Psychological prerequisites of extremism in the context of destroyed cross-cultural communication

Introduction. Extremism is primarily a phenomenon of spiritual character connected with the changes in the social, psychological and cultural spheres of life. It is social, psychological and cultural factors which largely determine the radicalization of human consciousness. The broken cultural and psychological mechanisms of cross-cultural communication become a significant condition of building radical forms of consciousness and extremism. Materials, Methods, Results and Discussion. When studying cultural and psychological prerequisites of extremism formation the authors relied on the researches conducted according to the structuralism approach. The hypothesis built implies that in the modern world extremism is developed due to the destruction of the “us” - “them” opposition fundamental for the human consciousness. Extremism is a destructive activity using radical violence methods of fighting with the opponents to solve burning social contradictions resulted in the aggravation of these conflicts, but not in their elimination. Conclusions. The prerequisite of extremism development is the increased recent tendency to destroy basic conditions of cross-cultural communication. This results in simplified people’s consciousness, the aim to solve any social contradictions in a fast and primitive way, which leads to the increasing extremism.