SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY OF SOVIET POLITICAL ELITES IN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT

Historical experience has shown that sustainable development of the human community in the process of making managerial decisions needs taking into account not only interests of individuals or organizations making these decisions, but also interests, values and goals of wide social groups and society as a whole. This ethical principle is the content of the concept of "social responsibility" - one of the fundamental concepts in social science. The relevance of this principle grows in connection with an increasing role of subjective factor in the socio-historical process. Social responsibility becomes especially important for activities of the most influential social groups. Thus, the increasing impact on society and the environment of the activities of managers and organizers of industrial production has drawn attention to the social responsibility of this social group. Responsibility for the state of society and the natural environment is becoming an important area of social science, the number of studies in this area of scientific knowledge multiplies. Higher education institutions are expanding their teaching courses like "Social Responsibility of Business". At the same time, there is another social group - political elite of society, to whose activity this ethical principle is even more relevant due to its greater influence. The article - starting from the early to the late Soviet period - analyzes nature and forms of social responsibility manifestations of first persons of the state.