767BOOK REVIEW

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com)

© 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. • DOI: 10.1002/tie.21499

Correspondence to: Nick Stone, Department of Management and Marketing, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC, 3010, Australia, 61 3 9499 8384 (phone),

n.stone@unimelb.edu.au.

By

Nick Stone

I approached the challenge of reviewing this 500-page

tome with some ambivalence. On the one hand, I was

excited to dive into a rare publication that compre-

hensively addresses areas I have been passionate about for

decades. On the other hand, the very reasons that make

intercultural competence so perennially fascinating also

make it very difficult to psychologically manage: it is diffi-

cult to feel like there are many clear answers to its various

related problems. On these grounds, I braced myself for

an anticlimax.

As several of the authors acknowledge, there has

been little widespread agreement amongst specialists with

respect to conceptual or methodological approaches,

for example. I suspected that in any single publication,

it was probably impossible to comprehensively represent

the multifarious nature of this field, or perhaps I should

say “fields.” It is almost an oxymoron to expect common

agreement across such diverse disciplines that are linked

to intercultural competence (ICC). It resembles the ever-

growing love child of several, sometimes conflicting par-

ent traditions including anthropology, sociology, social

and cross-cultural psychology, linguistics and communica-

tion, education, training, management, and international

business.

Is it possible to reconcile such an array of conflict-

ing spheres of research and knowledge? Is it even wise

to juxtapose value sets that are often defined by their

contrast and reaction to (and frequently rejection of)

other traditions? Kipling’s provocation comes to mind:

should we accept that “never the twain [East and West]

can meet”?

Deardoff and her contributors have confronted this

Hydra with Herculean courage to provide what is prob-

ably the most useful summary yet of ICC research and

applications for the “scholar and practitioner alike” (Hof-

stede, back cover). The foreword identifies its audience as

educators, students, administrators, trainers, and business

people, an ambitious scope that, overall, I believe is well

addressed.

There are 29 chapters by a virtual who’s who of

(mostly) well-known specialists in related areas. The first

half of the book deals with conceptual issues, reflecting

the overriding legacy of complexity resulting from such

diverse disciplinary roots. The second section addresses

applications of ICC, mostly related to education and

other learning, while the last part relates to “research

and assessment.” It must have been difficult to decide

on themes with which to structure the book, but it does

seem odd that assessment should be located in a separate

section from learning and development, especially when

authors such as Fantini (Chapter 27) affirm the need to

integrate the two.

Darla K. Deardoff, 2009. The Sage Handbook of Intercultural Competence. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 560 pages. ISBN:

9781412960458.

Intercultural Consilience

or Cacophony?

768 BOOK REVIEW

Thunderbird International Business Review Vol. 54, No. 5 September/October 2012 DOI: 10.1002/tie

effective cultural diversity management, the book tacitly

(and appropriately) accepts a diverse range of such

positions as both valid and valuable. However, a more

explicit excavation of links between disciplinary legacies

and the current work would be another way to make

more sense out of the many models presented, which,

when considered together, risk resembling an irreconcil-

able cacophony.

The authors do provide an insightful overview and

commentary regarding the ICC state of play. For exam-

ple, they point out issues related to the widespread

assumption that various elements comprising ICC can

be considered separable. They support the strong case

to consider more integrated models that acknowledge

humans as being influenced by a range of both conscious

and less conscious, more emotional forces. Janet Bennett

eloquently provides further support for this case in Chap-

ter 6 under the rubric of “cultivating” ICC. No doubt this

call to incorporate irrationality will concern traditional-

ists who lean toward exclusively cognitive explanations of

intercultural phenomena and interactions.

Similarly, most of the subsequent chapters offer a

succinct summary of their topic areas, as well as adding

further value such as challenging common assumptions

or identifying most needed future research avenues. In

Chapter 3, for example, Pusch highlights the critical

need for global leadership to include ethical dimen-

sions and an inherent responsibility to help address

critical global issues. In the following chapter, (Gert Jan)

Hofstede extends this approach with a refreshing and

accessible discussion of “moral circles” in ICC, integrat-

ing evolutionary biology and systems theories with the

culture value dimensions frameworks his father is best

known for.

While the catch cry global citizenship has been liber-

ally thrown around educational circles in recent years,

in Chapter 7 Ashwill and Oanh eschew the loose jargon

for a clearly defined, succinct operational definition (p.

142) that casts a sharper light on what can be an overly

obtuse concept. Their comparisons between US Ameri-

can and Vietnamese conceptions of global citizenship

provide powerful insights into relative manifestations

of patriot ism, nationalism, and ethnocentrism. While

not strictly in their own words, they also include a quote

from an international education leader (New Mexico

State University, 2008) that refers to a need to “compete

and thrive in the world.” This seems like a puzzling con-

tradiction to other definitional aspects that emphasize

responsibility to all of humanity, rather than, for exam-

ple, serving the single bottom lines of corporations or

nations. This is more than a trivial distinction that often

Both the book’s reviewers and contributors are pre-

dominantly US-based and/or educated, perhaps a natural

and inevitable product of the current center of gravity for

work in this domain. However, this bias does need to be

acknowledged when judging the representativeness and

possible stilting of its contents. The foreword by Derek

Bok, for example, is blatantly US-centric in its examples

and assumptions about readers’ origins, which is some-

what alienating to the majority of those who live in the

rest of the world. It will be a welcome sign of interna-

tionalization when we see such a handbook that is more

geographically and culturally balanced in its sources and

perspectives.

The subject scope, however, does include some

refreshing insights that are from more diverse cultural

origins. Several chapters focus on illuminating culture-

specific perspectives from Vietnam, sub-Saharan and

North Africa/the Arab world, India, China, Germany,

and Latin America. I found Chapter 12 on India particu-

larly interesting and useful, as it explained some funda-

mental aspects of Indian worldviews and philosophies in

clear terms, without assuming any overriding homogene-

ity across the subcontinent. The book also covers a broad

range of disciplinary areas, including communicative

competence, leadership, discourse analysis, and political

and social emancipatory concerns.

The first chapter dives head first into the maelstrom

of conceptualizing intercultural competence. Spitzberg

and Changnon provide a very useful typology of some of

the main types of ICC models that have emerged recently.

The depth and breadth of these various conceptualiza-

tions, along with the lists of associated “concept and fac-

tor labels” totaling eight pages and hundreds of items,

reflects the immense challenge involved in summarizing

and methodologically managing the multifarious con-

structs associated with ICC.

It may sound picky, but the continued use of blan-

ket terms such as Eastern perspectives (p. 4) do not seem

helpful in a book ostensibly aimed at fostering greater

category width and discriminant power. Even less coarsely

grained descriptions, such as “North-East” or “South-East

Asia” belie the historically, linguistically, and culturally

distinct composite groups within each category.

What might have been useful either here, in a sepa-

rate introductory chapter, or in a future edition, is some

sort of superordinate taxonomy, such as identifying

which philosophical and/or epistemological traditions

have influenced respective models. Such a spectrum

might range from Milton Bennett’s “radical constructiv-

ism” to the logical empiricist approaches outlined by

Van de Vijver and Leung in Chapter 24. In the spirit of

Intercultural Consilience or Cacophony? 769

DOI: 10.1002/tie Thunderbird International Business Review Vol. 54, No. 5 September/October 2012

should be required reading for academics, administra-

tors, and students—in fact anyone interested in maxi-

mizing the potential of international study to support

intercultural learning.

One omission of note seems to be that of indig-

enous people’s conceptions and issues relating to inter-

cultural competence. Neither the word indigenous nor

aboriginal appears anywhere in the contents or index

sections. The only related mention is in the last chapter,

significantly subtitled “An Epilogue,” where Trimble,

Pedersen, and Rodela offer a cautionary tale in which

researchers were sued for breaching the terms of their

agreement with the Havasupai Native American tribe.

The epilogue to this epilogue, which emerged since the

book’s publication, was the case being settled in favor

of the Havasupai (Harmon, 2010). Given the range of

ICC related, shameful, and persistent problems expe-

rienced by indigenous people’s due to domination by

other cultures across the globe, applying ICC to address

inequities and improve their wellbeing and opportuni-

ties should be a conspicuous part of any intercultural

research or applied agenda.

To return to Kipling’s ballad that is so often quoted

incompletely to contradict his intended message (and

forgiving the dead white male linguistic gender bias):

But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed,

nor Birth,

When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come

from the ends of the earth!

This handbook succeeds in “standing face to face”

strong, rich, and contrasting traditions. It provides a valu-

able platform for enhanced interdisciplinary synergies, as

well as its prime subject, intercultural competence. The

strike rate of high-quality, valuable, and interesting chap-

ters, compared with others of lesser standing, is admirably

high. I suspect this will become a standard authoritative

reference in years to come.

goes unheeded: much of the management and other

ICC-related literature assumes that commercial com-

petitiveness and superiority are universal motivators for

developing ICC, whereas they may in fact run contrary to

the values underpinning many of the conceptualizations

contained in this book.

In the second, “applied” section of the book, Storti’s

chapter is ostensibly focused on human resources, though

he actually addresses a much smaller, specific HR subset

by providing an introduction for (presumably) novice

cross-cultural trainers. He offers some advice that seems

curious to this reviewer, such as “it’s better not to start

down the assessment road if you don’t have to” (p. 281).

Given the profound effect assessment inevitably has on

the quality of learning, this precept appears problematic.

He later claims that the future of cross-cultural training

is “computer-based e-learning.” This also appears conten-

tious: as other authors have pointed out, the mere acqui-

sition of the type of surface knowledge that lends itself

to such efficient forms of delivery has limited impact in

developing ICC, compared with face-to-face, experiential,

and other more authentic learning modes.

A few of the other chapters in the applied section

also seem trite, adding little that is original or insightful.

Chapter 16, titled “ICC in Business: Leading Global Proj-

ects,” seems little more than a perfunctory summary of

some elementary project management strategies. Tacked

on toward the end is a superficial summary of some

basic intercultural concepts, including a self-citation that

amounts to a paraphrasing of some of Edward T. Hall’s

seminal work. It concludes, with little segue, by describing

Shackleton’s Antarctic achievements as an illustration of a

“great leader of a global project” (p. 301). The tangential

(at best) relevance of this content contrasts starkly with

most of the ensuing chapters in which veterans such as

Michael Byram, Michael Paige, Fons Van de Vijver, and

Kwok Leung provide essential reading in their respective

specialty areas. For example, Chapter 25 on study abroad

Nick Stone works as a lecturer, researcher, and consultant across several fi elds including cross-cultural manage-ment, learning and development, leadership and management, intercultural effectiveness, and interprofessional

and higher education. Nick has also worked in the public and community sectors managing a range of education

and training projects and as a human resource manager. He is currently completing a PhD on assessing intercul-tural effectiveness in management learning and practice. This study has resulted in the development of an original

assessment instrument which is currently being used by several universities in Australia and internationally.

770 BOOK REVIEW

Thunderbird International Business Review Vol. 54, No. 5 September/October 2012 DOI: 10.1002/tie

New Mexico State University (2008, March). News from the dean for international and border programs: Citizen diplomacy, social entrepreneurship, and international learning outcomes. Retrieved July 15, 2010, from: http://international.nmsu.edu/pages/news/March_2008.pdf

References

Harmon, A. (2010). Where’d you go with my DNA? New York Times. Retrieved July 6, 2010, from www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/weekinreview/25harmon.html?_r=1

Kipling, R. (1892). The ballad of east and west. Retrieved July 16, 2010, from http://bartleby.net/246/1129.html