Suchergebnisse

There are numerous works of both Russian and foreign authors concerning the issue of modernization, yet interest toward it is far from exhausted. While complexity of globalization processes grows, modernization constantly presents us with new challenges, thus demanding new approaches in research. This article represents our attempt to rethink existing concepts in order to prove the preference of deploying research in a socio-cultural direction, which may ensure priority of the human factor, social partnership and social equality in the global arena, as, without these, modernization also loses its socio-cultural perspective and content. Most certainly, this new idea requires a sociocultural model of modernization to be created, as well as a corresponding methodology. However, we are forced to narrow the postulate of the topic, as the justification of the need for such a model raises certain questions, namely: why exactly it is needed, and what factors hindering its development are present in existing modernization theories. Therefore, the following tasks have been prioritized: highlighting the positive aspects of the three stages of modernization theory, changing the paradigms of research approaches, creating the principles of interdisciplinarity by the American school of social scientists, determining the role of science in the institutionalization of these processes. The article highlights as determining factors of the socio-cultural modernization strategy the political motives for creating the modernization theory, leading to an increase in the status of strong states over weak ones, to an imbalance in the development of different societies, subordination of the weak to the powerful. Unlike many researchers who associate the leap in human progress with the Industrial Revolution and the Great French Revolution, the author believes that the true origins of the phenomenon should be found in the Scientific Revolution of the Western countries of the 16th—17th centuries. After all, the basis and driving force of modernization consist of intellectual capital and the middle class. The article also provides examples of practical application of scientific discoveries, its destructive and positive influence on Western societies in the era of rapid changes, giving examples to all humanity. In conclusion, the article defines the socio-cultural model of modernization.