Parsons and his idea of ​​the political system. T

Political science/ 3. Theory of political systems

Medvedeva A.V., Rybakov V.V.

Donetsk National University of Economics and Trade named after Mikhail Tugan-Baranovsky

Theories of political systems by D. Easton and T. Parsons

The theory of political systems was created in the 50s. in the twentieth century, primarily through the efforts of American political scientists D. Easton, T. Parsons, G. Almond, R. Dahl, K. Deutsch and others. The first political scientist to describe political life from a systemic perspective was the American scientist David Easton. In his works “Political System” (1953), “The Limit of Political Analysis” (1965), “Systemic Analysis of Political Life” (1965), he laid the foundations of the theory of the political system. He presented the political system as a developing, self-regulating organism, flexibly responding to external impulses and consisting of a whole complex of components and subsystems. Its main purpose, according to D. Easton, is the authoritative distribution of values ​​in society.

In a whole series of works, D. Easton tries to build a holistic theory based on the study of “direct” and “feedback” connections between the political system itself and its external environment, in a certain sense, borrowing the cybernetic principles of the “black box” and “feedback”, and using Thus, in the course of conceptualization, the systems approach and elements of general systems theory. To build a theoretical model, Easton uses four basic categories: 1) “political system”; 2) “environment”; 3) “reaction” of the system to environmental influences; 4) “feedback”, or the impact of the system on the environment. In accordance with this model, the mechanism of functioning of the political system includes four phases. Firstly, this is the “input”, the impact of the external environment (social and non-social, natural) on the political system in the form of demands and support. Secondly, the “conversion” (or transformation) of social demands into the preparation of alternative solutions that constitute a specific government response. Thirdly, this is the “exit”, decision-making and their implementation in the form of practical actions. And finally, fourthly, government performance affects the external environment through a “feedback loop.” The political system is an "open system" receiving constant impulses from the environment. Its main goal is survival and maintaining the stability of the system through adaptation and adaptation to the environment. This mechanism is based on the principle of “homeostatic equilibrium”, according to which the political system, in order to maintain internal stability, must constantly respond to imbalances in its balance with the external environment.

The disadvantages of Easton's model of the political system are:

· excessive dependence on the “demand-support” of the population and underestimation of its independence;

· some conservatism, oriented towards maintaining stability and immutability of the system;

· insufficient consideration of the psychological and personal aspects of political interactions.

Studying society, American sociologist Talcott Parsons (1902 - 1979) identified such fairly independent systems as spiritual, economic and political, differing in their functions.

The economic system serves to adapt society to the environment; the spiritual system supports established ways of life, educates, develops social consciousness, resolves conflicts; the political system ensures the integration of society, the efficiency of common activities and the implementation of common goals.

The model for the creators of the theory was the concept of “social system” by T. Parsons, who considered systems of human action at any level in terms of functional subsystems specialized in solving their specific problems. Thus, at the level of the social system, the adaptation function is provided by the economic subsystem, the integration function is provided by legal institutions and customs, the structure reproduction function, which, according to Parsons, constitutes the “anatomy” of society - a system of beliefs, morality and institutions of socialization (family, education system, etc.) .d.), goal achievement function - political subsystem. Each of the subsystems of society, having the property of openness, depends on the results of the activities of the others. At the same time, mutual exchange in complex systems is carried out not directly, but with the help of “symbolic intermediaries”, which at the level of the social system are: money, influence, value commitments and power. Power, first of all, is a “generalized intermediary” in the political subsystem, while money is a “generalized intermediary” of the economic process, etc.

In addition to the above-mentioned manifestations of a practical nature and the service role of the theory of the political system in political science, there are other forms of its expression. All of them indicate, despite their differences, not only the academic, but also the political, practical, applied significance of the topic under consideration.

Literature:

1. Andreev S. Political systems and political organization of society. // Socio-political sciences. 1992. No. 1.

2. Soloviev A.I. Political science: Political theory, political technologies: Textbook for university students. – M., 2007.

3. Seleznev L.I. Political systems of our time: Comparative analysis. – St. Petersburg, 1995.

The modern concept of “political system” began to take shape intensively in Western political science in the 50s and 60s. last century, and in our country - since the 1970s. The development of the general concept of “political system” was decisively influenced by:

• understanding the complexity and multidimensionality of power relations;
• awareness of the internal relationship of structures and processes;
• irreducibility of the problem of power to state structures.

What is the value of introducing the concept of “political system” into scientific circulation? Firstly, in modeling power as a complex social system. Secondly, supporters of a systemic analysis of power laid the foundation for a vision of the constant dynamics of power and society, their ability to mutually influence. Thirdly, with the introduction of the term “political system” into scientific use, a positivist view of power was developed. The emphasis is not on what the essence of power is, but on what its specific functions are and how it implements them. The modern understanding of the political system is associated with the development of issues of power based on structural-functional, information-communicative and systemic approaches.

The concept of “system” was used by T. Parsons in the study of society. The essence of his theory is that society is a complex open system where four subsystems interact: economic, political, social and spiritual, which are in a relationship of interdependence and mutual exchange. Each of these subsystems performs certain functions and responds to requirements that come from within or from the outside. Together they ensure the functioning of society in action. The economic subsystem is responsible for realizing people's needs for consumer goods (adaptation function). The function of the political subsystem is to determine collective interests and goals and mobilize resources to achieve them. The social subsystem ensures the maintenance of an established way of life, the transmission of norms, rules and values, which become important factors in motivating individual behavior (the function of stability and self-preservation). The spiritual subsystem carries out the integration of society, establishes and maintains bonds of solidarity between its elements. The significance of T. Parsons' theory lies in the fact that he laid the foundations for systemic and structural-functional approaches to the study of politics.

In political science, several models of the functioning of the political system have been developed. Let's consider the models of American scientists D. Easton, G. Almond, K. Deutsch.

The founder of the systems approach in political science is considered to be D. Easton (born 1917). In his works “Political System” (1953), “System Analysis of Political Life” (1965), “Analysis of Political Structure” (1990) and others, he develops the theory of the political system. For him, politics is a relatively independent sphere, but consisting of interrelated elements. On the one hand, politics is part of a broader whole—society. In this capacity, it must respond primarily to external impulses entering the system and prevent emerging conflicts and tensions between members of society. On the other hand, it participates in the distribution of material and spiritual resources and encouragement to accept this distribution of values ​​and benefits between individuals and groups. What is important is the ability and possibility of the political system to reform itself and change the environment.

A political system is an organism that develops and self-regulates through communication with the external environment. Using elements of general systems theory, D. Easton tries to build a holistic theory based on the study of “direct” and “inverse” connections between the political system and its external and internal environment and presents the political system as a mechanism for transforming social impulses coming from society (demands or support ) in political decisions and actions. D. Easton calls the political system a “decision processing machine.” To build their theoretical model, four basic categories are used: “political system”, “environment”, “reaction” of the system to the influence of the environment, “feedback” or the impact of the system on the environment (Fig. 6.1).

Rice. 6.1.

D. Easton put at the forefront the issue of self-preservation, maintaining the stability of the political system in a constantly changing environment. The exchange and interaction of the political system with the environment is carried out according to the “input” – “output” principle. He distinguished between two types of input: demand and support.

Requirements may concern the distribution of material goods and services (wages, healthcare, education, etc.); regulation of the behavior of actors in the political process (security, protectionism, etc.); communications in information (free equal access to information, demonstrations of political power, etc.). But this does not mean that the political system must satisfy all demands addressed to it, especially since this is impossible in practice. The political system can act quite independently when making decisions.

D. Easton considers support to be the main sum of variables connecting the system with the environment. Support is expressed in material (taxes, donations, etc.) and intangible (compliance with laws, participation in voting, respect for authority, performance of military duty, etc.) forms. D. Easton also identifies three objects of support: political society (a group of people connected with each other in one structure due to the division of activities in politics); political regime (of which he considers values, norms and power structures to be the main components); government (here he includes people participating in the affairs of the political system and recognized by the majority of citizens as responsible for their activities).

Regardless of their origin, demands and support become part of the political system and must be taken into account in the functioning of power. Demands tend to weaken the political system. Support leads to a strengthening of the political system.

The output of information expresses the ways the system reacts to the environment and indirectly to itself. “Outgoing” impulses are carried out in the form of decisions and political actions (creation of laws and norms, distribution of values ​​and services, regulation of behavior and interaction in society, etc.). According to D. Easton, they are determined by the very essence and nature of political power and are the main purpose of the political system. If decisions and actions meet the expectations and demands of numerous sectors of society, then support for the political system increases. Decisions and actions are very difficult to find understanding and support when the authorities are indifferent to the demands of members of society and pay attention only to their own demands and ideas. Such political decisions can have negative consequences, which can lead to a crisis in the political system.

D. Easton believes that the main means by which one can cope with tension in the political system are adaptation, self-preservation, reorientation of efforts, change of goals, etc. And this is possible only thanks to the ability of the authorities to respond to “feedback” impulses entering the system. Feedback is one of the mechanisms for eliminating crisis or pre-crisis situations.

A political system can be subject to numerous influences coming from the environment. These influences come in varying strengths and directions. If impulses are weak, then the political system does not have sufficient information to make decisions. Sometimes the impact can be strong, but one-sided, and then power structures make decisions in the interests of certain layers or groups, which can lead to destabilization of the political system. Erroneous decisions are also inevitable due to the oversaturation of the system with information coming from strong impulses from the external environment.

Thus, the political system, according to D. Easton’s model, is a constantly changing, functioning, dynamic system, directed from input to output and closed by a stabilizing feedback.

A different version of the analysis of the political system was proposed by G. Almond in his works “The Politics of Developing Regions” (1966), “Comparative Politics: A Concept of Development” (1968), “Comparative Politics Today” (1988). When studying ways to preserve and regulate the political system, he not only complements and develops the views of D. Easton, but also uses the structural-functional method and considers the political system as a set of interacting roles and functions of all the structures that make it up (legislative, executive, judicial branches of government, bureaucracy, political parties, pressure groups). G. Almond focuses not on the own structural elements of the political system, but on the connections of the political system with the environment. Basic in his concept is the concept of role (instead of organization, institution, group). The content of formal and informal interactions that develop the political culture of society, which the author considered decisive for the development of the entire complex of power relations, depends on the role.

From the point of view of G. Almond, a political system is a system of interaction between various forms of political behavior of state and non-state structures, in the analysis of which two levels are distinguished - institutional (political institutions) and orientation, including two levels: information-communicative and normative-regulatory (a set of moral, legal and political norms). G. Almond's model takes into account the psychological, personal aspects of political interactions, impulses coming not only from the outside, from the people, but also from the ruling elite. In his opinion, when studying a political system, it is necessary to take into account the fact that each system has its own structure, but all systems perform the same functions.

G. Almond, in his model of the political system, identifies three levels of groups of functions, connecting them with the activities of individual structural elements (institutions, groups, individuals). The first level - the “process level”, or “entry level” - is associated with the impact of the environment on the political system. This can be manifested in the implementation of functions (Fig. 6.2) implemented through the institutions of the political system. With the help of these functions, citizens' demands are formed and distributed according to the degree of importance and focus. The effective functioning of the aggregation mechanism helps to reduce the level of demands on the political system and increase support.

Rice. 6.2.

The second level includes the functions of the system, during the implementation of which the process of adaptation of society to the political system occurs and the degree of stability of the political system itself is determined. The function of political communication occupies a specific place, since it ensures the dissemination and transfer of information both between elements of the political system and between the political system and the environment.

The functions of information output or conversion functions consist of the establishment of rules (legislative activities), the application of rules (executive activities of the government), the formalization of rules (giving them legal form), the direct output of information (the practical activities of the government in implementing domestic and foreign policy).

Further, through feedback, you can check the stability of the political system, since the results of management activities and regulation of public resources must somehow change the social environment, which ultimately can strengthen or weaken its stability and efficiency.

In G. Almond's model, the political system appears as a set of political positions and ways of responding to certain political situations, taking into account the multiplicity of interests. The most important thing is the ability of the system to develop popular beliefs, views and even myths, creating symbols and slogans, maneuvering them in order to maintain and strengthen the necessary legitimacy for the effective implementation of functions. An important feature of the political system is its multifunctionality and mixedness in the cultural sense.

To implement functions or roles, the political system must have sufficient capabilities, which can be divided into the following types: extractive, regulating, distributive, integral and symbolizing.

The extractive capacity of a political system is its ability to extract natural and human, intellectual and physical resources from society: involving people in politics as voters, civil servants and activists; taxation; donations and other mechanisms for replenishing the budget of institutions of the political system.

Regulatory capability is the ability to manage, regulate, coordinate the behavior of individuals and groups, ensure effective political governance and interaction with civil society. It is carried out through laws, regulations, orders, setting interest rates on loans and taxation, processing public opinion, etc. The more effective and wider the extraction opportunity is carried out, the stronger the dependence of the political system on civil society, but the wider the scope of its regulatory capabilities.

Distributive opportunity is the possibility of the emergence of a social state that redistributes national wealth and creates broad public control over the distribution of goods and resources.

Integral opportunity is the ability of a political system to adequately respond to changes in external conditions and internal state, to quickly adapt to them, which makes the system stable and capable of self-development.

Symbolizing ability is the ability to appeal to the population with popular slogans, create symbols and necessary stereotypes of thinking. The degree of consolidation of society, and therefore the implementation of all other functions of the political system, depends on this.

Thus, through specialization and division of political roles and functions, stability is ensured not only of the political system itself, but also of the entire society, its ability to adapt to changed conditions.

An American political scientist proposed a fundamentally different approach to the study of the political system. K. Deutsch (1912–1992), developing its information-cybernetic (or information-communication) model. In his work “The Nerves of Control: Models of Political Communication and Control” (1963), he examined the political system as a rather complex network of information flows and communication connections, built on the principle of feedback. The goals of the political system are to ensure constant development and dynamic balance between the interests of all political groups. The effectiveness of the functioning of a political system depends on the quantity and quality of incoming information, the level of certain political agents, the tasks being solved, the features of the process of processing, transmission and storage of a chain of messages and other factors, as well as on the state of its communication networks.

The political system as a communication network includes four main, sequentially located blocks associated with various phases of information and communication flows that make up a single information and communication process of managing society: receiving information, assessing and selecting information, decision making, implementation of decisions and feedback (Fig. 6.3).

Rice. 6.3.

At the first stage, a block of information data is formed, compiled on the basis of the use of information coming from a variety of sources: open and closed, official and unofficial, state and public. The political system receives information through so-called receptors (external and internal political). These are information services, centers for forming and changing public opinion, etc. At the same time, the political system must receive both external and internal information. This information is sometimes not strictly tied to the subsequent formulation of public policy goals. In this block, selection, systematization and primary analysis of incoming information data and their coding take place.

At the second stage, further processing, evaluation and processing of the already selected information that has entered the “memory and values” block occurs. Here there is a correlation of the received information with the dominant values, norms and stereotypes, with the current situation, preferences of the ruling circles, as well as a comparison with existing data. K. Deutsch was one of the first to consider the “memory and values” block in the model of a political system, in which the results of information processing undergo additional transformation, after which they enter the decision-making center.

In the third block, appropriate decisions are made to regulate the current state of the system. The government makes a decision after receiving a final assessment of the degree of compliance of the current political situation with the main priorities, tasks and goals of the political system. K. Deutsch views the government as a subject of public administration that mobilizes the political system by regulating information flows and communication interactions between the system and the environment, as well as individual blocks within the system itself.

At the fourth stage, implementers (effectors) implement the decisions made by the government. “Effectors” not only carry out the decisions made, but also inform the system about the results of the implementation of decisions and about the state of the system itself, i.e. New information is supplied to the system input – a “feedback” signal. Thus, new information through the “feedback” mechanism again enters the “input” and brings the entire system to a new stage of functioning. Feedback plays a stabilizing role in the system.

According to K. Deutsch, using the proposed information and communication model, it is possible to reliably assess the reality of political systems, since they largely depend on the quality of a wide variety of communications: the transfer of information from managers to managed objects and back, between blocks of the political system and the environment. K. Deutsch identifies three main types of communication: personal, informal communications; communications through organizations; communications through the media.

The quality and speed of communication is influenced by the type of political system. In a democratic regime, the production, transmission and use of information do not encounter artificial obstacles in the form of censorship, restrictions on freedom of speech, meetings, the activities of parties and public organizations, etc. In an authoritarian political system, the speed of information transfer from bloc to bloc and the degree of awareness of citizens about political decisions systems are much lower due to constant monitoring and censorship and other obstacles.

Analyzing the success of the functioning of the political system in the process of managing society, K. Deutsch derived the following patterns: the possibility of success is inversely proportional to the information load and the delay in the system’s response; depends on the magnitude of the increment in response to changes; depends on the ability of power structures to see the future and take the necessary actions in the event of threats to achieving the goal.

The concept of a political system, developed by D. Easton, G. Almond, K. Deutsch, expanded the capabilities of political science theory in studying the problem of interaction between social structure and political institutions, the social environment and decision-making centers. These concepts adapted systemic, communicative and structural-functional approaches to the analysis of political life and gave a dynamic character to the study of the totality of state institutions and their active interaction with society.

There are other versions of the theory of the political system. Stand out, for example, is the theory of the political system of D. Truman, based on the postulates of the theory of “pressure groups”, the theory of G. Powell and M. Kaplan, which is an attempt to transfer the main provisions of the concept of D. Easton from the sphere of internal political life of a particular country to the sphere of external relations. There is a theory of a functional political system, built on the basic postulates of the social system of T. Parsons, a theory of the political system as a specific, active structure, etc.

C. Endrein developed the so-called cultural direction of understanding politics. He laid the basis for politics on cultural characteristics that determine the behavior of people and the functioning of the institutions of the political system. The structure of the political system is represented by three parts - cultural values, power structures and citizen behavior. The type of political system is determined by the level of development of political culture. It is cultural values ​​that play a decisive role in the development of society.

The political system, operating in conditions of constant changes in the balance of forces and interests, solves the problem of ensuring social dynamics within the framework of sustainability and legality, maintaining order and political stability.

• Easton D . A. Framework for Political Analysis. N.Y., 1965. P. 112.
• Easton D. An Approach to the Analysis of Political Systems // Political System and Change. Princeton, N.J., 1986. P. 24.
• Almond Gabriel A. The Political of Developing Areas / Gabriel A. Almond and James Coleman, Princeton, NJ.: Princeton University Press, 1960. P. 7.
• Deutsch K. The Nerves of Government Modesl of Political Communi"cation and Control. N. Y., 1963.
• Endrain C.F. Comparative analysis of political systems. M., 2000. P. 19-20.

Introduction

2 Methodology of comparative political science

3.1 Systemic research in political science by T. Parsons

2 Essay by T. Parsons “On the concept of “political power”

Conclusion

Introduction

The relevance of the course work topic chosen for research is due to the fact that political thought in the 20th and 21st centuries is characterized by a wide range of manifestations, scientific schools and political positions, which largely solve old questions in a new way about what politics, power, democracy, and the state are. etc. Considered through the categories of “role”, “interaction”, “political behavior” and other issues of state and law appear not as special metaphysical entities, alienated from man, developing according to their own special laws, but as a condition and at the same time the result of human efforts, will, interests. There is great humanistic meaning in this approach.

The American sociologist T. Parsons made a certain contribution to the development of the methodology of political science. First of all, Parsons is known for the fact that he proposed and substantiated a systems approach in sociology, on the basis of which D. Easton substantiated a similar approach in political science. Thus, using some provisions of the structural-functional approach of T. Parsons, D. Easton concluded that the systemic analysis of political life is based on the concept of “a system immersed in the environment and subject to influences from it.

Thus, the purpose of this course work is to study the contribution of T. Parsons to the methodology of comparative political science.

The set goal can be achieved by solving the following tasks:

Describe the biography of T. Parsons;

characterize the development of the comparative approach in political science;

analyze the methodology of comparative political science;

explore the contribution of T. Parsons to the formation of the methodology of comparative political science;

study systemic research in political science by T. Parsons;

analyze the essay by T. Parsons “On the concept of “political power.”

The object of the study is the methodology of comparative political science.

The subject of the study is the political ideas of T. Parsons, which underlie the methodology of modern political science, in particular, systemic research in political science by T. Parsons and the views of T. Parsons expressed in his work “On the concept of “political power”.

The main methods used are systematic and comparative analysis of concepts, theoretical positions and methods.

Thus, having clearly formulated the purpose and objectives of the course work, defining its object and subject, comprehensively using the capabilities of the basic methods of political science, relying on the achievements of domestic and foreign political thought and my own observations, I tried to create a holistic comparative study of T. Parsons’ contribution to the development of methodology political science.

Chapter 1. Biography of T. Parsons

Talcott Parsons was born on December 13, 1902 in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA. His father was a Protestant minister who taught at one of the small colleges in the state. Parsons' father later became president of the college. Origin from a Protestant environment undoubtedly had a certain influence on the scientist’s worldview. Parsons was educated at Amherst College (Massachusetts). It is noteworthy that the area of ​​interest of the young Parsons was not social sciences at all, but biology. The future scientist intended to devote himself either to this science or to engage in medical practice. Parsons himself noted that a certain interest in the social sciences arose in his penultimate year under the influence of “a peculiar “institutional economist” Walton Hamilton.”

As often happens, an incident intervened that pushed Parsons to change the field of intellectual pursuits. At the end of the penultimate year of study, the college president was fired, followed by all the teachers whose courses Parsons was going to attend. These events, together with his awakened interest in the social sciences, lead Parsons to the London School of Economics. Thus, Parsons entered social science not as a sociologist, but as an economist. In London, Parsons, in his own words, “discovered” Bronislaw Malinowski. This distinguished social anthropologist was considered by Parsons to be “intellectually the most important man” with whom he interacted in London. Parsons then participates in a scholarship exchange program with Germany and ends up at the University of Heidelberg. Max Weber taught at this university, and here the intellectual influence of this scientist was especially strong. In Heidelberg, Parsons wrote a dissertation on “The Concept of Capitalism in New German Literature,” which he successfully defended in 1927. The focus of this first scientific work was the ideas of Weber and Werner Sombart, although some attention was paid to other researchers, in particular Karl Marx, who was taken by Parsons as the starting point of the discussion. In his biography, Parsons devotes very little space to his dissertation, which earned him the German degree “Dr. Phil.”, noting only that “this work determined two main directions of my future scientific interests: firstly, the nature of capitalism as a socio-economic system and, secondly, the study of Weber as a sociological theorist.” According to one of Parsons' researchers, Edward Devre, from Germany the scientist, in addition to these two areas, also brought a complex and ponderous style of presentation of thoughts, which so often characterizes his theoretical works.

Since the fall of 1927, Parsons has been working as a teacher at Harvard University. Of the intellectual influences that should be noted for this period, the scientist’s contacts with a group of Harvard economists: Taussig, Carver, Ripley and Schumpeter are important. At Harvard, Parsons expanded his knowledge of economics. Communication with Schumpeter, which was combined with independent study of the legacy of the English economist, leader of the neoclassical school in political economy Alfred Marshall, turned out to be especially fruitful. Parsons even tried at this time to extract Marshall’s “sociology,” which was made easier by the absence in the Principles of Economic Science, the scientist’s main work, of clear boundaries of research to which Marshall would consider it necessary to limit himself.

During the same period, we became acquainted with the ideas of Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian sociologist. Parsons learned the bulk of Pareto's ideas through the mediation of the biologist L. Henderson, who was at that time the greatest expert on Pareto's sociological ideas. In his later work, The Theory of Action and the Human Condition, Parsons notes that Henderson attached great importance to the concept of "system", which he adopted from Pareto, extending it into the field of biological research.

From the study of the ideas of Weber - Marshall - Pareto, the idea is born of writing a work that would demonstrate the “convergence” of the theoretical constructs of these scientists. Parsons called this work, which was called “The Structure of Social Action,” “the first great synthesis.” Already in this work, those provisions appeared that subsequently became integral components in the further development of Parsonian theory. We are talking, first of all, about the “voluntaristic theory of action”, as well as the constant emphasis on the importance of normative regulation of human behavior (Parsons himself preferred the term “action”, pointing out that behavior can be unreflective, that it is inherent in both animals and humans, at the same time, the meaningful nature of human behavior can be conveyed through the term “action”).

Following the publication of The Structure of Social Action, a new period of intellectual development and replenishment of the store of theoretical knowledge begins. Parsons's main scientific interest at this time lay in the study of medical practice, especially the doctor-patient relationship.

In 1944, Parsons accepted the position of dean of the sociology department at Harvard University, a position he held until 1956. In 1949 he was elected president of the American Sociological Association. These posts can be considered evidence of the high prestige that Parsons enjoyed, although from 1937 to 1951 he did not publish a single work that could be compared in importance to Structure. The plans included an extensive monograph on the problems of the sociological study of medical practice, but it was not written, largely due to personal circumstances. Some of the materials on the problem were included in the work “The Social System,” but it should be noted that they add quite a bit to the main ideas.

Significant from the point of view of the development of the theoretical scheme was 1951, when Parsons published two large and quite similar works: “Towards a General Theory of Action”, co-authored with E. Shils, and “The Social System”. In 1953, another significant work was published - “Workbooks on the Theory of Action” together with R. Bales. This work sets out a “four-functional paradigm”: AGIL - A (adaptation), G (goal-attainment) - goal achievement, I (integration) - integration, L (latent pattern-maintenance and tension management) - latent pattern reproduction and regulation stress.

Following the Workbooks, Parsons turns to the topic that actually led him to sociology - to the topic of the relationship between economics and society and sociological and economic theory. In 1956, together with N. Smelser, the work “Economy and Society: A Study of the Integration of Economic and Social Theory” was published. In this work, the AGIL scheme was first used to study the most complex problems of the position of the economy in the social system and its connection with other “analytically distinguished subsystems of society.”

At the end of the 60s. In the twentieth century, the scientist’s scientific interest shifted to an area that, almost from the moment sociology appeared, attracted the best minds - the study of social development. Parsons turns to an analysis of the emergence and development of Western civilization. In addition to a number of articles, two works were devoted to this problem, which cannot be called large, given that Parsons is unusually verbose when presenting his thoughts. These are Societies: An Evolutionary and Comparative Perspective (1966) and The System of Modern Societies (1971). It is worth noting that the second work, being far from the most significant in the scientist’s creative heritage, is to date the only work translated into Russian in full. All other translations are either separate articles or fragments.

Two other topics have continually attracted Parsons' attention since at least the early 1940s. The twentieth century had themes of modern occupational structure and socialization. The first of these was closely related to Parsons' interest in the problem of social stratification. The result of this interest was the publication of the works “Family, Socialization and the Process of Interaction” (1955, together with R. Bales and a number of other co-authors) and “American University” (1973, together with J. Platt). These works lie somewhat aside from the main direction of Parsons' theoretical activity: the development of a systematic general theory of society based on the theory of action and systemic ideas.

Along with major theoretical works, Parsons is the author of many articles on a wide variety of topics: his interests range from the sociological study of politics and economics to the analysis of medical practice. If in most of his major works he appears as a theorist, then in many articles he appears as a publicist, often taking an active civic position. As an example, Parsons' participation in the collection of articles “The Black American” (1966) should be cited. In his article published in this collection, he raises a serious question for American society of that period about the need to integrate black Americans into the institutional structure of American society as equal citizens.

Parsons died in 1979 at the age of 77.

Thus, throughout his life, the scientist showed himself as a multifaceted specialist, from whose attention almost no topic in sociology escaped, on the other hand, as a theorist who persistently moved towards the goal set at the beginning of his creative activity - to create a general theory, which would become the basis of systematic sociology. It is noteworthy that Parsons's last theoretically significant work, The Theory of Action and the Human Condition (1978), extends the scope of Parson's general theory to the entire universe.

Chapter 2. Features of the methodology of comparative political science

1 Formation of a comparative approach in political science

The historical testing and justification of the comparative approach (usually along with and in combination with other methods) allows us to state the identification of a special branch of knowledge in political theory - comparative political science.

In a homogeneous cultural and civilizational environment, the use of political comparisons is not associated with fundamental difficulties. In addition, a lot is simplified here, say, in relation to the post-Christian civilization of the West, by the use of a generally accepted and developed language to describe political culture, which began to take shape in the works of Plato and Aristotle. The famous diagram of the latter’s political regimes was, by the way, the result of a comparison of dozens of states of Mediterranean antiquity. A. de Tocqueville’s famous book “Democracy in America” remains an exemplary comparative study in this sense. At this level of comparison, today it is permissible to use the definition of political culture as an individual-personal attitude to the phenomena of political life, the style of behavior of the subject of political power. Categories of comparison can be found in the developments of political socialization and education, political philosophy and political economy, political psychology and ethics, political geography, demography and political ecology, political cybernetics and even political astrology.

Difficulties increase when comparing political consciousness, political systems and instruments, political elites and political leadership of different civilizational and cultural objects, for example. East and West. M. Weber encountered similar difficulties when he tried to use Chinese material in his research. Comparison of political traditions requires a shift of emphasis to a slightly different definition of political culture - as the assimilation of existing political experience, which is given by history, which requires a comparable level of study of civilizational and cultural objects (objectively) and an adequate scientific choice of methods on the part of a political scientist (subjectively). In this sense, the presumption will be a rejection of Eurocentrism, the vitality of which, in addition to subjective preferences, can be determined by the language of political science. In many cases, it simply has no equivalent to describe the political realities of the East. Refusal of Eurocentrism will allow us to avoid adherence to the concept of the “highway” of the political development of mankind, which is openly manifested in Marxism-Leninism and latently contained in liberal-democratic doctrines.

The comparative study and assimilation of political cultures can usually proceed from the “more advanced” scientific and theoretical achievements of the West in their application to the “traditional” societies of the East. This concerns both the borrowing of ready-made political forms and the use of fairly rigid (in theoretical terms) political technologies of the West in the political environments of the East in the process of modernization, understood not as “Europeanization.” A structural-functional approach in combination with a sociological one could provide accurate and comparable information about the survival of Western institutions on Eastern soil.

However, the whole path is possible - from the recorded cultural and civilizational differences (Western Christian, Arab-Islamic, Hindu-Buddhist, Chinese-Confucian and Russian-Orthodox civilizations) to the identification of invariants of the behavior of political structures, behavior and mentality, which do not necessarily coincide with the primitive interpreted by universal, so-called “universal” values ​​in politics. After isolating the invariants, the “sediment” will contain elements of national political specificity, which can become rich source material for practical-political and theoretical-political creativity.

Each subsequent generation is not content with the understanding of political life that it inherits, and puts forward new approaches to organizing historical material, modern politics and forecasting political events. Today, three general sociological global paradigms, including political science approaches themselves, retain their significance (i.e. they work complementary to each other): formational, civilizational-cultural and world-systemic - each with their advantages and disadvantages.

The formational scheme of the world-historical process, developed in Marxism, includes, as is known, five stages-formations: primitive communal, slave-owning, feudal, capitalist and future communist, which, from the point of view of this theory, must inevitably replace the antagonistic society.

The civilizational-cultural paradigm (N.Ya. Danilevsky, O. Spengler, A. Toynbee, D. Ikeda) is mainly a theoretical product of our century. Here, the entire history of mankind is conceived as a set of unique, relatively closed civilizations (they numbered from 5 to 21), each of which goes through stages of emergence, growth, breakdown and decay, dying from natural disasters, military defeats or internal conflicts.

The combination of formational and civilizational approaches in East-West comparisons is still not a simple problem and is only partly resolved with the help of the third newest paradigm proposed in the 70s of the twentieth century by the school of world-system analysis (F. Braudel, I. Wallerstein). According to Wallerstein, in the 16th century. In Europe, a change in world-systems occurred: world-empires based on political domination gave way to a world-economy based on trade. The center of power moved from Seville (Habsburg Empire) to Amsterdam. This was the victory of the capitalist world-economy (CWE), which has since acted as the modern world-system (CMS) and around which the concentration rings of the world periphery have formed. The core center of the KME, receiving the bulk of trade profits, is constantly fighting for a monopoly, and the state is an instrument of this struggle, a decisive factor in internal and external expansion.

Over the entire 500-year history of the SMS, its center of power has shifted several times: from the United Provinces (Holland) to Great Britain, from Great Britain to the United States. The peaks of hegemony, as a rule, came after the world wars.

In any case, one can take advantage of the strengths of all three approaches to organize the material, remembering the original Eurocentric sin of Marxism, the internal Eurocentric dominant of world-systems analysis, its capitalocentrism , about the balancing potential of the civilizational approach for the destinies of a world united in its diversity. The latter is especially important, because no one will deny that the world of politics looked and looks different from New York, London, Paris and Berlin, and these differences increase when viewed from Beijing, Delhi, Cairo, Tokyo or Moscow, that national political culture-traditions have not yet developed a single metalanguage, and the language of Western Christian civilization is far from the only one.

And yet, it is intuitively clear that political truth can be obtained through comparison, provided that the phenomena being compared are those that have been studied to a comparable extent, concepts of the same order, side by side, and therefore sufficiently abstract. Today it is possible to show that the current level of knowledge of the political cultures of the West, Russia and the East makes it possible to compare them. And it doesn’t matter that the differences between them are obvious; the similarities will have to be looked for.

2.2 Methodology of comparative politics

Comparative political science, which was actively developing under the influence of the positivist methodology of behaviorism and structural functionalism in the 1950s and 60s, came under fire at the beginning of the next decade. Several directions can be identified. Firstly, political science in general and comparative political science in particular turned out to be immune to the new social and political changes that emerged so rapidly in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the form of countercultural movements, the post-industrial revolution, and communication transformations. Secondly, the attempt to create a political science devoid of value loading on the basis of behaviorism and structural functionalism actually led to the dominance of only one theoretical paradigm associated with the ideology of “bourgeois liberalism.” Thirdly, it turned out that these methodologies of comparative analysis, focused on the search for natural connections and similarities, actually led to the creation of a picture of the political world, devoid of a significant share of uniqueness and diversity. Fourthly, the predominance of quantitative methods of analysis in comparative political science, although it created the opportunity to test hypotheses, at the same time led to their impoverishment. By means of statistical testing, either rather banal truths or already known dependencies were often confirmed. Fifthly, although comparative political science included the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America in its field of view, the formed teleological concept of dependent development provoked protest from both Western comparativists and researchers of non-Western countries.

After the crisis of the 1970s, comparative political science lost its significance as a homogeneous field in terms of methodology and developed either under the influence of intentions to find a new methodological paradigm, or under the influence of changes in the very object of research. In this regard, for two decades, comparative political science retained the status of a highly differentiated field both in subject matter and in research methods. The methodology of neo-institutionalism, which became widespread in political science as a result of economic imperialism, still did not change the overall picture, and the third wave of democratization made it possible to advance some theoretical constructs further without radically transforming the industry. Comparative political science begins to demonstrate a new revival at the end of the last - beginning of this century. Generalizing works appear in which an attempt is made to summarize the development of comparative political science in the post-crisis period. The discussion about the relationship between quantitative and qualitative comparative research methodology is once again unfolding. Some researchers bring to the fore the problems of a hermeneutic understanding of political action and an interpretative approach to politics and management. At the same time, they point out the fundamental difference between the scientistic American tradition of political research and British political science, noting in the latter the emphasis on historical knowledge and interpretivism. What is even more significant is the desire of all participants in the discussion not to oppose different approaches and traditions, but to try to find some synthetic basis for their interaction and mutual enrichment. In this regard, the general attitude is formulated by Gerardo Munch, who, concluding the chapter on the history of comparative political science, writes: “In short, both the commitment of comparative political science to the humanistic tradition and its living aspiration to science require respect. The soul of comparativists is aroused not only by an essential interest in global politics, but least of all by the methods used to study their subject. Hence, the future of comparative political science is likely to revolve around the ability of comparativists to transcend waning differences and link their interest to both substance and method, politics and science."

The “waning distinctions” are associated with the decline in the opposition between the Durkheimian and Weberian traditions, quantitative and qualitative methods, explanation and understanding, causation and simple description, positivism and hermeneutics. In general, the belief that the method must be subordinated to the research substance is beginning to dominate in comparative political science, i.e. politics; one should look for approaches that would be based on the peculiarities of political reality. In this movement towards synthesis, a special role begins to be played by the cognitive components of the political process, the ideas that guide people in politics. That ideas influence policy is a rather banal statement in this case; what is new is the consideration of ideas as significant explanatory causes of political processes and events. Before this, ideas were always reduced to interests, functions, structures, institutions, worlds, i.e. to something objectively given, real and analytically deducible from observations, and these objectified facts were considered as the basis of explanations. Ideas needed to be explained, but they themselves rarely acted as explanatory factors. The instrumentalist understanding of ideas for politics today is being replaced by a substantive understanding of political ideas and their meaningful implementation in the process of constructing interests, functions, structures, institutions, worlds, and regimes. In political science and comparative politics, this turn in methodology is expressed, in particular, in the constructivist approach.

Thus, the methodology of comparative political science began to take shape in the second half of the twentieth century.

The main method of comparative political science is the method of comparison, the essence of which comes down to identifying the general and special in the phenomena being studied. Comparison is the correlation of phenomena with abstractions of thinking (“standards”, “ideals”).

The comparative method is actively used in political science, since it is almost impossible to apply the experimental method, which is one of the main ones in the natural sciences. The logic of comparative analysis is to a certain extent comparable to the logic of experiment. Comparison is a “substitute” for experiment in political science.

When conducting comparative studies, both the strategy of maximum similarity and the strategy of maximum difference are used.

parsons political science power

Chapter 3. Contribution of T. Parsons to the formation of the methodology of comparative political science

1 Systemic research in political science by T. Parsons

Talcott Parsons, having synthesized the theoretical approaches of Max Weber (whose works he translated), Georg Simmel, Emile Durkheim, Pareto, Alan Marshall, Sigmund Freud, developed “a general theory of action and, in particular, social action (structural functionalism) as a self-organizing system.”

In the latter, which is defined by a set of functional problems of any system (adaptation, goal achievement, integration, maintaining a pattern), Parsons analytically identifies the subsystems of social structure, culture, and personality. The orientations of the character (actor) are described using a set of standard (typical) variables. Parsons used this theoretical language to describe systems of economics, politics, law, religion, education, to analyze the family, hospital (and, in particular, mental hospitals), school class, university, art, mass media, sexual, racial and national relations, social deviations , and later - to build a neo-evolutionist comparative sociology of various societies involved and continuing to be involved in the universal process of modernization. Parsons and his theory were critical to the establishment of sociology as an academic discipline.

At an early stage of research, Parsons sought to find a certain compromise between E. Durkheim’s “sociologism,” which strictly determined human behavior by the influence of the external social environment, and M. Weber’s “understanding” theory of social action, which describes human behavior through compliance with “ideal types.” Parsons' early works were also significantly influenced by V. Pareto, who proposed a model similar to Weber's of dividing human actions for motivation into “logical” and non-logical, A. Marshall, G. Simmel, Z. Freud.

Structural-functional analysis is “the principle of studying social phenomena and processes as a system in which each element of the structure has a specific purpose (function).” Function in sociology is the role played by a certain social institution or process in relation to the whole (for example, the function of the state, family, etc. in society).

The concept of “system” came to political science from sociology. The development of the concept of “political system” is associated with the names of American representatives of structural-functional and systemic analysis.

Thus, according to T. Parsons, the political system ?

2 Essay by T. Parsons “On the concept of “political power””

Power in this work by T. Parsons is understood here as an intermediary, identical to money, circulating within what we call the political system, but going far beyond the latter and penetrating into three functional subsystems of society - the economic subsystem, the integration subsystem and the subsystem of maintaining cultural patterns. By resorting to a very brief description of the properties inherent in money as an economic instrument of this type, we can better understand the specific properties of power.

Money, as the classics of economics argued, is both a means of exchange and a “standard of value.” Money is a symbol in the sense that while it measures and therefore "expresses" economic value or utility, it itself does not have utility in the original consumer sense of the word. Money does not have “use value”, but only “exchange value”, i.e. allow you to purchase useful things. Money thus serves to exchange offers for the sale or, conversely, for the purchase of useful things. Money becomes the main intermediary only when the exchange is not obligatory, like the exchange of gifts between certain categories of relatives, or when it is not carried out on the basis of barter, i.e. exchange of equal things and services.

Making up for the lack of direct benefit from itself, money endows the one who receives it with four important degrees of freedom with regard to participation in the system of general exchanges:

) freedom to spend the money received on the purchase of any thing or set of things from those available on the market and within the limits of available funds;

) freedom to choose between many options for the desired thing;

) freedom to choose the time most suitable for purchase;

) freedom to consider the terms of purchase, which, due to the freedom of choice of time and option of offer, a person can, depending on the circumstances, accept or reject. Along with receiving four degrees of freedom, a person is, of course, exposed to the risk associated with the hypothetical assumption that money will be accepted by others and that its value will remain unchanged.

Similarly, the concept of an institutionalized system of power primarily highlights a system of relations within which certain types of promises and obligations, whether imposed or taken on voluntarily - for example, under a contract - are considered enforceable, i.e. under normatively established conditions, authorized persons may require their implementation. In addition, in all established cases of refusal or attempts to refuse obedience, whereby the actor tries to evade his obligations, they will be “forced to respect” by threatening him with the actual use of situationally negative sanctions, performing in one case the function of deterrence, in another - punishment. It is the events in the case of the actor in question that deliberately change (or threaten to change) the situation to his detriment, whatever the specific content of these changes.

Power, thus, “is the implementation of a generalized ability, consisting in obtaining from members of the collective the fulfillment of their obligations, legitimized by the significance of the latter for the goals of the collective, and allowing for the possibility of coercing the obstinate by applying negative sanctions to them, no matter who the actors in this operations".

The case with money is clear: when developing a budget designed to distribute available income, any allocation of funds for any one item must be made at the expense of other items. The most obvious political analogy here is the distribution of power within a particular community. It is quite obvious that if A., who previously occupied a position associated with real power, is moved to a lower rank and B. is now in his place, then A. loses power, and B. receives it, and the total amount of power in the system remains unchanged . Many theorists, including G. Lasswell and C. Wright Mills, believed that “this rule is equally valid for the entire set of political systems.”

There is a circular movement between the political sphere and the economy; its essence is in the exchange of the factor of political effectiveness - in this case, participation in control over the productivity of the economy - for an economic result consisting of control over resources, which can, for example, take the form of an investment loan. This circular movement is regulated by power in the sense that the factor represented by enforceable obligations, in particular the obligation to provide services, more than counterbalances the result represented by the possibilities opened up for effective action.

One of the conditions for the stability of this circulation system is the balance of factors and results of rule on both sides. This is another way of saying that this condition of stability as far as power is concerned is formulated ideally as a zero-sum system, although the same is not true, because of the investment process, for the money involved. The system of circular circulation inherent in the political sphere is then understood as a place of habitual mobilization of expectations regarding their fulfillment; this mobilization can be carried out in two ways: either we recall the circumstances that arise from previous agreements, which in some cases, as, for example, in the issue of citizenship, are legal; or we undertake, within established limits, new obligations that replace old ones that have already been fulfilled. Equilibrium, of course, characterizes the entire system, and not individual parts.

“Deposits” of power made by voters can be withdrawn - if not immediately, then at least at the next election and on a condition similar to the operating regime of a bank. In some cases, elections are associated with conditions comparable to barter, more precisely, with the expectation of the fulfillment of certain specific demands defended by strategically minded voters and by them alone. But it is especially important that in a system that is pluralistic in terms of not only the composition of the forces providing political support, but also the problems to be resolved, such leaders are given freedom of action to make various binding decisions, affecting in this case also other groups of society, and not just those whose “interest” was directly satisfied. This freedom can be represented as "limited by a circular flow: in other words, it can be said that the factor of power passing through the channel of political support will be most accurately balanced by its result - political decisions in the interests of those groups that specifically demanded them."

There is, however, another component of the freedom of elected leaders, which is decisive here. This is the freedom to use influence—for example, through the prestige of a position that does not coincide with the amount of power accorded to it—to make new attempts to “equalize” power and influence. It is the use of influence to strengthen the overall supply of power.

This process fulfills its role through a governance function which - through relationships maintained with various aspects of the community's electoral structure - generates and structures new "demand" in the sense of specific demand for solutions.

It can then be said that such demand - when applied to decision makers - justifies the growing production of power, which is made possible precisely because of the generalized nature of the mandate of political support; since this mandate was not issued on the basis of barter, i.e. in exchange for specific decisions, but because of the "equalization" of power and influence that is established through elections, it is a means of implementing, within the framework of the constitution, what appears at the governmental level to be most consistent with the "general interest." In this case, leaders can be compared to bankers or "brokers" who can mobilize the commitments of their constituents in such a way that the totality of commitments made by the entire community increases. This increase must still be justified by the mobilization of influence: it must be both perceived as consistent with existing norms and applicable to situations that “require” action at the level of collective commitment.

It can be assumed that the comparison with a loan, along with others, turns out to be correct from the point of view of its time dimension. The need for greater efficiency to carry out new programs that add to the overall workload of the community entails changes at the organizational level through new combinations of production factors, the development of new organisms, the commitment of personnel, the development of new norms and even modifications of the bases of legitimation. Consequently, elected leaders cannot be held legally responsible for immediate implementation, and, on the contrary, they need to be trusted by sources of political support, i.e. did not demand immediate "payment" - at the time of the next election - of the share of power that their votes had with decisions dictated by their own interests.

It may be legitimate to call the responsibility assumed in this case management responsibility, emphasizing its difference from administrative responsibility focused on day-to-day functions. In any case, one must think of the process of increasing power in a manner strictly analogous to economic investment in the sense that the "recovery" should entail an increase in the level of collective success in the direction identified above, namely, an increase in the efficiency of collective action in areas of discovered value, about which no one would suspect if the leader did not take risks, like an entrepreneur who decides to invest.

Thus, for T. Parsons, power is a system of resources with the help of which common goals are achievable.

In general, summing up the above, I would like to note that T. Parsons was more of a sociologist than a political scientist, therefore, T. Parsons’ political views are closely related to sociology and stem from his sociological research. In relation to the methodology of political science, T. Parsons formulated the concept of a political system, which was later adopted to substantiate the theory of systems in political science, as well as political power.

Conclusion

Based on the research conducted in the course work, the following main conclusions can be formulated.

T. Parsons' contribution to political science is due, first of all, to the fact that he developed the concept of political power, and was also the founder of the systemic and structural-functional method in modern political science.

Thus, power is understood by Parsons as an intermediary, identical to money, circulating within what we call the political system, but going far beyond the latter and penetrating into three functional subsystems of society - the economic subsystem, the integration subsystem and the subsystem of maintaining cultural patterns. By resorting to a very brief description of the properties inherent in money as an economic instrument of this type, we can better understand the specific properties of power.

Power, therefore, is the implementation of a generalized ability, consisting in obtaining from members of the collective the fulfillment of their obligations, legitimized by the significance of the latter for the goals of the collective, and allowing for the possibility of coercing the obstinate by applying negative sanctions to them, no matter who the actors in this operation are .

It may be legitimate to call the responsibility assumed in this case management responsibility, emphasizing its difference from administrative responsibility focused on day-to-day functions.

The concept of “system” came to political science from sociology. The development of the concept of “political system” is associated with the names of American representatives of structural-functional and systemic analysis. So, according to T. Parsons, the political system ? it is a subsystem of society whose purpose is to determine collective goals, mobilize resources and make decisions necessary to achieve them.

The systems method has been used in political science since the 1950s-1960s. This method examines the political life of society as an open system, subject to internal and external influences, but at the same time capable of maintaining its existence. The systems method focuses on the integrity of the policy and its relationship with the external environment. It allows you to determine the most important goals for the functioning of states and other elements of the political system, the optimal ways and means of achieving these goals - by constructing a model that includes all the interrelationship factors of the real political situation.

The structural-functional method in political science has been used since the mid-twentieth century. Structural-functional analysis breaks down a complex policy object into its component parts, identifies and studies the connections between them, and determines their role in meeting the needs of the system. Through structural-functional analysis, the number of social changes to which the political system can adapt is determined, and ways of preserving and regulating the political system are established. The structural-functional method allows you to answer the questions: what functions should the political system perform, with the help of what structures and with what efficiency does it perform them.

List of sources used

1Belanovsky S. On the sociology of T. Parsons / S. Balanovsky // Personal website of Sergei Belanovsky

2Gadevosyan E.V. Dictionary-reference book on sociology and political science /E.V. Gadevosyan//. -M.: Knowledge, 1996.-271 p.

Dobrolyubov A.I. Power as a technical system: About three great social inventions of mankind / A.I. Dobrolyubov //. - Minsk: Science and Technology, 1995. - 239 p.

Zhigulin V.S. “Intellectual biography of T. Parsons” as a means of theoretical analysis / V.S. Zhigulin //

6Ilyin M.V. Main methodological problems of comparative political science /M.V. Ilyin//Polis. - 2001. - No. 6. - 203s.

Kozhev A. The Concept of Power /A. Kozhev//. - M.: Praxis, 2007. - 182 p.

8Kosharny V.P. From the history of socio-political thought from ancient ideas to socio-political theories of the early 20th century / V.P. Kosharny // Socio-political magazine. - 2002. - No. 6. - 62s.

9Mannheim D. Political science. Research methods /D. Mannheim//. - M.: Publishing house. “The whole world”, 2007. - 355 p.

Masaryk T.G. Philosophy - sociology - politics / T.G. Masaryk // - M.: Publishing house RUND, 2003. - 664 p.

11Rovdo V.V. Comparative Politics. In 3 parts. Part 1. Theory of comparative political science / V.V. Rovdo //- St. Petersburg: European Humanitarian University, 2007. - 296 p.

12Sanders D. Some methodological considerations about comparative interstate studies / D. Sanders // International Journal of Social Sciences. - 2005. - No. 9. - 52 p.

13Smorgunov L.V. Comparative Politics. In search of new methodological orientations: do ideas mean anything for explaining politics? /L.V. Smorgunov // Polis. - 2009. - No. 1. - 129 p.

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Fursov A.I. School of world-system analysis / A.I. Fursov // East. - 2002. - No. 1. - 184 p.

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It is one of the most popular methods for studying social processes in the twentieth century. Its value lies in the fact that it can be used to study not only individual elements and stable connections, but also their vertical and horizontal hierarchical relationships. In the 50-70s of the twentieth century, the most prominent representative of this movement was T. Parson

With. Defining the concept of the social structure of society and its role in the analysis of people’s life, he used the methods of contemporary semiotics, synergetics and cybernetics. He also used the works of E. Durkheim and M. Weber. Parsons is not very interested in historical types of society, since he rejects the evolutionary approach to its formation. He is interested in modern society and the processes taking place there.

Social structure of society and theory of social action

Man, according to Parsons, is the basic element of any society. He and his relationships with other people represent a system that organizes itself. The actions of any person that are of a public nature can also be characterized. They have some features. The social structure of society determines human behavior, especially role behavior. It is symbolic in nature. After all, language plays the role of a regulatory mechanism in it. It expresses the concepts that determine our reactions, down to the subconscious, through symbols. In addition, behavior is inherently normative because it depends on a number of generally accepted frameworks. A person must do this or that because it is customary. And, finally, one of its main characteristics is voluntarism, since a person has personal preferences, desires, and so on. The structure of social action, which represents human social behavior, is as follows. It consists of the subject, the situation in which everything happens, and the orientation, direction of the individual. Parsons disagrees with Weber about whether this action must necessarily have a conscious meaning for the person, or whether it can be spontaneous, affective. On this basis, the sociologist builds an entire system and classifies it into divisions: cultural, social, personal. All of them are interconnected by various relationships, among which three regulators dominate: language, money and power.

Social structure of society. Sociology of the systems approach

Thus, according to Parsons, the social system is a complexly organized, ordered integrity that is held together by specific connections. Examples of this include a state, a nation, a large organization, or a movement. All such systems, as the author believed, should be studied using a special methodology. First of all, it is necessary to determine what the social structure of the society that is being studied is. That is, you need to find out what elements it can be divided into and what is constructed from them. Parsons suggested that the largest structures are divided into four types: family, institution, political and public organizations, and state. Their main regulators are the values ​​and norms adopted at this level. Then an analysis should be carried out that would show the relationship between the elements and the whole. In addition, such a method can clarify the roles of social systems themselves. This is how structural-functional analysis is carried out.

UDC 32.001

TALCOTT PARSONS' THEORY OF POLITICAL SYSTEM

Annotation. An analysis of Talcott Parsons's theory of political system, its influence on modern Russian political science and its study is presented. The history of the emergence of this theory in Russia is considered. The role of errors and discrepancies in the modern interpretation of the theory is highlighted.

Key words: politics, political system, theory of T. Parsons, political sociology.

TALCOTT PARSONS" POLITICAL SYSTEM THEORY

Abstract. Analysis of Talcott Parsons" political system theory and its influence on modern Russian Political Science and education in this field is provided. The history of emergence of the theory in Russia is considered. The impact of mistakes and misunderstandings on the modern interpretation of theory is allocated .

Keywords: Politics, political system, Parsons" theory, political sociology.

Talcott Parsons is often mentioned in Russian political literature as one of the main theorists of the political system. This opinion arose due to the fact that for a long time, understanding this issue remained the prerogative of foreign scientists. In addition, the vast majority of theorists represent the American political school.

For obvious reasons, in Soviet times the works of David Easton, Gabriel Almond and Talcott Parsons were not translated into Russian, although their concepts were formed already in the late 60s - early 70s; The situation did not change radically after 1991. This state of affairs was reflected in domestic political science textbooks - on many issues, the compilers had to rely not on theories, but on their retellings. The same fate befell Parsons's theory, with which the political system of society is presented in most textbooks.

It is worth making a few comments on this matter without going into a critical analysis of the theory itself.

Firstly, it is worth noting the translation errors of many concepts and the emergence of discrepancies in Parsons’s works. For example, such a concept as polity.

Polity, the author argues, is a key concept in his work on the political system. It can be translated as “politics”, but it must be understood that this does not mean politics in the classical sense - as a set of relations regarding power (it is denoted by the term politics), and not as an area of ​​state policy (it is denoted by the term roPsu and is often found in the author's works). Parsons's political system is absolutely synonymous with political system and implies precisely the political system as a subsystem of a large social system, giving this concept an extremely broad and abstract meaning. According to Parsons, polity is a certain segment of society as a whole, including everything that is even slightly related to power and management, both at the state level and at the level of private associations of individuals.

Secondly, strictly speaking, Parsons's main science was sociology, and most of his work is sociological. When it comes to politics, we can talk about political sociology - it is on the methods of this branch that his work is based. It is political sociology, and not social political science - for Parsons, the main object of research is society in its political aspect; politics interests him, first of all, as a subsystem of society, and not a self-sufficient set of relations. Therefore, the main categories of study remain either purely sociological, such as individuals, or political analogues of the latter, such as collectives. At the same time, it is interesting that the author constantly draws parallels in his research, comparing politics with other subsystems of society, primarily with the economy, and, admittedly, at the level of abstraction at which this is done, it is for him

© Galaktionov V.I., 2014

IN AND. Galaktionov

Vasily Galaktionov

Section I. Public Administration and Politics

It works out great. However, all his works, in fact, are quite far from modern political science and methods of its research.

Parsons did not develop a theory of the political system as such - he was simply not interested in it as a separate object of study. He viewed it only as part of a more general social system. Therefore, Parsons simply does not have a coherent, unified and complete theory of the political system. However, in his research there is a concept of a political system, which we will now try to present without subjecting it to critical analysis.

Parsons developed a general theory of action systems. Without delving into the jungle of sociology, we note that according to this theory, any action system consists of four main subsystems - goalattainment, adaptive, integrative and patternmaintenance. This theory is universal, and therefore any system of action consists of these four subsystems. Society as a whole, or a social system, is understood by the author, on the one hand, as an integrative subsystem of a more general system of action, and on the other hand, as a system of action by its nature. It, in turn, consists of the same four subsystems, with politics playing the goal-oriented role, economics playing the adaptive role, pattern maintenance

The cultural subsystem, and finally, the integrative subsystem is the social community. Thus, the political system is characterized by the function of a goal-achieving instrument of society. By the main goals of a specific society (within one state), Parsons understands the preservation of territorial integrity and internal law and order, maintaining the material well-being of citizens and pursuing economic policy. He considers the first two of these goals to be the main ones, noting, however, that each specific society has other goals. Thus, if we adapt the imperative to achieve goals to the goals themselves, we get that the above is nothing more than the specific functions of the political system within society as a whole.

Further, the political system is in turn a variant of the action system and the social system, and in turn consists of the same four components. The role of the goal-achieving system is played by the leadership subsystem, which is understood as elected (usually) senior officials of all three branches of government. The adaptive system is the administrative or bureaucratic subsystem, which refers to the executive branch, with the exception of top management. The integrative system is the legislative and judicial branches of government, and, finally, the patternmaintenancesubsystem

This is a regulatory system, that is, the totality of all regulatory legal acts of a given state. Accordingly, top management is endowed, as a goal-achieving subsystem, with the function of transforming the general goals of the team into specific tasks and determining their priority, and the main function of the bureaucratic subsystem is the implementation of these tasks. As for the integrative subsystem, the legislative power within its framework is endowed with the function of providing support, including through the representative function, to the governing subsystem, and the judicial power is called upon to legitimize the actions of management (the theory is clearly created on the basis of the American model, where the Supreme Court can actually create new norms rights). As for the normative subsystem, its function is to consolidate and maintain the chosen form of the state. This is the structural-functional theory in relation to the differentiation of the political system itself.

However, Parsons says that the above is only a model of internal differentiation of the political system. If we talk about its position among adjacent subsystems of society, then it is determined by slightly different three subsystems, only one of which is completely internal to politics. We are talking about the same bureaucratic, legitimizing and associative subsystems. These subsystems are not the internal structures of the political system, but the institutions through which its position in society is determined. The bureaucratic subsystem in this case performs the function of mobilizing resources to carry out the tasks facing it in connection with the need to achieve collective goals. The legitimization subsystem performs the function, firstly, of the legal justification of political decisions and, secondly, of correlating the actions of the authorities and the basic values ​​of society as a whole. At the state level, it includes the regulatory subsystem and judicial institutions. The associative subsystem implements

the most important function of mobilizing electoral support, and, therefore, is a source of power.

The last of the given structures of the political system is universal, and applies not only to the political system of the entire society, but also to any political system. It must be said that for Parsons the political system is a very broad concept. For him, a political system is any collective in which relations regarding power and management arise, and in the course of his work he tries to analyze mainly trends that are common to all political systems, and does not always highlight the political system of society as a whole. One of these selections is the first of the above options for differentiating political systems.

This is what we can say about Talcott Parsons' concept of political system. If we compare it with the modern structural-functional approach, which was presented to us as Parsons's approach, we will find practically no common ground. In fact, Talcott Parsons did not create what we now call the structural-functional concept of the political system. But, without creating the most significant concept of a political system in a political science sense, he at the same time played an important role in the emergence of both approaches to its study known to us. Albeit at a slightly different level - too abstract for political science - but it was he who first paid serious attention to such a phenomenon as the political system of society, and it was he who was the first to use elements of both a systemic and structural-functional approach to its analysis. A few years later, each of these elements received development and serious political scientific justification in the works of two of his colleagues and contemporaries - David Easton and Gabriel Almond, and this is how the modern systemic and structural-functional approaches with which we are all so familiar appeared.