Public administration perception as a factor of personality’s civic identity forming

Abstract

The aim of our study was a theoretical analysis of the perception of public administration and its impact on the characteristics of civic identity. Methodology: the study is based on the doctrine of subject-activity as inherent in the individual/group/organization desire-ability to be the author of his/her life, a source of activity aimed at realizing their potential. It is outlined that the perception of power is often associated with the frustration of external control and coercion. The specificity of the power image actualizes this or that paradigm of the individual's relations with the state and depending on it, some characteristics of civic identity are formed. The decisions made by public administration are one of the channels of its perception. Political decisions are perceived more negatively than managerial ones because they presuppose a hidden motive connected with the struggle for power, its strengthening, and spreading. This actualizes the paradigm of object-subject relations, where due to the individual perception the subject is the public administration, and the object is the citizen. Such a perception presupposes protest or, conversely, civic conformity as characteristics of civic identity. Both do not promote dialogue and the development of adequate ways to influence the government. The readiness for dialogue with the authorities should be based on the inherent civic maturity of the subject-subject paradigm of relations. The results can be used in the development of civic education programs; in psychodiagnostic tools for establishing civic conformity, protest, maturity as characteristics of civic identity. The direction of further research is to establish the psychological patterns of the citizen's perception of decisions made as managerial or political ones, as well as to study the impact of the state’s legal field perception on the characteristics of civic identity. The social consequences of such research lie in the field of value consolidation of citizens and public administration, enabling a common vision of the problems and models of state development