Already in 1952 Kroeber and Kluckhohn (1952, quoted in Warthun:1996:8) compiled 300 different definitions of the term "culture" although they limited their focus on the ethnological and theoretical-methodological approaches (Loenhoff 1992:114).

By referring to the inherent complexity of the term "culture" and monitoring it from the perspective of different scientific approaches (i.e. sociology, theories of communication and action), Loenhoff (ebenda:114; 138-139) concludes:
"The strained relation between culture as a) objective manifestation in scripture and symbols, products of daily use, art ect, b) the explicative and action guiding systems of knowledge lying behind them, kognitive schemes and cultural specific competence systems, c) concrete practices and communications which produce culture, re-produce and utilise it, are resolved by most theories in favor of one pole. This results in one-sidedness which narrows the perspective and derogates the explicative demand."

Hofstede defines culture as "...the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another." (1997:5).

The concept of collective programming is explained by Hofstede following the concept of "habitus" of the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1980):
"Certain conditions of existence produce a habitus, a system of permanent and transferable tendencies. A habituts...functions as the basis for pratices and images...which can be collectively orchestrated without an actual conductor." (Hofstede 1997a/2001:4).

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