Political culture (normative approach)

Abstract

This entry offers an overview of the more relevant meanings of the expression «political culture» in contemporary political theory. Since its character is mutable and multifaceted, no obvious definition eliminates the margins of uncertainty. Set aside its precedents in the history of social and political thought, the article focuses on the renewed interest raised by this topic from the 1960s. A distinction is drawn between descriptive and empirical approaches, on the one side, that aim at finding the cultural background of consolidated democracies, from other approaches that look for the normative dimensions of the issue, paying attention to the responsibility that our democracies have in the construction of a civic culture which live up to our expectations. Finally, the entry deals with Rousseaunian considerations on civic religion, where it is possible to identify the common root of many beliefs and compromises that support the coexistence in contemporary pluralist societies.