Student Tolerance in the Context of Basic Democratic Values

Abstract

The article analyzes the results of an author's survey among students from UNSS, Sofia and the University of Economics – Varna about the opinions, attitudes and perceptions of tolerance in the context of basic democratic values. The authors seek verification of three main hypotheses: (1) a high degree of tolerance among students regarding differences related to ethnicity, religion, race, political preferences, sexual orientation, regardless of their gender and university where they study; (2) supporting tolerance as a core democratic value, along with freedom, equality, and justice, and (3) understanding tolerance is tied to the content students put into the other three values – freedom, equality, and justice. The results related to the understanding of tolerance, freedom, justice, equality are subject to interpretation; the self-assessment of tolerance; the assessment of the importance of tolerance in democracy.