Features of the influence of public opinion on nacionalas security of Russia

Public opinion as an expression of the mass consciousness is able to influence practically all social phenomena and processes, thereby forming certain conditions to ensure national security. The philosophical analysis shows that public opinion as a state of mass consciousness has dialectical relationships with national security as security of the individual, society and state from external and internal threats. The author identified the mechanism of the influence of public opinion on national security, basic elements of which are channels of expression of public opinion (referenda and elections, institutions of civil society, public opinion polls, national performances, Internet) and the components of the mechanism of national security (institutional-organizational, subject-active, legal, ideological-axiological, theoretical ones). However, the effectiveness of these mechanisms depends on many factors, but primarily on the level of development of democracy and civil society in the country. The paper concludes that despite the existence of constitutional-legal and extra-legal possibilities of expression of public opinion in the functioning of the political system in Russia, it does not perform its basic institutional functions, and is mainly used as a tool of legitimation of political power.