As an emerging market Turkish culture’s quest to be positioned on Meyer’s cultural map

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to reveal Türkiye's place on the global cultural map through eight dimensions compared to other countries with the help of these two subresearch questions: “Where is Türkiye positioned on Meyer's map, and how is the positioning when country groups are taken into account?”. Design/methodology/approach This issue is considered necessary regarding the country’s business culture, which is an emerging market. For this, 17 senior executives engaged in international trade activities were selected as cases. The eight dimensions of Erin Meyer’s culture map were analyzed by considering the interview data obtained from the executives. Findings As a result of the analysis, it was determined that Türkiye is in a position that can be called an east–west synthesis in terms of culture, even though it is geographically evaluated within MENA and that it is located close to the middle of the continuum axis on the basis of almost all dimensions. However, the three dimensions out of eight – communication, deciding and trusting – are relatively far from the middle. The authors believe that this situation is closely related to Türkiye’s unique historical characteristics. Research limitations/implications The placement of the nations on a cultural map may be useful for practitioners. By looking at the relative position on this map and taking it into consideration while building connections and negotiating, for instance, businesses and policymakers who wish to enhance their ties with Türkiye can be aware of the distinctions between their own countries and Türkiye. The inhibiting nature of qualitative research prevents generalization; however, much bigger data set may be used for a comparable approach. Further research can be done to solve this issue because the cases under examination do not permit comparisons specific to the American continent. Originality/value The theoretical contribution of this study lies in its focused revelation of Turkey’s cultural positioning within the context of emerging markets. Positioning the countries on the cultural map can provide some convenience to the practitioners. Türkiye is a crucial clustering center when global production is considered. This opens the country to contact other cultures and enables intercultural transfer and learning.