When Hofstede published the book Culture’s Consequences International
Differences in WorkRelated
Values in 1980, he established indices of culture; culture
was to be a measurable variable in international business studies. Hofstede's theoretical
basis is traced to a comparative approach established by George Murdock. The lack of
use of Hofstede’s dimensions in mainstream social sciences is described. This is
sourced to the nineteenthcentury
scholarship of Edward Tylor, and the debate
concerning "Galton's problem". Murdock took the occasion of the 1971 Huxley
Memorial Lecture “Anthropology’s Mythology” to renounce his own adherence to this
method, and to plead for a new association between anthropology and psychology.
Such a shift was paralleled by Hofstede in 1991. It is suggested that there are other
methods which may better advance international comparative accounting research
