Authors: Bobbio, Matteucci, Pasquino
Summary: This 1,477-word entry defines political culture, presents three ways of understanding it, and then reports three different types of political culture. The entry defines political culture as "the whole of attitudes, norms and beliefs shared by the members of a specified social unit, having as their object political phenomena." Political culture in this sense means the ways that individuals look at social relations and events.
In accordance with Almond and Verba, the entry notes three ways of understanding political culture. The first one is a cognitive orientation: it concentrates on the knowledge and beliefs concerning the political system. The second one is affective orientation: is it concentrates on feelings about the political system. The third way of understanding political culture is the orientation of valuation. It includes opinions on political phenomena and combines knowledge, feelings and criteria of valuation.
According to these orientations, three different types of political culture are reported in the entry. The first type, called the parochial political culture, is present in simple and not-differentiated societies. The second type, called the political culture of subjection, is recurrent in relation to the administrative machine, that is in charge of implementing political decisions: these orientations are particularly passive. The third type is the political culture of participation: it occurs when the individual is expected to take an active part in politics.
The last part of the entry stresses that in contemporary society it is difficult to find a homogeneous political culture. It is easier to find a group of sub-cultures--that is, conflicting attitudes, norms and values.