China-Knigge für deutsche Geschäftsleute?: die Darstellung Chinas in interkultureller Ratgeberliteratur

Abstract

Anhand einer Analyse aktueller "China-Knigge" für deutsche Manager betrachtet Michael Poerner in seinem Beitrag das darin vermittelte Chinabild. Er geht dabei der Frage nach, ob es sich bei den Ratgebern tatsächlich um fachlich fundierte Darstellungen handelt oder ob sie sich vielmehr an den üblichen, im Laufe der Geschichte tradierten, undifferenzierten Wahrnehmungsmustern orientieren.

"Aimed specifically at Western businesses and managers, this book offers a general framework for understanding Chinese business culture". "You are given practical advice throughout on business etiquette, and how to incorporate Chinese expectations to achieve your goals". These are common samples of advertising texts of publications which promise to give intercultural advice for German businesspeople who are going on a business trip to China. The authors of those publications, which predominantly stress their extensive experience on the Chinese market, intend to describe China and Chinese culture with special emphasis on business interactions in a straightforward and practice-oriented manner. But how do these descriptions by self-proclaimed China-experts look like in detail? Do they really help to bridge cultural differences, or is it just another example of recycling dominant images of China which are mainly characterized by a lack of differentiation? This paper gives a brief overview of the analysis on the way China is presented in intercultural advice literature from 1972 to 2008 with a special focus on 2004 to 2008. It contains the first comprehensive list of intercultural advice books on the German book market from 1972 to 2008 and tries to outline a number of criteria for a first sound classification and evaluation of those publications.