Political culture

The concept of "political culture" appeared in the 18th century. This term was used in his writings by Johann Herder (German philosopher-educator). However, the theory itself, which provides for the study of political peace through culture, was formed much later. It was formed only to the 50-60th years.

Political culture is considered a complex of typical for a certain state images and forms of behavior of people in the public sphere. These forms and images embody the value representations of the population. They reflect the idea of people about the purposes and sense of political development. Together with this, the established traditions and norms of relations between society, man and the state are consolidated.

Political culture is the value-normative system that society adheres to. There is this structure in the form of generally accepted and generally popular among the majority of the population the main ideals and values.

Very often it is in the political sphere that entire social groups or individual citizens try to realize their interests. However, it should be noted that this process is not immediate. It is expressed in relation to leaders, elites, power and so on.

As a rule, the expression of this relationship is not something innovative or extraordinary. As practice shows, it is the political culture that dominates the society that prescribes typical rules and patterns of political behavior.

Representations of power are mostly inculcated in a person with upbringing. Based on these ideas, the individual interacts with the state. Thus, the most stable and unchanging features in the character are seen, the style of human behavior is manifested, the political culture of the individual is determined.

However, decisions are often made "not by the head, but by the heart". Not always the intentions of people coincide with their actions. Emerging contradictions, which are part of political life, give internal contradictions to political culture. At the same time, such ambiguity allows simultaneously supporting both active and passive forms of participation in the life of the power of each individual.

Defining political culture as a specific sphere of phenomena, it should be noted that it is able to influence the course of the process, the dynamics of changes in the public sector, and the state of the actors involved. Among the most stable functions, reflecting different directions of action on power, it should be noted:

1. Identification, revealing the constant desire of a person to understand his group affiliation and determine acceptable methods of participation in defending himself, expressing the interests of the entire relevant community.
2. Socialization - the acquisition of certain properties and skills in the implementation of their own civil rights, political interests and tasks.
3. Integration (disintegration), which enables different groups to coexist within the established system.
4. Communication, facilitating the interaction of all institutions and subjects of power based on the use of generally accepted stereotypes, symbols, terms and other information tools.
5. Orientation, characterizing the human desire for the semantic expression of the phenomena of power, the understanding of their personal abilities in the realization of freedoms and rights in the conditions of a certain system.
6. Prescription (programming), reflecting the priority of specific norms, orientations and concepts that set and explain a separate direction and boundaries of the formation of human behavior.

There are three main (ideal) types of political culture. However, in an ideal form, they are not found in the real world. Theoretically, there is a subject and patriarchal culture, as well as a culture of participation. For young states that are independent, the second type is characteristic. At the same time, the patriarchal political culture is oriented towards national values and can be manifested in the form of local patriotism, mafia, and corruption.