Political methodology in the context of the formation of "smart politics": to the question of the theoretical foundations for studying the interaction of society and government in the Russian Federation

• Main Author: Podyachev Kirill
• Format: Article
• Language: Russian
• Published: Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences 2011-04-01
• Series: Вестник Института социологии
• Subjects: politics; political science; power; influence; aggregation; modernization; social problems; civil movements
• Online Access: http:///files/File/Vestnik_2011_02/Podyachev.pdf

The article is devoted to the problem of choosing the object of research of political science in modern conditions, due to the apparent narrowing of the subject field to forecasting of electoral prospects for political parties and development of technologies for pre-election campaigns. The ground for this situation is the inconsistency of the old methodology, which considered the center of attention of political science to be the state power, as a result of which the struggling for the distribution of the power resource became the sole object of the study. As a result, politology became tied to a historically and culturally limited type of socio-political system. Therefore, it is necessary to go away from the old methodology, and moreover, from the old object of study. The electoral process is losing its importance everywhere, but the process of articulation and aggregation of interests does not stop. This process cannot be considered in isolation from politics in its traditional sense. No significant change in social reality is possible without the participation of the state, and any public activity inevitably faces the need to communicate with the administration and political power, which inevitably politicizes any actions and movements aimed at changing social reality. The theoretical basis for further research can be a conventional two-part model of the social world, in which there are two spheres – the “political community” (or the political system) and the “non-political community”. The key research problem is precisely the quality of communication “power – society – power”. At the level of high theorizing, required are further development of the “two-part” model and the development of definitions of “politics” and “political process” that do not emanate from the struggle for power as a basis. At the level of fundamental research, the main research focus should be on the study of such institutions as citizens’ appeals, public chambers and councils, public reception rooms, non-profit organizations. At the level of the applied developments, the main attention should be paid to the technologies of using existing and designing new communication institutes to promote the interests of citizens.