1. Intellectual Styles by Johan Galtung
Seminar:
Innovation, Change and Decision-Making in international Organisations
Katja Schülke, Björn Bauer

2. Overview:
Biography of Johan Galtung
Definition of Intellectual Style
Dimensions of Intellectual Styles
3.1 Paradigm Analysis
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
3.3 Commentary on others
Summary of the four Intellectual Styles
Conditions and Consequences
World Intellectual Style

3. Biography of Johan Galtung
One of the great figures in
Peace Studies
Born 1930 in Norway
Degrees in Mathematics and
Sociology
Established the first peace research institute in 1959
Professor of Conflict and Peace Research
1987 Alternative Nobel Peace Prize
Director of Transcend

4. 2. Definition of Intellectual Style
„[…] basic culture-bound models of thought and behavior shown principally by intellectuals.“
Style
Center
Periphery
saxonic
nipponic
tectonic
gallic
USA, GB
Japan
Germany
France
Canada, Australia
---
Eastern Europe
Latin countries

5. Description of reality Theory Formation Commentary on others
3. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
Paradigm Analysis
Description of reality
Theory Formation
Commentary on others

6. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.1 Paradigm Analysis
Paradigm Analysis means to recognize
and to analyse the paradigm you use
Try to discover the limitations of your own
intellect

7. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.1 Paradigm Analysis
Tectonic and Gallic:
Strong in Paradigm Analysis
Saxonic and Nipponic:
Weak in Paradigm Analysis

8. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Description of reality:
Deals with the importance and degree of data
collection and documentation
Theory Formation:
Refers to the process how theories are set up and
if they are based on data
„[…] theory formation is the stringing together of
words, with occasional anchoring in a data base.“
(Galtung, )

9. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Both dimensions act as counterparts
Saxonic Teutonic Gallic Nipponic
Description
of reality strong weak weak strong
Theory
Formation weak strong strong weak

10. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Saxonic:
Penchant for documentation
Analyse all sources concealing nothing
Goal is to find all relevant information
Faith and beliefs enter to a small degree
Tolerant and democratic, less elitist
Underlying figure of theory formation are
a couple of small pyramids

11. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Gallic:
Intellectual activity has at its very center
theory formation
Function of data would be to illustrate rather
than to demonstrate
Persuasion is carried by elegance
Words in theories connote something and
carry conviction

12. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
There is a totality to things, a balance rather
than a center (hammock)
Gallics goal is elegance (if necessary at the
expense of rigor)
Elitist (only the strongest survive
 Darwinian struggle)

13. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Teutonic:
Intellectual activity has at its very center
theory formation
Function of data would be to illustrate rather
than to demonstrate
Purely deductive
Goal to arrive from a small number of premises at
a high number of conclusions

14. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
One big pyramid is the forming exercise
The teutonic aim for rigor (if necessary at the
expense of elegance)
Elitist (only the strongest survive
 Darwinian struggle)

15. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.2 Description of reality and Theory Formation
Nipponic:
Very different visions of how real reality is constituted
Dialectic way of thinking
Little or no theory at all being developed
Japanese almost never pronounce absolute statements
Underlying figure of theory formation is a circle
 no beginning and no end
tolerant and democratic, less elitist
(opposed to gallic and teutonic)

16. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.3 Commentary on other intellectuals
Saxonic:
Pluralism is an important value
Togetherness / Team Work
Debate is seen as a source of delight
Changing opinion in the course of a
debate is appreciated

17. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.3 Commentary on other intellectuals
Gallic and Tectonic:
Presentator has the role of a defendant
No complimentary introduction
Discussants go straight for the weakest points
Nobody changes opinion
Change opinion in the course of the
debate is not honorable
Engage in a debate with a strict
antagonist would be considered hopeless

18. Dimensions of Intellectual Style
3.3 Commentary on other intellectuals
Nipponic:
Not very skillful at debating
Established social relations can not be harmed
Collectivistic solidarity no victimisation
Classification into schools preempts a debate
No direct focus on weak argumentations

19. 4. Summary of the four Intellectual Styles
Typical question when somebody is faced with a proposition:
Saxonic: How do you operationalize it?
Teutonic: How can you trace this back from basic principles?
Gallic: Is it possible to say this in French?
Nipponic: Who is your master?

20. 5. Conditions and Consequences
Relationship between language and Intellectual Style
A language has to fit the intellectual style of
the concerned culture
Class differences in languages are related
to differences in Intellectual Style
 Intellectual Style has a class character

21. 5. Conditions and Consequences
Intellectual Style and the culturally defined
notion of truth
Permanent truth  Deductive Intellectual Style
Flexible truth  Dialectical Intellectual Style
Notions of truth are related to a country`s status
in the world order

22. 5. Conditions and Consequences
Intellectual Style and social structures
vertical, polarized and individualist tectonic
horizontal, individualist and polarized  gallic
horizontal, individualist and less polarized  saxonic
vertical, collectivist and non polarized  nipponic

23. 5. Conditions and Consequences
The situation of peripheries
Hypothesis: periphery intellectual cultures don`t
produce anything new, but do only imitate their
center

24. 6. World Intellectual Style
World Intellectual Style is improbable
because of cultural and language variety
If there was a World Intellectual Style
 Saxonic
industrialization
exigencies of UN system

25. Thank you for your attention!