Populismus (Handbuchartikel) (original) (raw)
The article will review several works on populism, namely those contributions that concern the relation between populism and democracy. Our aim is to discuss the main theoretical issues on defining and conceptualizing populism. The overview of the academic literature shows that, in the first decade of the 21st century, populism was seen as a threat to representative democracy, while recent works consider this view debatable.
Demokratie und Populismus in der griechischen Antike und heute, 2024
The contribution argues that Aristotle may help us understand phenomena related to populism in two ways: First, by explaining how ‘populist’ attitudes may be understood as a deviation from the virtue of political wisdom (phronēsis). Thus, in the Aristotelian framework what prohibits a political leader or a whole group of citizens from reaching decisions which aim at the promotion of the common good is both a cognitive and an ethical (or character-related) deficiency. Further, Aristotle’s discussion offers us an acute analysis of the causes of political pathologies related to populism. Thus, he suggests that extreme economic inequality and political exclusion may foster ‘populist’ attitudes, since they make people unable to think in terms of the common benefit. Thus, remedying such conditions will provide the necessary basis for cultivating political wisdom and for avoiding the dangers of populism.
Populism: A Controversial Historiographical Category
2020
The note stems from the need to carry out a survey on recent international literature dedicated to populism, starting above all from the considerations contained in The Populist Temptation by Eichengreen, and in From Fascism to Populism in History by Finchelstein, as well as the results from the Oxford Handbook of Populism, edited by Rovira Kaltwasser, Taggart, Ochoa Espejo and Ostiguy. The contrasting reflections recorded around a phenomenon so debated allow to delineate the elements, that justify the introduction of a historiographical category in its own right and to project some definitions on the entire history of the Italian political system. The intention of this overview is to construct a catalog of the various interpretations of populism that have emerged in recent years. It is noteworthy that in the years following World War II until the present day, publications on populism have been produced in a discontinuous fashion, thus rendering the subject even more elusive and unc...
Populism, Populists, and the Crisis of Political Parties
2018
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Populismus: Kontroversen und Perspektiven – Ein wissenschaftliches Gesprächsangebot
opulismus: Kontroversen und Perspektiven – Ein wissenschaftliches Gesprächsangebot, 2020
Kaum ein Begriff wurde in den letzten Jahren so oft und kontrovers diskutiert wie „Populismus“. Dabei beginnt der Konflikt bereits bei der Suche nach einer gültigen Definition, denn häufig endet dieses Unterfangen auch unter Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern in gegenseitigen Vorwürfen, selbst populistisch zu sein. Der Ausdruck wird einerseits genutzt, um dem politischen "Gegner" eine verzerrte und simplifizierte Argumentationsweise zu attestieren. Gleichzeitig gilt er anderseits als inflationär gebrauchtes Totschlagargument, um den Gegenspieler zu diskreditieren, wenn keine konstruktiven und stichhaltigen Gegenargumente vorgebracht werden können. So handelt es sich letztlich um ein oft unspezifisch benutztes Schlagwort, dessen Verwendung von der Beschreibung einer Form der politischen Rhetorik bis hin zur Anprangerung rassistischer und antidemokratischer Weltanschauungen reichen kann. Der vorliegende Band will sich daher mit diesem Phänomen interdisziplinär auseinandersetzen und sich ihm aus historischer und politischer, aber auch aus sprachwissenschaftlicher sowie theologischer Perspektive nähern. Dabei können auch hier keine absoluten Antworten geliefert werden, sondern letztlich nur ein wissenschaftliches Diskussionsangebot – alles andere wäre Populismus.
2021
This paper is about populism and populists. It is a broad topic. It concerns also a controversial topic. A phenomenon we call "populism" is a global problem and beyond borders. Certainly, when we speak of populism, we think of some aggressive, divisive politics, and when we think of populists, we bear in mind such politicians like Donald Trump, Victor Orbán, Jarosław Kaczyński, Nigel Farage, Geert Wilders, Jair Bolsonaro, etc. But take such a general question: is every politician who promises everything to everybody a populist? Is this not true that those who are called "populists" are democratically elected? How to describe such leaders as Orbán or Bolsonaro? My aim is to conceptualise these phenomena, i.e. populism and populists. I propose to define what populism is and who populists are. First, I will present contemporary scholars's ideas. Second, I will go to history of ideas, precisely, to considerations by Aristotle and de Tocqueville. Finally, I will make concluding remarks. This paper is to understand, not to blame. It is also to consider what kinds of arguments are made by those whom we call "populists". Moreover, this is to think whether "populism" is a relevant term and one should try to describe this phenomenon in a subtler and non-pejorative way where "naming is not blaming". This is a theoretical aspect of the paper. Considerations by Austrian, Dutch, Brazilian, Polish, Finnish and Hungarian scholars are used in the paper. There is also a historical aspect: What would Aristotle and de Tocqueville say about "demagogues"? There is also a practical aspect of the paper: chosen contemporary politicians are mentioned. In particular, the author is very much familiar with the real leader of Poland (after 2015) Jarosław Kaczyński's ideology. 2 Methodologically speaking: my narrative is mostly related to the Western world. I focus on the literature and my own observations. The aim is to describe these phenomena in a neutral, objective and non-emotional way. My thesis is that we can define populism and populists, however, such process involves blaming. I claim that populism is a danger for the rule of law, democracy and human rights. It is also a danger for high political and legal culture. However, there are always some reasons behind populism: from social-economic to cultural ones. We have to understand those reasons. I also claim that we can learn some lessons from populism.
Call for paper on Cvilizational Populism
Announcement, 2024
Call for Papers ECPS Fourth Annual International Symposium Civilizational Populism: National and International Challenges Date/Location: May 21-23, 2025 / Warsaw, Poland
Springer eBooks, 2018
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Republicanism and populism: Articulation of plurality or plebeian democratism
Thesis Eleven, 2021
This article addresses-from a theoretical and historical perspective-the discussion on republicanism and populism, in connection to different ways of conceiving political modernity. It places republicanism and populism within the framework of contemporary democracies in the Latin American context, looking at the reciprocal interaction between these political traditions, and their relevance for understanding the current challenges of the liberal model in the region.
Three Provocations concerning the Uses of Populism (2024)
Populism, 2024
This article outlines three provocations to shake up the comfort zone of populism studies. These are: that populism may have become an anachronism and we should think about moving on; that populism may work better as a term of derision, as democracy was for the ancient Greeks; that we should describe it as a historical phenomenon, something that happened in the mid-twentieth century but is no longer current. So, my suggestion to populism scholars is to drop the term, use it to disqualify opponents, or refer to it as something that happened some time ago.
German Law Journal
Contemporary discussions of populism elide important distinctions between the ways in which populist leaders and movements respond to the failures of elites to follow through on the promises associated with international social welfare constitutionalism. After laying out the political economy of populisms’ origins, this Article describes the relation between populisms and varieties of liberalism, and specifically the relation between populisms and judicial independence understood as a “veto point” occupied by the elites that populists challenge. It then distinguishes left-wing populisms’ acceptance of the social welfare commitments of late twentieth century liberalism and its rejection of some settled constitutional arrangements that, in populists’ views, obstruct the accomplishment of those commitments. It concludes with a description of the core ethnonationalism of right-wing populism, which sometimes contingently appears in left-wing populisms but is not one the latter’s core com...
Populism and cosmopolitanism are commonly regarded as antitheses, reducing populism to communalism and cosmopolitanism to elitism. This chapter develops a more nuanced view by turning to the early histories of both phenomena. In Diogenes the Cynic, cosmopolitanism’s ancient inventor, it finds evidence less for elitism than for resistance to politics as such. In the populares, populists of the Roman Republic, it finds the origins of a long history of inclusive popular politics. Drawing on a recent debate between Ernesto Laclau and Jacques Rancière, the chapter argues that populism and cosmopolitanism are essentially ambivalent. Insofar as populism can be inclusive or exclusive and cosmopolitanism elitist or popular, the two can overlap, and each can usefully be regarded as a check on the other.
(1) A Conceptual Analysis of the Term Populism
Thesis Eleven, 2018
The work deals with the analysis of the term "populism" as the wrong way to understand the actual political turmoils. It is used as a combat-concept in the terminology of Reinhart Koselleck.
Review of J-W Müller's What is Populism?
Jan-Werner Müller's short book on populism is direct yet evasive, insightful and provocative while also unsatisfying. The book is officially organized into three parts: what populists say, what they do, and how to deal with them. It also addresses another three-part concern but this time simultaneously rather than sequentially: the identification of populism, diagnoses of conditions favourable to it, and what a better, non-populist politics should be like. Müller is most successful at identifying populism but his diagnosis of contributing conditions and ideas for a preferable politics are anaemic and, if widely shared by others, will contribute to more rather than less of the politics Müller fears.