The Dutch organisational sociologist Geert Hofstede is best known for his work on dimensions of national and organisational cultures.  Sadly, his insightful work is often criticised in academic circles; The Academy of Management demonstrate inconsistencies in Hofstede’s theory and methodology in their flagship journal The Academy of Management Review

If culture, as defined by Hofstede, is “the unwritten rules of the social game” what relevance does scientific evaluation play in improving our understanding of cultures? The American AOM’s criticism of the lack of academic rigour and methodology makes me wonder if there are any insights in Hofstede’s studies about the differences  between the cultural dimensions of the United States and those of Hofstede’s homeland, the Netherlands.

According to Hofstede, the Dutch and the Americans are similar on 4 of his 5 cultural dimensions. With the exception of Masculinity, where America’s testosterone count is an order of magnitude higher than their European counterparts, you can barely tell the nations apart.  Could American’s masculinity suggest a propensity towards left-brain thinking and scientific analysis?

The answer to this may lie in THE most significant piece of cultural research ever conducted. Commissioned by Russian ’scientists’ Vitaly Komar and Alex Melamid and sponsored by Chase Manhattan Bank the “People’s Choice” project identified the perfect picture defined by people by polling 14 countries.

American readers may be interested in perusing the numerical result in the spreadsheets, if you are Dutch, you may prefer to go straight to the pictures.

Illustrated in their book Painting by Numbers: Komarand Melamid’s Scientific Guide to Art the ‘most wanted’ painting in Holland looks like this:

compare that to the ‘most wanted’ painting in America:

Fascinating.  So fascinating, I’d like to expand on this important piece of research and bring it up to date. Please help me close the gap between art and science by completing the short 33 question survey here http://bit.ly/c7N789.

Please pass the link on to your contacts.  I will publish the results (and the ‘most wanted’ painting amongst our virtual community) at the end of the month.