Influence of Foreign Culture on Air Force Contingency Contracting Operations

摘要

Abstract Contingency Contracting Officers (CCOs) are increasingly findingthemselves an integral part of overseas deployments, purchasing in theater whatever the combat forces cannot bring with them. This thesis is designed to explore the possible impact of culture on the deployed CCO's ability to do their job. There were four objectives of this study. First, those tasks CCOs must accomplish in order to perform their job were enumerated. Next, a theory of cultural comparison was identified. This theory measures culture using four dimensions: Power Distance (PDI), Uncertainty Avoidance (UAI), Individualism (IDV), and Masculinity (MAS). These four dimensions were then applied to each of the CCO tasks. Finally, these dimensionalized tasks were compared to specific scores for Japan, the Gulf Arab States, and Southeastern Europe. Results of these comparisons suggest that CCOs in all three locations might expect difficulties accomplishing the twelve identified CCO tasks due to attitudes towards superior-subordinate relationships (PD I) and individualism (IDV). The results also suggest that to a large degree, the cultural differences CCOs need pay most attention to are those differences between American culture as a whole (as differentiated from USAF contingency contracting) and foreign cultures.