Cultural Anchors in a State of Flux: the Case of Brexit

Abstract

Formal institutions such as laws and regulations, enacted and administered by statutory bodies can be changed overnight. However, that degree of volatility hardly applies to informal institutions, namely traditions, beliefs, national culture values and related behaviour, deeply engrained in social consciousness. Brexit brings about new regulations of international trade and business that cause operational disturbances to international business participants so far as the British market and counterparts are involved. In such a state of flux, business people might find some stability and comfort in the established societal-level values of the United Kingdom and respectively, in the mitigating role of intercultural competence. The paper attempts to reveal the underlying cultural values at a country-level of the United Kingdom and discuss their implications for international business participants. It is a conceptual desk research drawing on contributions of renowned crosscultural communication scholars. The merits of the paper lie with its broad applicability, subject to further contextualization on behalf of international business agents.