the rise of populism

What three big 2016 events suggest neoliberalism is not as strong as we thought?

Populist victories!

• Rodrigo Duterto (Philipines) would brag drug dealers would not be killed but personally taken and thrown out of helicopters, openly flouting the law). No trials, was elected.

• UK: Brexit. Cameron lost the referendum. No more FTAS, rejected of EU and neoliberal institutions EU represented

• Donald Trump elected → ending free trades, tarriffs, free trade free market ideas.

All dramatically different. Cornwell says neoliberalism would die at the hands of populism.

Often populist leaders come to power because

They reject something or promise to fix something, ie Italian prime minister who would bang tables and say ‘go italy’, Tsipras who promised to reject austerity measures that would cut funding for schools etc post-GFC.

What is populism?

Generally applied as a label for someone who doesn’t fit current political ideas → someone who doesn’t fit neoliberalism (markets gaining power, democracy).

There are three key examples: populism as an

• ideology,

• populism as a political style,

• political logic.

According to Muddle and Kalwasser, what is populism as an ideology?

‘A thin-centred ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogenous and
antagonistic camps, "the pure people" versus "the corrupt elite," and which argues that politics should be
an expression of the volonté Générale (general will) of the people.”
Populism as ideology

• no set ideology. could be left or right → division.

• overthrow elites. Bolsonaro and tsipras shared ideas.

According to Moffit, what is populism as a political style?

‘the demonstration of bad manners by the populist leadership – that is, a rejection of the conventions of political or even polite discourse; and the advancing of a narrative of crisis, breakdown or threat’.

• talking off the cuff, showing you’re different and an outsider. (Trump). performs being different

According to Laclau and Mouffe, what is populism as political logic?

Laclau and Mouffe:
◦ “a way of constructing the political on the basis of interpellating the underdog to mobilize against the existing status quo.” (i.e. about antagonism

→ interpolation: taking on a specific identity. convincing people their identity is x and this is why they should vote for y.

• building competing ideologists.

• problem is that if everything is populism, then it doesn’t exist.
  

How has the definition of populism changed?

Contested meanings:

◦ Dornbusch and Edwards (1991): “an approach to economics that emphasizes growth and income redistribition and deemphasizes the risks of inflation and deficit finance, external constraints, and the reaction of economic agents to aggressive nonmarket policies”

◦ Jan Werner Müller (2016, and others): “a particular moralistic imagination of politics, a way of perceiving the political world that sets a morally pure and fully unified ... people against elites who are deemed corrupt or in some other way morally inferior.”

◦ Applies to:

• Political leadership

• Political parties

• Social movements

• Cultural moments

◦ Meaning of “populism” stabilised over the last decade (Velasco and Bucell, 2022)

◦ Many meanings, but some key features most definitions agree on

◦ Populists don’t call themselves populists (in general)

What are Simon Tormey’s six features of populism?

◦ Antagonism; ‘the people’ vs. ‘the elites’

◦ Crisis (real or imagined)

◦ Redemptive, simple vision for society

◦ Charismatic leader figure

◦ Blunter, confrontational language

◦ Construction of an enemy (internal or external)

What is Tormey’s concept of antagonism? what does it involve?

◦ “The people” as a core concept in democratic sovereignty

◦ As foundational and “powerful”

◦ Often inscribed in Constitutions

◦ Elements of the populist construction of “the people”

◦ Essentialist: a singular identity

◦ Restrictive: in-groups and out-groups

◦ Naturalistic and ambiguous: you can see yourself in that group (Aslanidis, 2020) – they are “genuine” and “authentic”

◦ Have a moral rightness

What is Tomey’s concept of corrupt elites and its characteristics?

◦ “Elites” expansive in construction → very variable and shifting

◦ Populist leaders are often political, economic or military

elites

◦ The power of betrayal:

◦ Koehler and Gershoff (2003): people react more negatively to a bad action when it involves a violation of a duty (or promise) versus something that occurs “by luck”

◦ If the “system” is rigged populist leaders are therefore able to ignore conventions, institutional norms, and rules

◦ Link to their authoritarian tendencies → why should I bother listening to xyz if they’re not legit?

Where do notions of ‘corrupt elite’ come from?

◦ Linkage with conspiracy theory thinking

◦ Hodstadter (1964) and the “paranoid style”

◦ Paranoia:

◦ Irrational and persistent feeling that people are “out to get you”

◦ American politics governed by paranoia throughout history

◦ This is deliberately cultivated

◦ Not a pathology, but a “style” – a way of doing and seeing politics

◦ Changes in the USA during the last decade towards more conspiratorial thinking in

conservatives (van der Linden, 2020)

◦ A general cultural orientation (elites and non-elites)

◦ Heightens the political power of fear

What is Tomey’s conceptualisation of antagonism - the people vs elite? and its characteristics?

essentially the elite vs the people. but can be changed - ie Trump and muslims, trump and communists

What is tomey’s conceptualisation of crisis - real or imagined?

◦ ‘Never let a serious crisis go to waste...’

◦ Remember the history of the rise of neoliberalism

◦ Crisis as opportunity for renewal vs. potential for ruin

◦ The beatific (if we turn away) vs. the horrific (if we stay the same)

◦ Populism as generating the crisis that it benefits from

(division as self-fulfilling prophecy; see work of Ben

Moffit)

◦ Creating imaginary crises vs. exploiting real crises (synthetic media and drug crisis) (Farage in the UK pretending Turkish mass migration if they didn’t brexit)

◦ See also the ‘vibe-cession’ in US and Australia (ideas of recession when there isn’t)

What is a cornerstone that makes populists so effective?

◦ Simple prognoses of complex problems

◦ Simple solutions (trump and his wall)

◦ Blame the elites

◦ ‘Drain the swamp’

◦ If solutions not working.......blame the elites!

In contrast to ideas of political ideology and beliefs taking precedence, often populist leaders are also:

Charismatic leader figure

◦ From Max Weber (via Willner 1984)

What is tomey’s conceptualisation of ‘blunter, confrontation’ within populism?

◦ Tells it like it is...

◦ Conversational, unscripted

◦ Insulting, name calling

◦ Jair Bolsonaro (beyond incivility):

◦ ‘I wouldn’t rape you, you wouldn’t deserve it,’ to congresswoman Maria

do Rosario

◦ ’I would be incapable of loving a homosexual son ... I would prefer my son

to die in an accident than show up with a moustachioed man.’

◦ ‘Since I was a bachelor at the time, I used the money to have sex with

people’ (on how he spent his Congressional salary)

◦ Puzzle of how this approaches squares with the conservative

sensibilities of the parties of many of these populist leaders?

What is Tomey’s conceputalisation of constructing an emeny?

◦ Tajfel, et al. (1971):

◦ Categorising people into arbitrary groups produced a

psychological effect strong enough to trigger ingroup bias

◦ Social identity:

◦ “that part of an individual’s self concept which derives from

his knowledge of his membership [in] a social group (or

groups) together with the emotional significance attached to

that membership”

◦ Politicisation of the social identity

◦ “Others”:

◦ Not part of “the people”

◦ Negative / threatening

◦ Arbitrary

◦ Example of the social construction of the other

◦ Lega (Nord)

◦ Est 1989

◦ Conservative north Italian base

◦ Pre-2000

◦ Corrupt political elite in Rome and the lazy

southern Italians

◦ Post-2000

◦ Immigrants from Muslim-majority countries

What is populist notions of othering and moral panics?

Moral panics as the re-interpretation of social phenomena in moral terms (Cohen, 1974)

• Thus, society is ripe for a “political agenda that casts liberal rights as arcane and out of touch with ‘the people”

(Vincent, 2009)

What is a case study example of confrontational and blunt language of Tomey?

Trump on truth social

What is an example of othering in Australian politics?

She started off with being ‘swamped by asians’, then against welfare for indigenous, then post-9/11 muslims Pauline Hansen wearing a hijab into parliament

What are some reasons the radical right underperforms in australia?

• poor organisational skills

• compulsory voting

• we already have some of these measures in place (offshore concentration camps for migrants)

What is pluralism?

many competing groups/identities within society, democracy as

system of peaceful adjudication between competing groups

What is the relationship between populism and pluralism?

Populism seeks to flatten this nuance (people vs. elite, friend vs. enemy, against separation of powers)

What are the consequences of populism for democracy?

◦ A threat to democracy → populism as the autoimmune disease of democracy (Keane)

◦ Or as natural part of democracy → populism is how pluralist societies deal with competing influence groups (Mouffe)

What does Keane discuss when he says pathologies of populism as an ‘autoimmune disease’ of democracy?

◦ Fetish of The Leader; political bosses; demagoguery

◦ Against complexity and countervailing institutions (judiciary; media; civil society)

◦ In-grouping / out-grouping - contempt for the Other (Trump: ‘The only thing that matters is the unification of the people – because the other people don’t mean anything’); remaking The People

◦ Spread of lies & bullshit (gaslighting; ‘post-truth’ politics)

◦ Aesthetics of violence - populism as redemption, apostolic zeal, salvation

Why is populism bad?

Yes!

◦ Populism as anti-democratic and anti-liberal

◦ Populism as socially divisive

◦ Trust vampires

◦ Othering

◦ Populism as “incompetence”

◦ Insurance against “elite betrayal” (Tella and

Rotemberg, 2016)

◦ Brexit

◦ Covid-19

Or is populism just part of democracy?

◦ Anti-populism as elite ideology?

◦ ‘Populism is the label that political elites attach to policies supported by ordinary citizens that they [that is, the elites] don’t like.’ Francis Fukuyama

◦ How to make an idea unacceptable – call it populist!

◦ Technocratic governance (i.e. by experts) as the opposite of populism

What does Arditi say about populism being bad? Why is it regarded as dangerous?

◦ Populism itself as a “moral panic”

◦ Commonly presented as a “dis-ease” (lack of ease)

◦ Elites don’t want participation, so populism is “dangerous” (Arditi, 2003)

◦ Structural drivers behind “panic language”

◦ “Politicians seeking to stem the flow of votes to minor parties need to respond to these push factors. Rebuilding trust will be a slow process. A period of leadership stability and policy delivery could go a long way. But improving political institutions – reforming political donations laws and improving the regulation of lobbying activities, for example – could help reassure the public that the system is working for them.” (2018)

What, according to Chantaf Mouf makes populism good?

◦ Chantal Mouffe (and others)

◦ Liberalism as “depoliticising”

◦ Conflict is an inevitable and natural part of political life

◦ Different actors assert their collective identities and

struggle for power and hegemony

◦ Agonism vs. antagonism

◦ Representative and other forms of “managed”

democracy is the latest attempt by elites to

suppress conflict

◦ What can be achieved is a temporary “conflictual

consensus” between political adversaries

◦ Need “Left wing populism” to develop a clear “left-

right opposition” and Agonism

◦ “Thick populism” (participative)

Democratic politics “presupposes that

the ‘other’ is no longer seen as an

enemy to be destroyed, but as an

‘adversary’, i.e., somebody with whose

ideas we are going to struggle but

whose right to defend those ideas we

will not put into question ... An

adversary is a legitimate enemy, an

enemy with whom we have in

common a shared adhesion to the

ethico-political principles of democracy

... We could say that the aim of

democratic politics is to transform an

‘antagonism’ into an ‘agonism.’”

What are some key factors that explain the rise of populism?

• economic insecurity (inequality, 1%, economic urbanisation, UE)

• status threat and racial motivations (Mutz, USA)

• Education and demographics over trade exposure and budget cuts (UK, Becker et al)

• Cultural backlash theory, (Norris and Inglehart)

What do Norris and Inglehart have to say about the rise in cultural backlash due to populism?

Norris and Inglehart (2019):

◦ Populism as a backlash against the post-material

values shift of the mid-late 20th century

◦ Generation of a “political cleavage” between

liberalism and conservatism

◦ Ideological, demographic (youth, age) and geographical

(urban-rural)

◦ Populism as a form of “recognition politics” that is

socially constructed by “entrepreneurs”

◦ Fukuyama (2018):

◦ “...individuals often want not recognition of their

individuality, but recognition of their sameness to

other people

Has populism really challenged neoliberalism?

Trump (2016-2020) in government:

◦ Attempt to repeal Obamacare (i.e. marketise healthcare further)

◦ Largest tax cut in history (targeting wealthiest + corporations)

◦ Deregulation bombfire, especially of environmental regulation

◦ Austerity? Not so much

◦ Inequality continues to increase

◦ So more Reagan than Thatcher?

◦ Failure of populism as driving...more neoliberal populism?

◦ Progressive neoliberalism vs. reactionary/regressive

neoliberalism (Nancy Fraser)

What is the area of debate on Trump rejecting neoliberalism or hyperreactionary reloaded?