| Summary: | This dissertation will examine the concept of ‘ethnocentrism’, or a belief in the superiority of one’s own cultural norms and values, against the backdrop of the Global Oil & Gas Service industry. Using Howard Perlmutter’s framework, ethnocentrism will be tested and analysed across distinct areas of international business; staffing and cultural prevalence, the management of international subsidiaries and corporate and national culture.
Data will be collected from experienced Oil & Gas managers from several leading Global Service businesses, using interviews and it will thus be questioned whether the firms employing these professionals, as well as the individuals themselves have adopted a truly ‘global’ and cosmopolitan mindset, or whether they and their organisations still feel tied or associated with a national identity in a business sense.
Upon study, it was revealed that ethnocentrism was largely absent amongst the organisations studied, aside from in the field of subsidiary management, whilst strong corporate cultures had the effect of nullifying ethnocentric tendencies. That said, even within the field of subsidiary strategy, the high levels of centralization and rigidity which have been argued as characteristic of an ethnocentric firm could also be the result of other variables capable of influencing a firm’s strategy and international structure.
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