The Civic Culture: Between Analytical Category and Normative Ideal


Abstrakt

Political culture is one of the most popular research areas related to the functioning of the sphere of politics. Contemporary research on political culture was initiated in the 1950s by American researchers Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba. Their research was characterised by the assumption that the stability of a political system requires a balance between political structures and the accompanying political patterns. They pointed out that modern democratic institutions require civic participation and thus the development of a specific type of attitudes towards the sphere of politics referred to as the civic culture. In this article, the author analyses the social context in which the concepts of Almond and Verba arose, noting that they strongly influenced the way the concept of the civic culture was conceptualised. The author draws attention to the normative aspect of the theory of the American researchers, the consideration of which is necessary for a full understanding of the concept of the civic culture.


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Opublikowane : 2020-12-22


Potulski, J. (2020). The Civic Culture: Between Analytical Category and Normative Ideal. Civitas. Studia Z Filozofii Polityki, 27, 15-42. https://doi.org/10.35757/CIV.2020.27.02

Jakub Potulski  jakub.potulski@ug.edu.pl
University of Gdańsk  Polska
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4139-5590

A professor at the University of Gdańsk. He works in the Institute of Political Science in the Department of Political Systems of that University. His research interests include the sociology of politics, political geography and Russian studies. He is the author of ten independent monographs and over one hundred scientific articles.