Style życia Polaków. Próba socjologicznej typologii

Abstrakt

The issue of lifestyles in social sciences has an ample history. The beginning of the success won by the idea of a ‘lifestyle’ in sociology should be associated with Max Weber, Therstein Veblen and Georg Simmel. In modern times, especially from the perspective of empirical sociology, it is accepted that ‘lifestyle’ is connected with more or less cohesive patterns of behavior and individual values. A review done by the Institute of Opinion Study GfK Polonia in July 2002 on a group of randomly chosen 1000 people aged 15 and more revealed five basic group of Poles practicing various lifestyles. Generally 11% of Poles may be called ‘conquerors’, 35% - ‘pioneers’, and 27% - ‘traditionalists’. A further 7% is characterized by an ‘elite’ lifestyle, whereas 20% makes up a group of ‘misfits’.

Individualism and being oriented towards values of self-realization, of being open to the surrounding reality and the ability to ‘manage’ is first of all characteristic of ‘conquerors’. The ‘elite’ and ‘pioneers’ distinctly try to make a synthesis of traditional life principles, expressed e.g. by the values of acceptance and duty, and the ‘new’, individualist-self-realization ones. In turn, ‘traditionalists’ completely deliberately remain with traditional life values and principles that have been tested by the previous generations. However, this is not an ‘escapist’ lifestyle, but a conscious rejection of the life principles based on individualism. It is this attitude that makes ‘traditionalists’ different from ‘misfits’ whose ‘clinging’ to tradition first of all results from the fear of an individualized society, and not from a conscious choice.