Cultural DNA: The Psychology of Globalization

Chapter 1America—The Change Makers

America today is still the world's most powerful country, both in terms of the size of its economy and its military muscle. Even more important than this, however, is the soft power that the country exercises. In particular, after America and its allies won the Cold War, there was an implicit sense in many parts of the world that American values and ideals would become the global norm. It was this sense that persuaded the political economist Francis Fukuyama to prematurely call out the End of History, on the basis that fundamental debates about values were over and we were all marching toward an American future whether we recognized it or not.¹

The American model also seemed to have triumphed in business. The idea that free markets should create the champions of the future through Darwinian selection became widely embedded. Other notions took hold, too: push relentlessly for ever higher targets and differentiate aggressively on the basis of performance; never rest from change; let companies outsource to the lowest cost providers around the world. American executives who went abroad did so on the front foot and led predominantly through American leadership values. The country's business schools were also teaching leaders from around the world how to manage their companies, and American heroes, such as Jack Welch and Louis Gerstner, were the doyens of the global business community.

Just a few decades later, however, the world looks very different. ...