Regional Issues
One of the main challenges facing the central Africa region is poverty. Poverty is undoubtedly one of the greatest hindrances towards the achievement of individual goals. This has hampered growth in all aspects and brings about a lot of social and economic problems. Lack of decisive action by governments and financial institution has contributed to the increasing rates of poverty in this region (Tonnemarcher & Durhen 2009).The main cause of the abject poverty in central Africa is caused by low human development according to the United Nations Human Development Indexes.
Another issue affecting this region is HIV and Aids. Statistics show that children are most affected by the great challenge that comes along with this problem posed by the disease. The HIV crisis is influenced by many medical, social and cultural factors (Poku & Whiteside 2004). Such cultural factors include polygamy as well as lack of the necessary medical facilities to combat the disease. This has led to the continued stagnation in terms of economic growth by many countries in this region as a result of a declining labor force.
Many countries in this region also face political instability. According to Stevenson, in one way or another, political instability is brought about by lack of a proper regulatory process governing the rule of law (Stevenson 1971). Most political leaders are power oriented and will do anything to ensure their survival in leadership. This has been the main cause of the continued conflicts in most countries leading to loss of lives and destruction of property.
It is important to take action on these issues so as to develop a mechanism of measuring or predicting the stability of this region in terms of economic growth and also politically. This also helps individual governments to become more responsible in coming up with a system to reduce the social-cultural problems in the society. Due to the depth of these problems, NGOs in this region are often strained in terms of aid to combat these problems. An example of this is a country facing political instability and the NGOs in the country may not have enough qualified medical personnel to cater for the high casualty rate.
Cultural Variation Models
The Lewis model that evaluates the relationship between cultures tries to assume that cultural practices is as a result of the wisdom collected over the years by an individual. This wisdom is then passed down to the oncoming generations and the people share it through believes and assumptions regarding certain matters affecting the society directly or indirectly (Fisher 2005). This passage acts like a programming of the mind where an individual is obliged to set his behavioral standards on the basis of the cultural values and practices.
The Lewis model views that the behavioral practices that we engage in and that we consider normal is actually from a gradual consecutive inherent process. This process is based on the factors such as the ethnic differentiation, religious upbringing, level of education and other social and cultural norms in the society. All these factors are primarily the basis of our perspective to life but the only shortcomings that they have is that they tend to be very submissive on the same culture that we grow up in.
According to Lewis, what is considered as the third generation kids is a unique generation that posses the ability to transcend different cultures. The Lewis model view how people of different cultures can be differentiated in accordance to their general perspective regarding time, the style of communication and their cultural values and attitude towards life. This is represented in the case of cultural differentiation.
Let’s see a case using the Lewis model; we can view how different cultures relate to particular matter in the society today because it is not always the same in all cultures. Different cultures have different perspective regarding to different opinions and facts. The practical part of it is that it is not everyone who can effectively relate to the culture of the country he/she is living in. Some of the children have to be exposed to many different cultures in the course of their upbringing as situation that leads them to become more advanced it terms of knowledge and exposure. It is necessary for each and every person to identify with a culture that one is comfortable with.
The Hofstede dimension reviews the way nations interrelate. Hofstede generated the analytical process when he accidentally came across a database containing a large survey that contained sentiments of different people in more those fifty countries that at the time were in local subsidiaries of large multinational companies. The primary analysis proved to be somehow complicated since it was conducted at the individual level. This called for a change in the method in which the analysis was done and another approach was used. This involved finding the correlation between the mean scores that was individually sampled with regards to the number of survey items and the country level (Karen 2005).
These two scenarios called for two different interpretations. One of the shortcomings of the cross-cultural research is that the boundary between individual sentiments and cultural related sentiments is not easily identifiable. There is an ever clear link between cultures according to Hofstede analysis. This analytical dimension has been use to evaluate the relationship between the norms of a particular country and the personality dimensions that affect individual behavior.
Let’s take an example of avoiding uncertainty. This does not mean the same thing as avoiding risks. Avoiding uncertainty means the ability of the society to tolerate ambiguity or the unknown. This is a clear indication that there is a system that prompts either a comfortable or an uncomfortable feeling when an individual is faced with an unstructured situation. Unstructured situations are those situations that are uncalled for and occur promptly or immediately from nowhere. This prompts an individual to rely on personal judgment rather than follow the strict code of conduct that is normally guided by cultural beliefs and practices.
Countries found to be containing the fear of the unknown contain people who are more or less emotional towards different issues that affect their lives. These people‘s actions are motivated by an inner nervous calling that always lead the individual to either engage in a rational or an irrational behavior. Cultures that accept uncertainties find themselves better placed in that they are able to accommodate different opinions that are not similar to what they are used to experiencing. This forces these cultures to formulate fewer rules that govern their code of conduct.
People in a culture that is more tolerant to opinion tend to be contemplative and the environment in which they live in does not require them to be emotional towards different factors that affect their lives. Hofstede also explores the two sides of the society that is the individual aspect and the collective aspect. Some cultures contain in them loose ties that binds different individuals together. One is expected to be responsible for his/her action. In these cultures, each person is mandated to take care of himself/herself. The other aspect of the society which is the collective aspect of it tends to be a binding factor among the people and cultures in these categories have individuals formed into strong cohesive groups (Braweys & Prince 2008).
Other models have a different analytical perspective in that the cultural model is predetermines by a constant factor. According to Clyde, different cultures of the world should be grouped categorically wit h respect to their cultural differentiation. He argues that despite sharing some similarity, cultural distinction is apparent and different cultures have different answers to more or less the same questions. There is a need to create systems that guards against this universal assumptions and be able to self-identify different cultures with respect to their beliefs and practices.
Many other anthropologists have suggested methods to counter the problems caused by the distinction between different cultures. According to Hofstede, there is a primary approach in which the society can try and uphold the common cultural dimension. One judging factor that sets a culture part from the rest may be as a result of economic evolution or modernity. Economic progression is one of the factors that may cause a general programming of the mind in such a way that the mind responds differently to certain issues (Martnelli 2003).
Edward Hall uses the communication analytical approach to divide cultures. This involved dividing different cultures according to the way they communicated. (Lange & Paige 2003)This approach is highly concentrated on the rational cultural model as opposed to the new cultural model. We are led to believe that individualism if allowed to take influence in a more collective manner in other cultures will bring economic development. Individualism as well as collectivism is two opposing factors that explore the different personality dimensions.
Edward T Hall analytical context of cultural variations majored on two aspects that revolved around the high and the low context. A culture that has the concept of high context have rules as the main basis of analytical decisions by individuals hence so much is perceived to be as a result of uncontrollable forces and individuals tend to take for granted a lot of occurrences. The low context on the other hand creates a special emphasis on paying attention to details and not jumping into conclusions hence individuals have no room to take things for granted.
The third phase of cultural variation according to Hall was that of space. Space in its composition includes personal and social space. Personal space was identified to be the primary essential with regards to space where different individuals had different preferences on distance between them and others. This can be practically applied today where different people have different preferences on the size of the house, car or even offices. Hall found out that cultural factors played a big role in some of these preferences. Space was in two context that is high territoriality and low territoriality where individuals in the latter have less concern on space.
Contrastive Analysis
The main difference in these approaches is that there is a predetermined factor that is the approach used by each model. Though they share, the similarity of stating that language is one important factor in evaluating cultural dispersion and integration, different approaches are used to arrive at the best conclusion. Hofstede argues that individualism may be one factor that leads to economic progression. Lewis on the other hand observes that the communication model is perhaps the best approach to enact the cultural approach.
Application
These models should be used to verify the effective environment in which to or not to identify with a certain culture. Some as redundant and one that is only useful at individual level may view the collective culture. The only question left unanswered is when one should shift from using one approach to another. This concept helps us tackle some of the main problems in the society today. Issues such as poverty may deeply relay of the Hofstede model of collectivism in order to effectively combat it. Issues to do with HIV and Aids may result from moral jurisdiction of the individual and perhaps the best approach to this is having an effective communication system and establishing a common goal in communication matters relating to the problem.
References
Besley, T.W. (2009), Poverty in Africa, New York: Nova Science Publisher.
Browaeys, M.S. & Prince R. (2008), Understanding Cross-cultural Management, New York: Prentice Hall.
Essex, M. (2002), Aids in Africa, New York: Springer.
Fisher, K.E. et al, (2005), Theories of informational Behavior, New York: Information Today INC.
Karen, E. et al, (2005), Theories of Information Behavior, New York: Information Today INC
Kohen, D. & Kitayama S. (2007), Handbook of Cultural Psychology, New York: Clifford Press.
Lange, D. L. & Paige R M, (2003), Culture as the core in second language learning, New York: IAP.
Martinelli, S. (2003), Intercultural Learning, New York: Council of Europe.
Stevenson, H.M. (1971), Conflict and Political Instability in Africa, New York: Stevenson.
Tonnemarcher, S. & Duhren S. (2009), Poverty in Africa-Cultural Studies, New York: GRIN Verlay.
Wright, P. (2001), Intercultural Relations, New York: Oxford University Press.