Political culture
POLITICAL CULTURE In political sociology -political culture covers a set of beliefs, feelings and values that prevail for a nation at a certain time. Political culture of a society reffers to the way in which the political system has been internalized in the knowledge, feelings and evaluations of the population. In other words, the political culture reffers to certain political orientations, to attitudes towards the political system as a whole and towards its parts, and it also reffers to the attitudes towards the role of oneself inside the system. This concept describes the attitudes, beliefs and rules that guide a political system, which are determined jointly by the history of the system and the experience of its members. Political culture filters the perceptions, generates attitudes and influences ways of participation; it is a major component of the political game. The concept is also used to characterize the differences between national political systems and to analyze these in behavioral terms that draw on psychology and sociology. The study of political culture focuses on the content of this culture and the processes of socialization and internationalization of political values, including the various agencies of political socialization such as family, education, mass media, political parties, and on the compatibility of political culture with the values and attitudes current in the wider national culture, elite and mass culture.