THE INFLUENCE OF CULTURE ON THE NEGOTIATION STYLES OF BRITISH STUDENTS by JALAL ALI BELSHEK (research)

In this study, the argument is that British students whose major subject is politics are very tough and direct in their negotiation, but they lack the understanding of the many cultural factors that should be taken into account when negotiating with others from different backgrounds. So, the main purpose of this study is to describe the understanding of British politics students of negotiation in intercultural settings. First, the concepts of culture and negotiation processes in general are explained, and then cultural influences on negotiation are discussed. Culture has many definitions, and it affects everything people do in their society because of their ideas, values, attitudes, and normative or expected patterns of behaviour. Culture is not genetically inherited, and cannot exist on its own, but is always shared by members of a society (Hall 1976, p. 16). Hofstede (1980, pp. 21-23) defines culture as “the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group from another”, which is passed from generation to generation, it is changing all the time because each generation adds something of its own before passing it on. It is usual that one’s culture is taken for granted and assumed to be correct because it is the only one, or at least the first, to be learned. Culture is a complex concept, and no single definition of it has achieved consensus in the literature. So, out of the many possible definitions examined, the following definition guides this study: culture is a set of shared and enduring meaning, values, and beliefs that characterize national, ethnic, or other groups and orient their behaviour (Mulholland 1991).