Konzervatismus a liberalismus a percepce sociálního státu

The main topic of this study is the research of perception of social and generally any active role of 
the state in attitudes of the Czech adult population. The role of the state is analyzed in context of 
political thinking of respondents. The importance of the traditional dichotomy between liberal and 
conservative politics is stressed, primary attention being paid to conservatism. Theoretical reflection 
in the first part of the study is generalizing the conflict of conservative and liberal ideology into a 
highly individual and philosophical conflict (which is an interconnection too) of the order of perception
and the order of Being in human personality. This is considered as a base for conflict of liberalism 
and conservatism in the public sphere that has taken a new form recently as a conflict of democratic 
conservatism and social liberalism. Inspiration was looked for in ideas of D.J. Levy, I. Kant, M. 
Heidegger, R. Nisbet, F.A. Hayek, R. Scruton. In the second, empirical part of the study there is an 
attempt for operacionalization of theoretical propositions into one main hypothesis and four 
subhypotheses. They give the author a possibility to verify the potential existence of attitudes of 
democratic conservatism among Czech adult population. Particular data on perception of the role of 
the state or on political attitudes are then used and examined by factor analysis and frequency 
comparison. The results confirm the existence of democratic conservatism defined by hypotheses in 
attitudes of Czech population which however in comparison with the situation in developed western 
countries has different position in continuum of political attitude. Though conservative attitudes are 
independent of attitudes towards material redistribution, they are always partly connected with the 
request for a stronger social role of the state in the Czech enviroment.