There is trouble in Tibet. Or rather, there was trouble in Tibet. The protesters have surrendered as per this writing date.
The Chinese authorities, once again, used force to crush this opposition.
Why is the Western world so concerned about this? Why does the Chinese government use crude power to end opposition?
I’ll attempt to explain this from a cultural perspective, using Hofstede’s 5D-model of cultural dimensions.
First some numbers; China scores high on power distance (hierarchy): 80; in comparison UK/US score 35/40, so significantly lower. A characteristic of power distance is, when it comes to change: “evolution (low score) versus revolution (high score)”.
