Cultura política e a percepção das instituições políticas locais: o caso do município de Santo Cristo/RS

Abstract

The present study aims to contribute to the debate on the importance of political culture and democratic institutions in the consolidation of a democratic regime, as well as their contributions to the promotion of development in a local sphere. To this end, a research was carried out in the municipality of Santo Cristo-RS, seeking to analyze the possibility of classifying the population, applying the typology on political culture developed by scientists Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba, in their work "La Cultura Cívica", as well as to verify if there is the existence of possible connections between the groups, according to the type of political culture, with specific elements of perception and knowledge about local political institutions. From then on, it was investigated if there are differences in perceptions according to the distribution among the types identified. For the development of the study, as to the objectives, a descriptive research of a quantitative nature was carried out. For data collection the same procedure was used that Almond and Verba used in their studies on political culture, the survey type research. The methodology employed is quantitative. Thus, it is intended that the present study may help in future works and research on the theme. In the municipality of Santo Cristo/RS, a political culture predominantly of the subject is present, with traces of a parochial culture and of participation among the population. But these traits become more evident when the groups within the variables gender, age, family income, education, place of residence, and religion are analyzed separately. In this case, the education variable allows, with greater evidence, to verify the differences in perceptions according to the distribution of individuals within the typology used. Besides the family income variable, which also points to traces of another culture, besides that of the subject. From this, it was possible to identify the profile of the individuals of each type of culture.