Social Consciousness

The Essence and Structure of Social Consciousness

In this section, we aim to focus on elucidating the essence of social consciousness, its structure, and an examination of its primary forms.

In the course of their existence, humans do not merely engage with the surrounding world in a practical, material sense but also spiritually. Social consciousness plays an enormous role in this process—it is the sum total of ideal forms (concepts, judgments, views, emotions, ideas, representations, theories) that encompass and reflect social being, the vast diversity of societal relations formed by humanity in the process of mastering both nature and the history of society. Social consciousness not only reflects the world but also actively shapes it, fulfilling a predictive, anticipatory function.

The structure of social consciousness is typically divided into the following levels: everyday consciousness and theoretical consciousness, social psychology and ideology, as well as forms of social consciousness such as scientific, religious, political, legal, moral, aesthetic, and philosophical consciousness.

Everyday consciousness arises spontaneously in the process of daily human activity, under the direct influence of phenomena from both natural and social realities, serving as an empirical reflection of their external aspects. This is the elementary form of social consciousness, common to almost every individual. It manifests in vague, emotionally tinged representations of various aspects of social existence. This level of social consciousness finds expression in axioms, dogmas, postulates, proverbs, sayings, and anecdotes. While reflecting certain aspects of social development with some degree of truth, everyday consciousness does not contain systematic knowledge about it.

The second, higher level of social consciousness is theoretical consciousness, which reflects the essential connections of reality and its inherent laws through scientific theories that form a system of reliable, profound, and specific knowledge about the world.

A question arises: is everyday consciousness necessary when theoretical consciousness exists? Undoubtedly, yes. Both these levels of social consciousness function as two interconnected dialectical opposites. No matter how much knowledge and science develop, everyday consciousness will always persist. Everyday consciousness, or "common sense," serves as a means through which any phenomenon of social or natural reality can be discussed. However, the conclusions drawn from such discussions are not always accurate, as common sense is limited by empirical generalizations and metaphysical constraints. The absolutization of everyday consciousness (that is, the lower level of social consciousness) leads to illusions and errors within social thought. Theoretical consciousness, however, can transform and refine everyday consciousness, cultivating it. This necessitates that the sciences, including the social and human sciences, always operate at a theoretical level, ensuring that scientific concepts are not replaced by everyday notions and representations, as this would cause the system of knowledge to lose its scientific character.

Social psychology, on par with everyday consciousness, includes moods, opinions, emotions, and value orientations formed through people's daily activities. What dominates here is not knowledge of reality itself, but an attitude towards that knowledge—an evaluation of reality. Social psychology, with its emotional coloring, plays a crucial role in public movements, motivating various actions. Therefore, for statesmen, political parties, and politicians, it is important to study people's moods and predict their reactions to certain events.

Closely related to social psychology is ideology, which belongs to the higher level of social consciousness. In our view, ideology must be understood in terms of practical consciousness—reason that is employed by the thinking subject engaged in material, sensory-objective activity, aimed at mastering and transforming natural and social objects, forming the general foundation for societal development and knowledge, which is captured by the concept of "practice."

The lower level of practical consciousness is represented by "common sense"—people's spontaneous views of the surrounding world and themselves, shaped by experience, serving as the basis for practical activity and morality. The higher level of practical consciousness, however, is ideology—a collection of theoretically substantiated ideas and views of the surrounding reality and oneself, which are accepted by the social subject as correct and necessary for solving specific practical tasks. In other words, ideology functions as a theoretically grounded practical consciousness.

In line with the main forms of practical activity, it is appropriate to distinguish:

1. The ideology of material production, which encompasses the knowledge adopted by people from various branches of technical, agricultural, and other specialized sciences;
2. The ideology of scientific research—the theoretical insights of predecessors that researchers draw upon when embarking on their scientific pursuits;
3. The ideology of social transformative activity, which constitutes a part of practical consciousness and includes a set of theoretically grounded ideas and views reflecting the existing social reality and the relations to it formed by society, a class, another social group, or an individual.

Each of these structural elements of the ideological system can, in turn, be represented as a subsystem.

Ideology, by its nature, can be classified as progressive, conservative, or reactionary, as well as relatively true or unscientific, illusory. The character of an ideology depends on whose social interests it serves and how it aligns with the needs of social development.

It is worth noting that there has likely never existed an ideology that completely distorted reality. At the same time, not all ideologies are inherently scientific. For an ideology to be scientific, its theorists must continuously reconsider new phenomena in the evolving social reality, adjusting previously substantiated theoretical models, thereby refining the ideology.

The structure of social consciousness can also be analyzed from the perspective of its forms. However, one must abandon the attempt to depict social consciousness as a flat mirror composed of surface-level forms that merely reflect social being. The spatial-temporal characteristics inherent in real reality and human activity are also present in social consciousness, though in a dialectically transcended form.

This is evident in the fact that social consciousness reflects human activity in all its diversity of manifestations. This fact accounts for the existence of a multiplicity of forms of social consciousness. Yet, not all forms are equal. Forms of social consciousness differ in their object of reflection, in their modes of reflection, in the specifics of their development, and in their social functions. Among them are forms that act as integrators within the system of social consciousness, concentrating around themselves a range of other forms and, thereby, shaping the structure of social consciousness. These, then, emerge as the primary forms of social consciousness. These include moral, religious, political, legal, aesthetic, scientific, and philosophical consciousness. The next section of this monograph will be devoted to examining these forms of social consciousness.