Andrusyshyn V. Political culture of modern Ukrainian society: cultural analysis

Qualification scientific paper as a manuscript. A thesis for the scholarly degree of the Candidate in Cultural Studies (PhD), specialty 26.00.01 – Theory and History of Culture. Kyiv National University of Culture and Arts, Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, Kyiv, 2024. The dissertation is devoted to the consideration of the mental-axiological and national-psychological foundations of the political culture of Ukrainian society, the dynamics and peculiarities of its transformation at the present stage. It is determined that the search for answers to the question of the vital mechanisms of the transition of Ukrainian society to a new quality draws the attention of theoretical and practical scientists to political values and national-psychological aspects of Ukrainian political culture, since its axiological foundations and their transformation in times of crisis remain an under-researched topic in political science and cultural studies. It is emphasized that the political culture of Ukrainian society, like any other, is formed and developed in close connection with the centuries-old values and traditions of Ukrainians, which are the inner core of the people’s culture and which determine the stereotypes of political behavior and are converted into sociocodes. Particular attention is focused on family traditions and values, since it is the family as a socio-cultural microenvironment that makes the functioning of the entire social structure possible, and the axiological system generated by it influences the way each member of society operates and behaves, especially since patterns of political participation, the main features of political behavior and mentality are laid down in the family. It is stated that the axiological basis in the form of a value consensus in society is of great cultural significance: it is formed and transmitted in time and space, “re-historicized” in everyday life and objectified in the forms of signaling and symbolization. This is how political myths emerge as archetypal constructions that preserve social experience, the imperatives of the spiritual and moral dimension of political processes in the collective memory, as a basic cultural and political form that contains and transmits the historical experience of the people, the semantic core that either corresponds to the nation-building social model and therefore represents it, or does not (“political pseudo-myth” or a culturally different/alien mythological narrative as a threat to authentic cultural traditions, national history and memory). The potential of political mythosymbolism through the prism of cultural analysis is identified and revealed, which made it possible to look at it as a tool for creating a political identity and manifestation of Ukraine’s civilizational choice. At the turn of the XX-XXI centuries, especially after the declaration of independence, the relevance of political myths in Ukraine increased.