HOW NOT TO DO CROSS CULTURAL ANALYSIS: PREDICTIVE FAILURE AND CONSTRUCTION FLAWS IN GEERT HOFSTEDE’S CASE STUDY

Abstract

This paper considers Hofstede’s claim that his national cultural “dimension scores” and related rankings of countries have predictive power by examining a ‘validating’ case study he has used in a number of publications to ‘demonstrate’ that capability. When tested against cross-sectional and longitudinal empirical evidence the case study is shown to have neither explanatory nor predictive power. A further unpacking of the case study demonstrates methodological flaws in its construction. Some characteristics of valid cross-national case studies are then outlined in a discussion of these flaws.