The Classification of Cultures

(From the book Malignant Self-love: Narcissism Revisited by Sam Vaknin

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/thebook.html )

Culture is a hot topic. Scholars (Fukoyama and Huntington, to mention but two)
disagree about whether this is the end of history or the beginning of a particularly
nasty chapter of it.
What makes cultures tick and why some of them tick discernibly better than others
are the main bones of contention. Cultural interaction is no longer precipitated only
via face-to-face encounters, immigration, visits, tourism, and trade. The emergence
of radio, television, the Internet, and smartphones has created a virtual and global
melting pot. One can benefit from cultural exchanges, be influenced by
civilizations foreign and far-away, and react (positively or negatively) to them from
the comfort of ones swivel chair. The need to classify cultures has, therefore,
become all that more urgent.
We can view cultures through the prism of their attitude towards their constituents:
the individuals they are comprised of. More so, we can classify them in accordance
with their approach towards "humanness", the experience of being human.
Some cultures are evidently anthropocentric others are anthropo-transcendental.
A culture which cherishes the human potential and strives to create the conditions
needed for its fullest realization and manifestation is an anthropocentric culture.
Such striving is accepted to be the top priority, the crowning achievement, the
measuring rod of such a cultures attainment: its criterion for success or failure.
On the other pole of the dichotomy we find cultures which look beyond humanity.
To paraphrase Hanna Arendt, they sacrifice the individual to advance the human
species. This "transcendental" ouytlook has multiple purposes.
Some cultures want to transcend human limitations, others to derive meaning from
such transcendence, yet others to leverage it in order to maintain social
equilibrium. But what is common to all of them regardless of purpose is the
subjugation of human endeavour, of human experience, human potential, really of
all things human to this attempt at transcendence.
Granted: cultures resemble living organisms. They evolve, they develop, and they
procreate. None of them was "created" the way it is today. Cultures go through
Differential Phases wherein they re-define and re-invent themselves using varied
parameters. Once these phases are over the results are enshrined during the Inertial

Phases. The Differential Phases are period of social dislocation and upheaval, of
critical, even revolutionary thinking, of new technologies, new methods of
achieving set social goals, identity crises, imitation and differentiation. They are
followed by phases of a diametrically opposed character: preservation, even
stagnation, ritualism, repetition, rigidity, emphasis on structure rather than content.
Anthropocentric cultures have differential phases which are longer than the inertial
ones. Anthropotranscendental ones tend to display a reverse pattern.
This still leaves two basic enigmas:
What causes the transition between differential and inertial phases?
Why is it that anthropocentricity coincides with differentiation and progress /
evolution while other types of cultures are concomitant with an inertial
framework?
We can use a few axes to describe a culture:
Distinguishing versus Consuming Cultures
Some cultures give weight and presence (though not necessarily in equal measures)
to each of their constituent elements (the individual and the social structures or
institutions). Each such element is considered distinctive, idiosyncratic, and
unique. Such cultures accentuate attention to details, private enterprise, initiative,
innovation, entrepreneurship, inventiveness, youth, status symbols, consumption,
money, creativity, art, science and technology.
These are the things that distinguish one individual from another.
Other cultures engulf their constituents, assimilate and consume them. Both
individuals and institutions are deemed, a priori, to be subservient to some higher
cause or value system, redundant, their worthiness, raison detre, and life
expectancy mere functions of their actual contributions to an abstract whole.
Such cultures emphasize generalizations, stereotypes, conformity, consensus,
belonging, social structures, procedures, formalisms, rituals, undertakings
involving the labour or other input of the human masses.
Future versus Past Oriented Cultures
Some cultures look to the past real or imaginary for inspiration, motivation,
sustenance, hope, guidance and direction. These cultures tend to direct their efforts
and resources and invest them in what already exists. They are, therefore, bound to
be materialistic, figurative, substantive, and earthly.

They are likely to prefer old age to youth, old habits to new, old buildings to
modern architecture, etc. This preference of the Elders (a term of veneration) over
the Youngsters (a denigrating coinage) typifies them strongly. These cultures are
likely to be risk averse.
Other cultures look to the future always projected for the same reasons. These
cultures invest their efforts and resources in an ephemeral vision (upon the nature
or image of which there is no agreement or certainty).
These cultures are, inevitably, more abstract (inhabiting, as they are, the mental
space of an eternal Gedankenexperiment), more imaginative, more creative (having
to design multiple scenarios just to survive). They are also more likely to have a
youth cult: to prefer the young, the new, the revolutionary, the fresh to the old, the
habitual, the predictable. They are risk-centered and risk-assuming cultures.
Static versus Dynamic (Emergent) Cultures; Consensus (Synoptic or
Synergetic) versus Conflictual (Distributive) Cultures
Some cultures are more cohesive, coherent, rigid and well-bounded and
constrained. As a result, they maintain an unchanging nature and are static. They
discourage anything which could unbalance them or perturb their equilibrium and
homeostasis. These cultures encourage consensus-building, teamwork,
togetherness and we-ness, mass experiences, social sanctions and social regulation,
structured socialization, peer loyalty, belonging, homogeneity, identity formation
through allegiance to a group. These cultures employ numerous self-preservation
mechanisms and strict hierarchy, obedience, discipline, discrimination (by sex, by
race, above all, by age and familial affiliation).
Other cultures seem more "ruffled", "arbitrary", or disturbed. They are pluralistic,
heterogeneous and torn. These are the dynamic or the emergent cultures. They
encourage conflict as the main arbiter in the social and economic spheres ("the
invisible hand of the market" or "checks and balances"), contractual and
transactional relationships, partisanship, utilitarianism, heterogeneity, self
fulfilment, fluidity of the social structures, democracy.
Indeed, the structure and functioning of government itself reflect these
dichotomies. Where a basic distrust of human nature prevails (such as in the United
States), founding fathers and pioneers have created systems of checks and balances
that intentionally rend asunder the very fabric of cohesive governance. This
paranoia and belief in original, primal sin led to the formation of distributive,
conflict-driven branches of government; turf wars; walled gardens of information;
and, finally, pernicious partisanship, culminating in a civil war and followed by
decades of strife to this very day.

The alternative is a synoptic-synergetic form of government where all societal

institutions ruling parties, opposition parties, the military, the judiciary, the
legislature, the civil service and public administration, non-governmental
organizations, and even the private sector collaborate in sharing resources and
information; in setting common goals; and in striving to accomplish them. One
should not confuse this largely European model with authoritarian regimes
where all the stakeholders are coerced into apparently similar but in truth hollow
- behaviors.
Exogenic-Extrinsic Meaning Cultures Versus Endogenic-Intrinsic Meaning
Cultures
Some cultures derive their sense of meaning, of direction and of the resulting wishfulfilment by referring to outside frameworks which are perceived as bigger, or
more significant than they are. They derive meaning only through incorporation in
or reference to these frameworks.
The encompassing framework could be God, History, the Nation, a Calling or a
Mission, a larger Social Structure, a Doctrine, an Ideology, or a Value or Belief
System, an Enemy, a Friend, the Future: any thing which is bigger and outside the
meaning-seeking culture.
Other cultures derive their sense of meaning, of direction and of the resulting wish
fulfilment by referring to themselves and to themselves only. It is not that these
cultures ignore the past they just do not re-live it. It is not that they do not
possess a values or a belief system or even an ideology it is that they are open to
the possibility of revising it.
While in the first type of cultures, Man is meaningless were it not for the outside
systems which endow him with meaning in the second type of cultures these very
outside systems are meaningless but for Man who endows them with meaning.
Virtually Revolutionary Cultures Versus Structurally-Paradigmatically
Revolutionary Cultures
All cultures no matter how inert and conservative go through the differential
phases. These phases are transitory and, therefore, revolutionary in nature.
Still, there are two types of revolution:
The Virtual Revolution is a change (sometimes, radical) of the structure while the
content is mostly preserved. It is very much like changing the hardware without
changing any of the software in a computer.

The other kind of revolution is more profound. It usually involves the

transformation or metamorphosis of both structure and content. In other cases, the
structures remain intact but they are hollowed out, their previous content replaced
with new one. This is a change of paradigm (superbly described by the late Thomas
Kuhn in his masterpiece: "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions").
The Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome Differentiating Factor
As a result of all the above, cultures react with shock either to change or to its
absence.
A taxonomy of cultures can be established along these lines:
Those cultures which regard change as a trauma versus those cultures who react
with traumatic shock to the absence of change, to paralysis and stagnation.
This reactive pattern is discernible in every sphere of life: the economic, the social,
in the arts, the sciences.
Neurotically Adaptive versus Normally Adaptive Cultures
This is the dividing line:
Some cultures feed off fear and trauma. To adapt, they develop neuroses. Other
cultures feed off hope and love they undergo normal adaptation.
Neurotic Cultures

Normal Cultures

Consuming

Distinguishing

Past Oriented

Future Oriented

Static

Dynamic (Emergent)

Consensual

Conflictive

Exogenic-Extrinsic

Endogenic-Intrinsic

Virtual Revolutionary

Structurally-Paradigmatically
Revolutionary

PTSS reaction to change

PTSS reaction to stagnation

So, are these types of cultures doomed to clash, as the current fad goes or can
they cohabitate?
It seems that the Neurotic cultures are less adapted to win the battle to survive. The
fittest are those cultures flexible enough to respond to an ever changing world and
at an ever increasing pace. The neurotic cultures are slow to respond, rigid and
convulsive. Being past-orientated means that they emulate and imitate the normal
cultures of the past. Alternatively, they assimilate and adopt some of the attributes
of the past of normal cultures. This is why a sojourner who visits a neurotic culture
(and is coming from a normal one) often has the feeling that he has been thrust into
the past, that he is experiencing a form of time travel.
A War of Cultures is, therefore, not very plausible. The neurotic cultures need the
normal cultures. Normal cultures are the generators and progenitors of neurotic
cultures. A normal cultures past is often the neurotic cultures future.
Deep inside, the neurotic cultures know that something is wrong with them, that
they are ill-adapted. That is why members of these cultural spheres entertain overt
emotions of envy, hostility, or even hatred coupled with explicit sensations of
inferiority, inadequacy, disappointment, disillusionment and despair. The eruptive
nature (the neurotic rage) of these cultures is exactly the result of this inner
turmoil. To forgo the benefits of learning from the experience of normal cultures as
to how to survive would be suicidal, indeed.
Note about Adolescent Cultures
The tripling of the world's population in the last century or so fostered a rift
between the majority of industrial nations (with the exception of the United States)
and all the developing and less developing countries (the "third world"). The
populace in places like Western Europe and Japan (and even Russia) is ageing and
dwindling. These are middle-aged, sedate, cultures with a middle-class, mature
outlook on life. They are mostly liberal, consensual, pragmatic, inert, and
compassionate.
The denizens of Asia, the Middle East, and Africa are still multiplying. The "baby
boom" in the USA - and subsequent waves of immigration - kept its population
young and growing. Together they form the "adolescent block" of cultures and
societies.
In the Adolescent Block, tastes and preferences (in film, music, the Internet,
fashion, literature) are juvenile because most of its citizens are under the age of 21.
Adolescent cultures are ideological, mobilized, confrontational, dynamic,
inventive, and narcissistic.

History is the record of the clashes between and within adolescent civilizations. As
societies age and mature, they generate "less history". The conflict between the
Muslim world and the USA is no exception. It is a global confrontation between
two cultures and societies made up mostly of youngsters. It will end only when
either or both ages (chronologically) or matures (psychologically).
Societies age naturally, as the birth rate drops, life expectancy increases, pension
schemes are introduced, wealth is effectively redistributed, income and education
levels grow, and women are liberated. The transition from adolescent to adult
societies is not painless (witness the 1960s in Europe and the USA). It is bound to
be protracted, complicated by such factors as the AIDS epidemic. But it is
inevitable - and so, in the end, is world peace and prosperity.
Note about Founding Fathers and The Character of States
Even mega-states are typically founded by a small nucleus of pioneers, visionaries,
and activists. The United States is a relatively recent example. The character of the
collective of Founding Fathers has a profound effect on the nature of the polity that
they create: nations spawned by warriors tend to be belligerent and to nurture and
cherish military might throughout their history (e.g., Rome); When traders and
businessman establish a country, it is likely to cultivate capitalistic values and
thrive on commerce and shipping (e.g., Netherlands); The denizens of countries
formed by lawyers are likely to be litigious.
The influence of the Founding Fathers does not wane with time. On the very
contrary: the mold that they have forged for their successors tends to rigidify and
be sanctified. It is buttressed by an appropriate ethos, code of conduct, and set of
values. Subsequent and massive waves of immigrants conform with these norms
and adapt themselves to local traditions, lores, and mores.