4.5: A Hierarchy of Needs?

The psychologist Abraham Maslow (1943) posited a hierarchy of needs, grouped into five categories. If an ‘earlier’ need is unsatisfied, then other needs will be treated as irrelevant. The categories are:

1. Physiological or survival needs
2. The need for safety
3. A need for love, affection and belonging
4. Esteem needs
5. The need for self-actualization.

Maslow argued that his hierarchy of needs applied to all human beings in all cultures, and that there is a “relative unity behind the superficial differences in specific desires from one culture to another” (p. 389).

If this is right, then his argument could be translated into human security terms as follows. Shan people seek fulfilment of their immediate primary needs, such as food and drink. When these needs are not met, they may risk their safety in order to escape from Burma and work on an orange farm in Thailand where their primary needs will be met, at least for a time (until exposure to pesticides affects their physical well-being). Certainly, some have fled Shan State because they were forced to labour for the Burmese military, and were therefore unable to make a living for themselves. However, even if their immediate needs are met in Shan State, then the lack of longer-term safety may become apparent, and they may take the same decision to flee.

However, there are others who risked their safety – and became political prisoners, subject to torture and risking summary execution – because of their strong feelings about the political situation in Burma. They felt that the military regime denied their human rights, and those of their compatriots. In other words, primarily due to a lack of self-actualization – not just for themselves, but for others too – they were willing to risk their safety and their physiological equilibrium.

A large number of human actions and decisions can be explained, or at least conceptualised, in Maslow’s terms. Some, apparently, cannot. The question that arises is whether or not this is culturally relative. Does Maslow’s hierarchy work better for explaining people’s felt needs, and actions to fulfil those needs, in one culture than in another? Most importantly, does it work better in the West than in the developing world? In other words, is it ethnocentric?

Hofstede (1984) argues that it was. He cites a 14-country study by Haire, Ghiselli and Porter (1966) in which managers were asked to rate the importance of a number of needs, all of which were aligned with Maslow’s five categories; the only country in which the managers responded as predicted by Maslow’s theory was the USA, the country Maslow was from. Hofstede claims that:

Maslow’s value choice … was based on his mid-twentieth century US middle class values. First, Maslow’s hierarchy reflects individualistic values, putting self-actualization and autonomy on top. Values prevalent in collectivist cultures, such as “harmony” or “family support,” do not even appear in the hierarchy. Second, … even if just the needs Maslow used in his hierarchy are considered – the needs will have to be ordered differently in different culture areas. (1984, p. 396)

Hofstede classifies these culturally ordered needs in four categories, according to what the ‘highest’ need would be in a given culture area:

1. Self-actualization
2. A combination of security and assertiveness needs
3. Social relationship needs
4. A combination of security and relationship needs (1984, p. 396).

While he places the USA and other Western counties in the first of these categories, he places Thailand in the fourth (1984, p. 393). Even the Theravada Buddhist monk – who seeks Nirvana for himself – seeks self-transcendence, not self-actualization.