The stages of political adaptation of the population in the process of democratization

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The stages of political adaptation of the population in the process of democratization

Iskhakova N.G.

PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology and Political Science,

National Aviation University

This article re-veals the social factors of the political adaptation of the population of the countries that are in the process of democratic transformation. The general characteristics of political adaptation of people are established. The specificity of political adaptation in the transformation of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes is studied.

Keywords: political adaptation, political socialization, democratization, transformation ofthe political system.

Ісхакова Н.Г., кандидат політичних наук, доцент, доцент кафедри соціології та політології, Національний авіаційний університет (Україна, Київ

Етапи політичної адаптації населення в процесі демократизації

Розкриваються соціальні чинники політичної адаптації населення країн, які перебувають в процесі демократичної трансформації. Виокремлюються загальні тенденції зміни взаємодії людини та політичної системи. На цій основі встановлюються загальні характеристики політичної адаптації людей. Досліджується специфіка політичної адаптації під час трансформації авторитарних та тоталітарних режимів.

Ключові слова: політична адаптація, політична соціалізація, демократизація, трансформація політичної системи.

political adaptation democratic transformation

In the conditions of contradictory formation of a democratic political system ofthe Ukrainian society and also deformation of social communications and loss the value of previously acquired political the practices the particular importance obtains the research of the process of political adaptation of the personality, its active participation in the formation of new forms of the organization of society. Consideration of the given problem has to happen with the attraction of theoretical and empirical researches of those countries which formation of new public order has already happened. The complex research of the defining factors of political adaptation of the personality is extremely important. It is necessary to specify that political adaptation will be considered by us as compound more scaled process of political socialization. The last has been presented as a process of integration of individuals to all systems of the socio-political relations, their inclusion in the institutional structure of society by political activity of the personality during which takes place knowledge and further development ofthese relations.

The process of democratization became the expansion of the leading tendency of world political development in the second half of the 20th century. The transition researches from totalitarianism and authoritarianism to democratic regime have been generally concentrated on the analysis of events in the countries of Southern Europe (Greece, Spain, Portugal) and Latin America (Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil). Researchers have developed a number of approaches by results of development of democratic processes which subsequently have been postponed for the researches of the countries in the Central American region (Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua) and the countries of Africa, Central and Southeast Asia. In the late eighties of the XX century this global process has moved to Eastern Europe, and then has involved the Soviet Union.

An experience of these countries, the considerable material has accumulated in scientific literature, that gives the chance to make defined generalize conclusions of democratic transformation of political regimes. There is the whole concept under the name a transitology at which beginnings was the American political scientist D. Rastou [4]. He has for the first time constructed dynamic model of the process of transition to democracy based on the analysis of processes of democratization in Sweden (1890-1920) and Turkey (since 1945). The scientist picked out the main stages of democratization, having especially noted a role of subjective factors of such transition. This model assumes the existence of the main prerequisite of transition to democracy - it is the perception of citizens of the general identity, accessory to political communities. The very transition has three stages: preparatory which is characterized by the serious conflict of the main social forces; phase of adoption of rules of democratic law and order; an adaptation phase -fixing of democratic political institutes and procedures, the statement of a new form of interaction of civil society and the state. These phases are considered by modern political scientists as such which are characteristic of all transitional societies.

In well-grounded research « Transitions from authoritarian government: preceding conclusions about uncertain democracies» (1986) the authors G. O'Donnell, F. Shmitter have carried out the comparative analysis of the transition processes happening in the countries of Southern Europe and Latin America. Authors have picked out three stages of transition to democracy: liberalization, democratization (establishment of democratic institutes and procedures), resocialization (assimilation by citizens of new political norms and values, gradual entry into the new system of the relations during the democratic political process and also as a result of a specially organized system oftraining) [6, p. 71].

The American researcher Adam Przeworski in work «Democracy and the market. Political and economic reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America» (1990) gives the detailed description of those determinants of social and political development which directly influence the process of change of the institutional system of society, its social sphere and the relations. The scientist tried to answer the question «whether there will be a new democracy stable and under what conditions which social institutes have to be in its foundation what factors of an effective new political system, economic mechanisms are in its foundation» [3, p. 11].

Giving the wide analysis to these processes scientists almost didn't focus on a problem of political adaptation of people and if this problem entered the field of researches, it wasn't standing out as a specific component, demands the detailed description.

On the basis of the analysis of above-mentioned approaches and concepts of democratization the author of this article suggests defining the features of political adaptation in the conditions of formation of a democracy. An initial thesis is as follows: regularities of processes of democratization are the defining conditions of political adaptation of the person.

The further research demands terminological clarity and specification of concepts.

The historical changes which have happened in the countries of Central Europe since the end of the 1980th years of the 20th century, and subsequently in the republics of the former USSR have received in scientific literature the name transformation. The term «transformation» means to change, transform. The social sciences have begun to use this term since the end of the 50th years of the 20th century for the characteristic of radical structural changes. It reflects the transition to the qualitatively new condition of public organization. Transformational processes are based on dialectic overcoming the existing elements of old public order, formation of the new purposes of development.

Democratization appears as a process of change of the political sphere of society, the transformation of the political regime in all its structural elements in a certain country. This process lasts from the beginning of falling of the previous non-democratic regime to a final stage of stabilization of a new democratic regime.

For designation of a way of change of the political regime in the scientific literature has used the concept «transition period» that means the process of institutional transformation. The transition period is an intermediate phase of a process of democratization which begins with the disintegration of the previous political regime, and comes to the end with the establishment of a certain form of democracy.

The transition period consists of steadily changing political situations. One ofthem is the process of liberalization that makes impossible return to previous non-democratic regime. Liberalization is the real ensuring enrollment of the rights which protect certain individuals and social groups from repressive actions of the power and reliability, ensuring the rights and freedoms means withdrawal from the settled practice of the non-democratic modes. The transitional period, at best, comes to the end with democracy promotion. It means recognition of democratic rules and procedures by political institutes and their distribution on all spheres of public life. It is important that during a transition period there are changes as in the political system of society to political institutes and the relations, characteristic of it, and in other spheres of society.

The conclusive role in the process of democratization is played by political modernization, which is followed not only by formation of political institutes, but also social mobilization and distribution of political participation and also distribution of democratic values and norms in developing countries [2, p. 364].

Based on the conventional lines of democratization it is possible to allocate the general tendencies of change of interaction of the person and political system.

1. Delegitimization destroys by the developed system of the interrelation of the person and political system as a result of a crisis of the state institutes and decentralization of the power.

2. Liberalization of the regime expands possibilities of political activity of individuals and social groups in the course of realization of the rights and interests.

3. Activation of non-state institutes promotes organized participations of citizens in the political process and to the introduction of civil norms and rules of conduct.

4. Formation of party system provides structuring public interests.

The process of political adaptation of people to changes of political system has a number of common features.

1. Social disorientation. This phenomenon is caused by deformation of the social and economic system of society and is a consequence of destruction of social communications, the statuses and roles, the systems of norms and examples ofbehaviour.

2. New social identification. Adaptation of individuals to new socio-political conditions happens with establishment of new social identities and entry into the institutional structure of society.

3. Collective political participation. Mobilization of individuals within non-state institutes by group participation in the political process.

4. Establishment of loyalty to valuable and standard bases of democratic society.

However, it is necessary to notice that regularities of transformation of authoritarian regimes differ from the democratization of the countries with the totalitarian past, first of all, of the Post-Soviet countries which have the features and tendencies of development. Therefore, a political adaptation of people will gain peculiar features in a number of the countries.

Based on a number of concepts of transformational processes of authoritarian societies (D. Rastou, F. Shmitter, A. Przeworski) it is possible to claim that process of delegitimization of authoritarian regime as a result of the crisis of its public authorities and split of the authoritarian block in the environment of elites breaks the settled system of the relations of submission of citizens with power institutes. The weakened state regulation of the non-political sphere of society gave the chance of the articulation of interests of social groups, self-identifications of individuals though with considerable political, ideological, cultural constraints. Strict regulation of political activity of the masses, restrictions of political debates and opportunities to influence the authorities from citizens didn't exclude the existence of «limited pluralism» in various spheres of public life. Therefore a decrease in the state control of the socio-political relations expands opportunities for activation of political activity of citizens. It creates prerequisites for change of relationship of the person and political system, and then the changes of all types of political socialization characteristic of authoritarian society. Spain can become examples (the 1970th years) where at a stage of liberalization has been weakened prosecutions of labour movements and also Brazil (the 1980th years) where at once the organizations became more active.

Assumption ofactivity ofthe uncontrollable organizations in the state, the conciliatory relation to the strikes, meetings and other actions of a mass protest, leads the introduction of alternative elections to expansion of the group forms of impact on the power, the introduction of a new system of roles and their variability (votes, participation in activity of associations, mass movements, etc.). An increase in the level of the collective involvement into political process has a number of consequences in the socio-political sphere:

- stabilization of system of requirements and social expectations;

- assimilation of new system of roles and standards of behaviour;

- providing channels of non-state regulation of political activity;

- understanding the aims in the political sphere through development group than consciousness.

So, for example, in post-authoritarian Spain and Portugal despite the absence of the non-state organizations since the beginning of democratization, already in the 1990s the role oflabour unions, parties, movements was rather notable.

Level of conflict of the new party system relying on the broad support of social groups can accelerate or interfere with the formation of new identities (class, professional), to allocation of public interests therefore to a successful formation of new motivational and cognitive structure of consciousness of the person:

- awareness of requirements and interests;

- formation of new system of political values, sociopolitical installations.

Thus, a political adaptation of the personality to new conditions of political life in the post-authoritarian countries has the following characteristics.

1. Activation of a general population in various forms of political participation;

2. cooperation of citizens in voluntary associations, membership in any collectives;

3. establishment of formal rules of rationing of political activity of social groups and individuals.

Political adaptation in the conditions of transformation of totalitarian regime gains peculiar lines. Reasoning from urgency of a problem, the author of article focuses on the analysis of concepts of transformational processes of Eastern Europe and also a number ofPost-Soviet societies.

The crisis of the state and political system in general, as well as in the previous case, has as the result the loss of legitimacy of a political regime, was based on an ideological basis andjustified hierarchically constructed interrelation of the person by the state. Since the end of the 50th years of the 20th century in countries of Eastern Europe and from 70th years in the USSR artificially entering into mass political consciousness (by means of purposeful promotion and the system of political education) communistic values have lost the cementing value for legitimation of the power. The purpose of political development of communistic society didn't become internal beliefs of the person. The social interests haven't been represented in a political system that brought to the hidden negative attitude to the state, political system in general from social groups and individuals [7].

Process of liberalization of the regime in the postcommunist countries, unlike post-authoritarian societies, connected with instability of economic, social and legal systems of society. In the political sphere the revival public and political organization doesn't get broad support from the population owing to deformation of public groups, their interests and the relations. Therefore introduction of new political values, models of political behaviour, steady forms of participation in the political process has slow though the unequal character in the concrete countries. In Post-Soviet Belarus and Russia nearly ten years later (for 1999-2000) remained a steady tendency of attachment to previous social and political system and less focus on the western way of development of citizens of these countries unlike postcommunist Poland and Hungary.

On this basis, the impact of democratization processes in the post-communist and post-Soviet countries can be traced to the nature of political socialization in general and the adaptation, in particular, of the population of these countries.

The following correlation should be made for comparison: the level of social activity - the level of legitimization of the new political regime. For example, at the beginning of the 1990s, the level of public activity in Hungary, Poland and Russia was equally low, and in 1999-2000, the level of support for a democratic regime (democratic institutions as an optimal form of government) in Poland and Hungary was significantly higher than Russia, where there is a tendency to decrease. Accordingly, it can be argued that, unlike postunitary societies, the intensity of population adaptation to democratic political institutions and procedures depends to a lesser extent on the activation of civil society institutions, which is greater than other factors:

- the level of ideologisation of mass consciousness;

- the preservation of the mechanism of culture;

- the level of social disintegration of society.

Thus, there are significant differences in the political adaptation of the population of post-unitary and postcommunist societies. They consist in the following:

1. The orientation of the population of the postauthoritarian countries to the values of the previous sociopolitical and economic system is less than that of the population of the postcommunist societies, where at the initial stage of democratization there were such general features of mass political consciousness as: paternalistic expectations in the socio-economic sphere, lack of interest in political participation, insufficient level of political education distrust of the institutions of power.

2. For post-authoritarian societies, the liberalization of the regime leads to the intensification of the population, in the post-communist - the passive rejection of change. The activities of non-state political institutes in postauthoritarian countries contributed to the involvement of the population as group entities in political relations than in post-communist societies, where the political activity of citizens does not have a permanent institutionalized nature due to the lack of practice of expressing the interests of social groups by organizational structures.

3. Loyalty of the population to a democratic political regime in post- authoritarian societies depends on the success of the functioning of political institutions and the representation of group interests, as opposed to post-communist societies, where loyalty to new political institutions and procedures depends directly on the success of economic transformations [8].

Consequently, the success of democratization processes depends directly on the adaptability of citizens to a new political system, the establishment of a new stable relationship between man and political power on the basis of a rational attitude towards political institutions and structures of a democratic political regime. Therefore, further research into the political adaptation of the population of post-unitary and post-communist societies should be guided by the analysis of the following factors:

- duration of value-added adaptation of mass political consciousness,

- the intensity of political mobilization of the masses,

- the level ofloyalty of the population to the democratic regime.

References

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