Corporate Culture And Euro Disney

            Over the last decade a large amount of organizational communication research has focused on the assessment and development of "corporate culture". Largely due to the advancement in communication technology, the physical distance between countries is diminishing and the range of the marketplace has extended from local to international populations. With the increase of intercultural contracts in business the impact of culture communication processes have become an important challenge. .
             American business management tends to assume that we have the best business schools, the best business people and subsequently the best business procedures. These assumptions have led to specific behaviors in international business that is increasingly recognized as American in nature. American business's tendency to assume the transferability of culturally loaded business models includes the codification and protection of organizational procedures. This results in an approach to overseas business interactions that can easily become domineering and rigid. Such tendencies are illustrated in the communication and business assumptions and tactics included in the initial establishment of Euro Disney in Paris, France. In this paper I will explore the establishment of Euro Disney and the related assumptions and behaviors precipitated by predetermined procedures, cultural threat, and a sense of autonomy.
             In 1985, Disney Corporation officials individually approached the French, Spanish and English governments with a proposal for building their first European theme park (Rudolf, 1991). Initially, Disney created what one of Disney's investment bankers called "a false sense of competition" among Spain, England and France. It was clear that Disney intended from the beginning to plant its roots in the soil of Marne-La-Vallee near Paris, France (interview with American consultant, 1996). The bargaining chip that made the competition so important to these European governments was an estimated 30,000 jobs that a Disney park would create as well as, providing assistance with the overall economic improvement for France (Rudolf, 1991).