Important Factors That Determine a Political Culture are listed below:
1. History:
Historical events like the French revolution, the American war of independence, the Glorious Revolution, the Bolshevik revolution, have greatly influenced the political cultures of France, U.S., U.K. and Russia.
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The Indian political culture bears the influence of events of the freedom struggle and the contacts with the western civilization and culture.
2. Political Continuity/Discontinuity:
Continuity of political process helps the revolution of a participant political culture and serves as a linkage between past and present.
The importance of political continuity in a country like Britain, says A.R. Ball lies, in the fact that older values have been allowed to merge with modern attitudes undisturbed by violent internal strike or dominion by foreign power. This is why British Monarchy exists together with Democracy.
On the other hand, Pakistanis stints with democracy between long periods of military dictatorship have hindered the development of a stable political culture which is why people of Pakistan struggle for democracy when living under dictatorship, yet fail to manage a political system when it becomes democratic.
3. Geography:
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Favourable locations have helped Britain meet foreign invasions successfully thereby keeping its political culture stable. It was a great factor in the spread of socialism to eastern European countries.
4. Socio-Economic Factors:
A predominantly urbanized and industrialized society is more complex. Educational standards are higher, communication is more fluid, groups proliferate and participation in the decision making process is higher.
States with predominantly rural and peasant population are usually more conservative. The impact of science and technology also leads to change in values and beliefs of the people, which in turn bring the changes in the political culture.
5. Ethnic Factor:
Ethnic differences and conflicts in a society also determine the nature of the political culture. Ethnic issues are always behind differences between national political culture and regional sub-political cultures.
6. Ideological Factor:
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As a set of principles offering an explanation of given phenomena, or even life in a society, ideology plays an important role in forming and changing people’s values, commitment and orientations.
The ideology of Marxism determines the nature of political cultures of several states. The ideology of liberalism is prevalent in most western political cultures.
Gabriel Almond has used the concept of political culture to classify the political systems.