ABSTRACT
Ethnographic research methods were used in this study to investigate management control systems in use in a Thai owned company, the Saha Farms Company. The findings show that Thai culture has had a significant influence on management control practices at the Company. Komin (1990a, 1990b) writes from an insider's point of view about nine Thai value orientations that are to be seen in the very hierarchical Thai society. These nine cultural value orientations are ego, grateful relationship, smooth interpersonal relationship, flexibility and adjustment, religious-psychical, education and competence, interdependence, fun and pleasure, and task-achievement. These cultural values have such a strong influence on management control within the case company that other control systems, such as Western accounting controls, have very little influence on the internal control and management of the Company.