Assignment task: How does the strength of a social hierarchy determine individualism, or lack of, in a society?
Power distance refers to the strength of a society's social hierarchy. A society with a low power distance tends to have more equality between the people. Superiors will communicate with those of lower ranking and there are no expectations of prominent respect. There is a fairly equal distribution of power.
However, those with a high power distance are far less consultative. Status and power are highly important, and respect is shown to those of higher status without question.
Each society can be more individualist or collective to a certain degree. Collectivist societies focus more on the importance of relationships and loyalty. People are judged by the group(s) they belong to, whereas those belonging to individualistic societies assign themselves their own affiliations. These societies focus on the individual and their own needs.
On figure three of Hofstede's cultural dimension values, it is interesting to note that Panama, for example, holds strong power distance values. Directly underneath, one can see that figure four shows that Panama holds values of a collectivist society. So, this begs the question of the relation between the two: Does the social hierarchy directly determine the level of individualism in a society? Or is it something more?