Cultura política e participação: debates a partir do Movimento Revolucionário Angolano

Abstract

The 21st century was and continues to be a common time of effervescence of civic and associative spirit in much of the African countries that after the end of colonization and the political regime adopted in the post-colonial period, an authoritarian system, have experienced various forms of participation: marches, strikes, vigils, boycotts, street demonstrations, among others. Because of that, the Angolan society registered the first wave of non-conventional civic participation from the year 2011, having as protagonists the young people of the Revolutionary Movement (MRA), a group formed by activists, students, teachers, journalists and ordinary non-partisan citizens, inspired by the revolution of the so-called Arab Spring. Thus, the present dissertation is a study whose general objective is to map the stages that mark the participation of the MRA in the Angolan political system, as well as its influence on social and political transformation. Regarding it, the specific objectives are: to investigate the impact of political culture and participation for the construction and consolidation of democracy of a nation, in particular the Angolan; as well as evaluate the impact of social capital on political and civic participation in the sphere of Angolan public life according to the perception of Revús. To this end, it was necessary to present briefly some concepts related to the theme, namely: Political Culture and Participation, and in summary form the debate on social capital. With regard to the reality under study we made a brief socio-historical trajectory that marked the constitution of the Angolan political system, which allowed us to formulate the hypothesis that the absence of a culture of participation in the public life of the country is a consequence of the authoritarian legacy that remains intact in the policy of the State and the Government, a characteristic of a political regime built on nepotism, personalism and patronage, a type of regime that annihilates its opponents and inhibits any act of demonstration organized by independent associations. In short, for the development of the work we used the qualitative approach method, through the semi-structured interview technique that allowed us to maintain contact and hear the perception of some members of the MRA, as well as test the hypotheses, objectives and research problem.