAI shows a low-risk taking nature of the country and LTO positions this country as having short-term goals. Trompenaars (2004) is focused on cultural approaches within a country. He claims that there is a diffusive relationship in Saudi Arabia. Different organizations in the country are influenced by the specific cultural background and religious beliefs. 4.0 Stereotypes of Saudi Arabian business It should be noted that Saudi Arabia is a high-context culture and the business partners should take into account not only the current conditions of business doing, but also refer to historical specifics of the country’s development. Saudi nation came across numerous controversies and there was an essential mixture of different cultures experienced by the nation. Therefore, the dominance of the Islamic law and a great power of monarchy were introduced by the King Abdul Aziz AL-Saud in 1932 (Saudi Arabia Online). Starting from 50s this country became the largest oil producer in the world. Therefore, the modern society is interested greatly in a successful cooperation with Saudi Arabia (El Sheikh, Fath El Rahman Abdall, 2003). There is a need to clarify to international business partners the way Saudis make their appointments. There are religious beliefs and religious holidays, which prevent Saudis from business meetings appointment on their religious holidays. Saudis are not concerned much about exact time, but rather about a part of a day when the meeting occurs (Yamani, 2000). A proper attention to elder people is one of the greatest concerns for Saudis. Therefore, foreign business partners should be tolerant and full of respect in relation to those people. A personal contact plays a great role for Saudis that is why a modern communication mediated by computer technologies would not be supported by Saudis for sure (Alanazi et al., 2003, p. 376). In order to initiate business with Saudis, it is relevant to have a good reputation in this country. A need for friendly relations, trust and respectful communication is very important for Saudis. Saudis are open people and they expect that their foreign partners will show openness and respect to them as well. There is still an evident gender marginalization in this country and very often women as foreign partners are negatively perceived by Saudis. Therefore, the cultural, social and religious contexts in Saudi Arabia play an important role for the foreign partners. There is a need to take into account these cultural specifics in order to consider the organizations function. Young employees in Saudi Arabia are looking forward working as managers: “The kingdom has become heavily dependent on foreign labor, and this has hindered the development of a skilled workforce to the degree that the private sector is not able to absorb the new Saudi entrants and cannot provide attractive salaries” (Al-Kibsi et al., 2007). Another challenge to perform successfully as a manager is the fact that the role of an individual is not taken into account in the country. Group work plays a more important role in the country and the business partners should focus their attention not on the separate individuals, but on the whole group. In accordance with numerous researches and studies, there are specific management strategies in Saudi Arabia and people should be aware of different peculiarities of doing business. The American scientists and researchers are focused on leadership and management terminology adaptation to that country. In other words, it is necessary to take into account different kinds of perspectives in order to penetrate into the complex nature of Saudi Arabia management and leadership. 5.0 Transformation of business practices in the East The global connections with this country should be considered in different aspects. On the one hand, Saudis are not really interested in potential perspectives for their country in the social sphere. The state is much interested in economic growth and a constant enrichment. There is a clear marginalization of gender issues in this country. Unfortunately, the paradigm of the social relations should be changed and adapted in accordance with the needs of the modern Saudis: “a set of social relations which includes consumption patterns, market regulations, ownership and control structures, labor conditions, government decision making, and the motivations and aspirations of the actors involved” (Thompson 1994, p. 4). Therefore, the foreign partners of the country may be puzzled by the country’s inability to function and perform in compliance with the norms and regulations accepted globally. There is a need to develop a more organic social basis for a more successful implementation of technological innovations or any other kinds of improvements in different spheres of lives among Saudis (With Values Aligned: Improving Saudi-US Relations 2006, p. 15). There is a need to adapt some social, cultural, and behavioral norms in Saudi Arabia in accordance with the advanced capitalist cultures. Otherwise no innovations are promoted locally and nationally in the country. One of the most crucial tasks for the international partners is to adapt the living norms and standards of Saudis in accordance with the international norms, but at the same time there is no way to discard authenticity and uniqueness of Saudi culture (West and Robinson 2001, p. 27). At a given moment, social aspects of international cooperation with Saudi Arabia are rather challenging. There is a perfect example to illustrate challenging and marginalized international relations of Saudi Arabia. The employees from the BA organization live on the outskirts of Arriyadh and have to develop their relations with the Saudis partners and common dwellers. In accordance with the words of the English employees: “though this segregation provides Westerners with a chance to exercise their own versions of religion, gender relations, and fun away from home, and though this was also the case with Western companies in Saudi Arabia before offset, it continues to limit any social modernization of the host society through personal demonstration and contact effects with outsiders which might otherwise have taken place” (Thompson 1994, p. 4). This tendency can be clarified in the following way: there is a need to decrease cultural disturbances within the community. This claim can be correlated with the definition of “contingency”, which states that it is impossible to change one element of the system and remain the rest without changing. A system represents an integration of interconnected elements and in case any one element is changed, there will be a change in other elements as well. The greatest challenges and complexities in cooperation with Saudi Arabia of the international partners can be seen in the local market’s inability to adapt the new coming innovations and changes. On the other hand, it should be noted that the profits of the emerging market may experience local constraints and prevent the possible ways of the innovations expansion by making an attempt of creating and developing the like changes and innovations. Saudi Arabia has enough resources, both human and natural, in order to promote their own technologies and production, borrowed from the foreign partners. Therefore, the foreign cooperation may be on halt. The following factors are of the greatest importance for the foreign partners: “labor and time saving, an extensive division of labor and production, the satisfying of mass markets, pollution control, internal performance and quality monitoring, and scientific management skills” (Thompson 1994, p. 5). Moreover, there is a special need in technology promotion and adaptation in the modern Saudi Arabia. The recipient society should be able to adapt to relevant changes and shift the accents of their centennial principles of behavior. There is a need to make a great emphasis on promotion of the productive systems, such as consumer sovereignty, commercial producer competition, marketing, rational business management methods, and individual advancement (Negandhi, 1983). In this case international relations with Saudi Arabia of the foreign parents will turn into a successful cooperation and mutual merits. Different methods are developed by the modern scientists and managers in order to shift management practices in Saudi Arabia re invented. For example, Pillai et al. (1999) in the book "Leadership and Organizational Justice: Similarities and Differences across Cultures" claims that a manager is “a father” in the business world. This position is strong for Saudis, because family relations are of high importance for them. The problem solving and decision making processes cannot be reached by the line managers. The Middle East positions a line manager on the outskirts and it is necessary to mention that the group work in the country should be as much fruitful and favorable for the whole business figures and participants. These authors claim that manager “is expected to act as a father figure” (Pillai et al., 1999). With respect to the study conducted by Yavas (1997), in case a freedom of change or innovation is prevented in the business world, there is a lack of future success for sure. Bhuian, Abdulmuhmin and Kim (2001) claim that Saudis are used for being guided in their daily practices by a senior person; the same can be said about business. Thus, it is possible for the Saudi government to intervene in the business affairs of their citizens. It is relevant to consider religious basis of decision making process in the Eastern world. Walker, Walker and Schmitz (2003) consider that God exerts a great influence on the decision making process for Saudis. They believe that their actions and decisions are predetermined by God. This point of view is unclear for the Western society. The business world in the Western world is controlled by the parties and figures involved. Therefore, there are two different ways of thinking and it is necessary to find a common point in order to prevent potential incongruence in business practices. For example, though Saudis are punctual and tolerant people, they may accept some changes in business. The western businessmen are stricter and more direct in their actions. Alanazi and Rodrigues (2003) provide the following definition for Saudi culture and its connection with business: this relation “is covered by a strong cultural fabric” (p. 376). Thus, a strong cultural background exerts and evident and essential influence on business in Saudi Arabia. Very often when Saudis want to take their time, to be patient and tolerant, they may prevent themselves from a perfect organizational performance. Saudis culture should be adapted and transformed into a global culture of the world’s society for sure. There are evident dualistic interpretations of cultural specifics of business relations in Saudi Arabia. From one point of view, people in the country are looking forward to grasping the management positions because of centennially rooted principles of seniority. From another perspective, there is a need to develop and improve individual performance of Saudis in different spheres and enable them to become specialists and leaders not only in management, but also in medicine, technology, sciences and other fields. 6.0 SWOT analysis of international relations in Saudi Arabia Strength: Saudis are rational in business; they make their decisions and further steps basing on a strong background of qualitative and quantitative information; Saudis have a strong and regulated basis for further developments of business policies with their foreign partners. Weaknesses: they are slow, patient, and reliable on God in their business; there is a lack of opinions of line managers in the decision making process. Opportunities: reliable and trusted business relations with the foreign partners. Threats: a lack of individual contribution of employees and line managers may lead to a subjective nature of decision making process and the absence of creative potential and the new vision in business; inefficient knowledge in the sphere of business may hinder business relations with Saudis partners. 7.0 Conclusion and recommendations Unlike a hardened cultural background of doing international business with Saudis, this background may turn into a favorable condition for further decision making process. In other words, it is relevant to the international partners to change this “minus” for “plus” and then social and cultural heritage of Saudis may turn into a strong and reliable basis for international cooperation. It is possible to claim that both Eastern and Western cultures should become a holistic global conglomerate and transform their cultures and traditions with respect to each other. On the basis of numerous researches and studies, it is evident that both negative and positive aspects of international relations in Saudi Arabia can be seen. First of all, a cultural aspect reflected in Saudi business was analyzed in accordance with Hofstede’s and Trompenaars’ models. This step enabled to give an unprejudiced look at the nature of business in Saudi Arabia. Moreover, in terms of SWOT analysis, foreign business partners may be challenged with cultural specifics, religious beliefs and traditions of Saudis. Though Saudi Arabia is a conservative country with a hardened nature, though the Western world has been developing on a different background, the modern global context enables these “two poles apart” to unite in the name of global merits. The western businessmen can learn a good lesson from their Eastern partners. A sphere of international relations is perceived as a complex and speedy world, but in reality these cross-cultural economic relations are better developed in case of mutual understanding, respect and tolerance. In spite of the fact that the religious background and social bounds of the eastern world are often misinterpreted by the modern westerners, these facts should be considered as business favorable factors, which bring in stability and balance in the world of international business relations. It is on behalf of the eastern businessmen to become more open and creative and provide their employees with the opportunities of self-development and self-realization within the organization. If Saudis want to be global, they should act globally, but think locally. There is no need to abuse their values on the rest of the world, it is better to open their eyes and become more open and ready for changes in the world. 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