Individualsm and collectivism Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Individualsm and collectivism - Assignment Example Collectivism advocates for the importance of social groups always having cohesion. Therefore collectivists will focus mainly on the society or the nation or even the community and not on individuals (Donohue, 1995, p.7). In the United States, individualism and collectivism can be seen in many ways. Individualism can be dated back to the 17th and 18th century in United States. A perfect event of individualism in American history was the frontier. A person was believed to fail or to succeed based on their own individual effort. Many people actually died during this period trying to prove to them that they can be individualists in the frontier farms and the forests. Certain people like Franklin and Washington succeeded based on their own intelligence and ambition and they are perfect examples of individualism (Kim, 1994, p.23). Collectivism is something that was mainly practiced in United States after the world war. Events like United States gaining its independence from Europe in 1776 also shows that individualism worked really well for America. Today, United States wants to be a bigger part of something by practicing collectivism. An event of collectivism in United States was the political system whi ch happened to be representative democracy. In such an event when a president is elected by the majority the people are all expected to embrace their new leader. An ideal case in point would be the choice of Barack Obama as the president in 2012. The totality of the votes casted in the college showed the collectivism of the people in the election of the president (Kitayama, & Cohen, 2007, p.259). In the real world experience some people believe that individual work is what will make them successful while others believe working collectively in a society is what will bring about success. These two aspects help one understand the cultural differences of people. In individualist culture they put the