Ethnometric Approaches to the Analysis of Economic and Cultural Values

The success of the market modernization of Russia depends in many ways on similarity of the Russian economic mentality and the European one. To estimate a degree of similarity of the former with the mentality of citizens of Western and Eastern countries, it is suggested that the techniques of a quantitative estimation and the analysis of national economic mentality — ethnometric methods — should be used. The authors analyze four most popular ethnometric techniques — G. Hofstede’s, the project GLOBE, the project WVS and F. Trompenaars’. The most important parameters of national economic mentality are considered to be the indexes of individualism and hierarchy (power distance). According to the WVS results, Russia belongs to the East; according to G. Hofstede’s technique, Russia occupies an intermediate position between the East and the West; GLOBE and F. Trompenaars give inconsistent results.