HYBRID POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS

The concept of "hybridism" in political science has become the result of the theoretical search to describe the new political realities that have emerged in crises, "transitional" or different socio-cultural contexts. Hybrid forms of political institutions were the subject of research interest of V. Merkel, A. Croissant, G. O'Donnell, H.K.Bhabha, S.P. Peregudov, I.L. Prokhorenko, I.V. Kudryashova et al. The purpose of our research was to assess the status and trends of development of modern hybrid political institutions. The research methodology was based on the ideas of M. Castells' network society, "risk society" by U.Beck and "fluid modernity" by Z.Baumann, the concept of deliberative democracy. The authors used comparative and neo-institutional approaches, network analysis, policy documents analyses, monitoring of Internet resources. Hybrid political institutions of different origin and destination became the objects of the research: state, political parties, political regimes, crowdsourcing platforms. The term of "hybrid state" appeared in the political thesaurus when there emerged atypical forms, that "did not fit" the classification matrix. Spain, calling itself "autonomous state" formally remains a unitary, but it is a decentralized regional state. Party hybrids combine party and group functions, implementing them within a kind of synthesis (5 stars Movement in Italy, the United Kingdom Independence Party, Pirate Parties). Crowdsourcing platforms as a hybrid of activities in online and the offline spaces, substantially extend and modify the capacity of civil society in its dialogue with state. "Fluidity" of modern society is associated with non-linear processes and societal changes caused by the development of network sources. Political hybrids are mostly generated by changes in the nature of identity and political culture. Heterogeneity of political space is an important consequence of globalization, and it leads to heterogeneity of actors interacting in it. We concern the hybridity of political institutions more as a model of development, than as an organizational deviation. The concept of hybrid political institutions enables the development of theoretical and methodological tools for understanding the processes taking place "here and now".