Understanding Trump Phenomenon:A Cultural Profile

Donald Trump's popularity and success in the 2016 presidential election of the United States have attracted considerable academic interests.His rather phenomenal victory not only shows that the business mogul can run a brilliant campaign,but more importantly,implies that the values he stands for are representative of the prevailing opinions of the current American society.Widely applied in the field of intercultural communications,the Cultural Dimensions Theory developed by Hofstede offers a comprehensive scheme for the profiling of cultures,being able to unite numerous cultural signs under one multi-dimensional framework.In this way,the theory may also be able to put the cultural values behind Trump's political propositions into one cultural profile.Applying four cultural dimensions of the theory: Power Distance,Uncertainty Avoidance,Individualism v.Collectivism,and Masculinity v.Femininity,this study examines the cultural values represented by Trump as the President of the United States as embodied in his campaign promises.It comes to a finding that Trump seems to possess conservative,uncertainty avoiding,individualistic and masculine cultural values over a wide range of issues facing the country.The conclusion could be conducive to deciphering the Trump phenomenon,explaining the cultural motives behind his policies and predicting the future course of the country,which can further contribute to the maintenance and development of the Sino-U.S.relationship.The thesis comes in six chapters.Introduction elaborates the topic and the intentions of the study.Chapter 1 presents a review of literature on Trump as the subject of the thesis.Chapter 2 explains the theoretical framework of the study following an introduction of its theoretical basis,the Cultural Dimensions Theory.Chapter 3 offers a briefing on Donald Trump,his campaign during the 2016 presidential election and his political propositions.Chapter 4 looks at Trump's political propositions in an effort to identify the cultural values therein from the perspectives of the four cultural dimensions,which it later assembles into a cultural profile of President Trump.The last part draws a conclusion of this study: the cultural profile of President Trump,its meaning and its prospect,followed by the limitations of this thesis and suggestions for further research.