NATIONAL IDENTITY: PROTECTION AGAINST DESTRUCTIVE INFORMATION INFLUENCES IN THE CONTEXT OF CIVIL SOCIETY BUILDING IN UKRAINE

Abstract

National identity means the sense of belonging and unity of a person to a particular nation. The current political regime in the country has a significant influence on the ways of protecting the information space and the ways of forming national identity. But in spite of the basic components of the regime, in the modern world, protecting the information space of any country can provide only highly developed spiritual production, the ability of the state or, in particular, of the political elite, political leaders, etc., to generate genuine ideas capable of inspiring people and uniting society. Undoubtedly, one such idea is a national idea that is based on national identity. At the same time, in our opinion, when we exaggerate the role of the state as an institution regulating the processes that take place in civil society, we remain in "post-authoritarian rhetoric". That is, I would like to point out the following position - one of the basic conditions for the emergence of the ability to protect their information space from powerful external information influences is a clear self-identification of citizens with their country, nation. (In other words, the formation, or more precisely, the “cultivation from below” of a powerful civil society, united around integrated national values, involving all ethnic and other population groups in the country). In the absence of such self-identification, the protection of the mass consciousness of citizens cannot be secured from external information influences, no matter what the cruelest methods can be resorted to by the state authorities, which would be the most advanced methods and tools used by the political propaganda apparatus. It is therefore important not only to form a national idea (formed by the state), but also to pay attention to how a national dream is formed (“sponsored” by civil society), to seek consensus between the two phenomena.