Democratization - the moral ideal of cultural policy. A philosophical revision of the Social Critique of the Power of Judgment of P. Bourdieu

Abstract

Democratization has become the unknowingly accepted moral ideal of cultural policy. It is more or less consciously based on Pierre Bourdieu’s postulate to abolish the Kantian distinction between pure and barbaric taste. A closer analysis of theoretical assumptions and cultural practice shows that the ideal expressed and applied in this form is internally contradictory, and it certainly cannot be universally applied in all areas of culture. The correct articulation of the ideal of democratization cannot be based on negating the Kantian aesthetics, but, on the contrary, requires its rehabilitation in the direction that was set, among others, by Herbert Marcuse. The article presents non-dogmatic arguments for maintaining the elitist nature of the activities of legitimate institutions of artistic culture. If democratization is to constitute a real (i.e. consistent with its concept) moral ideal, then the autonomy of high culture works in its favor.