acceptance of democracy and democratic orientation in serbia in the context of social changes

The subject of the paper is the support for democratic government and its basic values expressed by the citizens of Serbia. Direct, general evaluation of democracy, operationalized through valuing democracy as a good or bad system of government was analyzed. Unidimensional syndrome of democratic orientation which comprises social tolerance, postmaterialist values, valuing of autonomy, support for gender equality and market orientation was observed as an indicator of the acceptance of the democratic values. The data collected in the three waves of the World Values Survey (N=3700), conducted on representative samples of Serbian citizens in 1996, 2001 and 2006, were analyzed. The results of the analysis indicate that general support for democratic government, as well as the acceptance of the democratic orientation among Serbian citizens, shows a 'zigzag' profile of change - a sharp increase after the democratic changes in 2000, followed by a significant decrease. The congruence between support for democratic government and democratic values is relatively rare. The concluding chapter discusses the importance and implications of the obtained results in the context of social change effects on the changes of value orientations in one society, as well as in the light of the two competing models of the relationship between political culture and political structure, culturalist and institutionalist. .