Studying Populism in Comparative Perspective: Reflections on the

contemporary and future research agenda

Mudde and Kaltawasser
 The author argues that comparative research on populism have to try to link work
to other academic fields. In this sense the article purpose it’s to illustrate some of
the advantages to the study of populism, by pointing out 4 avenues.
o Economic Anxiety
o Cultural Backlash
o Tension between responsiveness and responsibility
o Partisanship and polarization
 THINGS TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT FOR THE ESSAY
 Populism has been using a
buzzword (also a contested
term), in that way it is needed to
have a clear definition, according
to the author the oxford
handbook offers three distinct
conceptual approaches
o Ideational: set of ideas that not only depicts society
as divided between the pure elite us the corrupt
elite, respect popular sovereignty at any cost.
o Political Strategic: this is employing by a charismatic
leader who seeks to govern based on direct and
unmediated support from their followers (Weyland).
Here the problem is that this definition blind the
existence of populist forces, for example US Tea
party.
o Socio cultural approach: Folkloric style of politics
used by a leader who behave improperly and break
taboos with the aim of building connections. The
problem is that not all the leaders behave in that way
for example Pim Fortuyn and Pablo Iglesias.
Important lessons from Ideational Approach

Populism is distinct from classical ideologies as fascism and liberalism, because it has
limited programmatic, it is a thin centered ideology  That´s why populism appears
attached to other ideological elements, that are appealing to a broader public.

The content is always determined by the specific way in which grievances are
addressed
Here it is important to say that the we need to analyze the ambivalent relationship
between populism and democracy  given that the people is seen as honest whereas the
elite is portrayed as fraudulent, populist are prone to claim that nobody has the to bypass
the popular will, this definition favor the minimal or procedural democracy, defined as
popular sovereignty and majority rule.

They have serious problems with liberal democracy most notably

minority rights, rule of law and separation of power
 According to the authors liberalism without
democracy can easily deteriorate into oligarchy of
technocracy
 In that sense, populism is an illiberal democratic
response to undemocratic liberalism
Another lesson from ideational approach is that: we should undertake empirical research
on both to supply side (populist leaders, parties, social movements and even media) and
the demand side (populist attitudes why there is demand for populism) of populism.

Future Research

Economic anxiety: Key subjective indicators (ex: privación relativa, this theory tried
to explain the rise of Trump and the Brexit; Here most Trump voters were
Republican voters, basing their vote on partisanship not populism).
This relates to the losers of globalization theory, which established that the
formation of new underclass, which feels threatened by the arrival of immigrants
as well as the ongoing societal transformation.

Cultural Backlash: It is useful to understand the electoral success of the populist

right than populism per se but is of limited use to study populism.

Responsiveness and responsibility: (Peter Mair) Help us to understand the

growing relevance of populist around the globe. Argued that the increasing
influence of global markets and international institutions is seriously limiting the
maneuvering room of political actors at national level. For example, the case of the
great recession in which some countries have to applied austerity policies, like
Greece and Spain in which populist leaders born (SYRIZA- Alexis Tsipras and
PODEMOS).

Here the argument is that the governments are being responsible to the
international institutions and irresponsive with the desires of the voters. In my
opinion here it is not clear what plan is needed, in other words There is no plan
that allows us to envision long-term sustainable solutions.
Another problem that Singer points out is that when populist leaders obtain
results, they be less tolerant to the opposition. In that way populist forces prioritize
 the rise of responsive governments over the liberal democratic one. (the liberal
rights).

Partisanship and Polarization:

First assumption: Partisanship creates polarization.
Second assumption: The lack of polarization leads to the rise of populism,
based on Laclau´s theory. Laclau submit that populism is a radical
democratic alternative to a state. Depoliticized liberal democracy in which
an enforced consensus has taken politics out of politics.
Here it is important to say that when we are studying populism, we must
take into account that populism impact to democracy is mediated for the
dominant political forces and for the grade they submit to a process of
programmatic adaptation.

Mouffe: Politics and the Political

 Heidegger say that politics (is power in action/activities) refers to the ontic level
while the political (adjective) has to do with the ontological one.
 He believes that the political space is a space of power, conflict and antagonism.
 The author is interested in the practices of democratic politics and is therefore
located at the ontic level.
 The rationalist approach dominant in democratic theory prevent us from passing
the questions which are crucial for democratic politics  Political questions always
involved decisions which require us to make a choice between conflicting
alternatives.
Liberalism: to a philosophical discourse with many variants, united not by a common
essence but by a multiplicity of what Wittgenstein calls family resemblances. Call for a
universal consensus.

Pluralism and friend/enemy reaction

Other understandings of the friend/enemy distiction

Here the author established a reflexion of the possibility that this we/they relation can
become antagonistic
Every hegemonic order is susceptible of being challenge by counter hegemonic
Identities are in fact the results of process of identification

Canetti on the Parlamentary System

The task of antagonistic relations was the task of democratic politics

Parlamentary system indicates that such a system uses the psychological structure of
opposing armies and stages a form of warfare which has renounced killing.

Agonistic confrontation
Many liberal theorist refuse to acknowledge the antagonistic dimension of politics and the
role of affects in the construction of political identities because they believe that it would
endanger the realization of consensus.

Beyond the Adversarial Model

Politics need to be reinvented.
In search of alernatives: Radical democracy

Different conceptualizations of democracy shape the way we understand the virtues and
problems of populism

The liberal component refers to:

1. Rights-based individualism that
believes common good most likely to
emerge free competition
2. Operates undr the principles of
classical liberalism

Liberal Democracy Liberal Democracy

1. Free and fair multiparty election
2. Separation of powers between
different branches
3. The upholding of the rule of law
DEMOCRACY 4. Protection to civil roghts and political
freedom

Associated with concepts of

Democracy popular soveregnity and majority
rule

Laclau and Mouffe – Radical democracy

For them, the problemm was that liberal democratic societies did not implement
constitutive principles of liberty and equality for all, effectively enough in practice.

1. Liberal democracy historically contingent: tension between individualism (liberty)

of liberalism and collective identity (equality) of democracy.
2. Antagonism in democracies inevitable: According to Mouffe rationalist consensus
can be reached through deliberation or with the help of liberal democratic
institutions, in that way democratic politics inevitably requires conflict and
antagonism since there is no a common ground for the heterogenity of gruops and
ideas.
Institutional innovation
Here author call for an institutional reforms that allow excluded sectors to be part of the
political desicions
They recognized that this reforms would produce disputes and transgress the established
institutions of liberalism

Agonistic Pluralism

Clear distinction of adversaries that fight to achieve a better order  no victory can be
final (as a personal thought, in liberal democracies there is not a final victory).
Here Mouffe submit that is needed and agonistic pluralism, in which the different parts
recognize that there is no rational solutions to their conflict but recognize legitimacy of
opponents (so what… what we can do…. Stay there?). In an utopic scenario democracy
helps to domesticates antagonism into agonism but again so what….

Example: Cannetis Analysis of Parliament

A parlamentary vote does nothing but ascertainn the relative strenght of two groups at a
given time and place. The act of counting votes in parliament ends the battle. According to
this example liberal demcoracy does not produce consensus, but it does produce
legitimate decisions.

New Hegemonic prohect

Here it is recognized that the contemporany world there are not emancipatory demands,
in that way it is needed to create a new hegemonic project that can unite these groups in
the service of a demcoratic project that pulls their concerns and desires at the center of
democrtic politics.

Consequences of liberal consensus

End of history Fukuyama
Mouffe: Liberal democracy- capitalism imposed itself as the only rational solution
to the problem of organizing modern societies.
Third way: Politics emerges that rejects old right distinctions, promotes brand of
liberal consensual politics. Tony Blair/ Bill Clinton.
 Here it is interesting to analyze that nowadays thir way is what people are
begging for.

Populist revolts
Liberalism depoliticized decision-making: transfer of items from the realm of public
contesttion to the realm of technical or juridical expertise  so what is the solution?

Populism and the Mirror of Democracy

Panizza
He presents populisms analytical core in terms of 3 elements
1. A mode of identification
 2. A process of namig
3. Dimension of politics

According to Panizza populism can be undesrtood through three categories.

a. Empirical generalizations: Authors such as Peter Wiles, propouses a twenty-four
features but without relations are meningless.
b. Historicist accounts: Cases as Latam, but fails to justify its self-imposed narrow
geographical and temporal limits.
c. Symptomatic reading: Populism as an anti-status quo discourse that simplifies the
political space by symbolically dividing society between the people and its other.
So populism is thus a mode of identification available
Here Canovan submit that the contitution of popular identities is at the heart of the
populist appeal

The conditions of emergence of populism

Laclau Chain of equivalence: situation in which plurality of demands coexists with an
increasing inability of the institutional system to absorb them.

Other causes:
Economic: Such as Hyperinflation
Political: Such as scandal of corruption, for example in Europe Silvio Berlusconi
arrive because of party scandals.
Social turmoil
Emergence of new forms of political representation
The people are those who consider themselves as disenfranchised and excluded from
public life.

Populism, politics and democracy

 El populismo puede exponer los puntos ciegos democráticos del liberalismo, pero
su relación con la democracia también es problemática.
 Si la democracia se trata de la promulgación de la voluntad del pueblo, su
supervivencia depende del reconocimiento de que la voluntad del pueblo nunca
podrá ser plenamente promulgada, y de que la gente no existe, excepto como
parte de un horizonte imaginario en constante retroceso.
 En otras palabras, debido a que solo podría haber versiones controvertidas de
quiénes son las personas y quién tiene el derecho de hablar en su nombre, solo
podemos tener versiones provisionales de la soberanía popular, y por lo tanto, el
argumento para la tolerancia de las diferencias es no solo un argumento liberal
sino también un argumento democrático.
 Como Claude Lefort nos recuerda, en una democracia, el poder es un "lugar vacío"
que solo puede ser ocupado provisionalmente.
 Si la incertidumbre asociada con un lugar de poder que permanece "vacío" es
negada por un discurso político que dice hablar para el pueblo como su
 representante inmediato, y que, al amparo de esta identificación, busca apropiarse
del lugar del poder, es la democracia misma, y no solo el liberalismo, lo que se
niega. Llevado al extremo, el populismo desciende al totalitarismo.
 El populismo nos recuerda a los fantasmas totalitarios que ensombrecen la
democracia.
 Pero también nos recuerda que todas las sociedades democráticas modernas son
un compromiso entre las lógicas democráticas y no democráticas, y que los
controles y equilibrios de la democracia liberal moderna garantizan y limitan
simultáneamente la voluntad popular (como originalmente lo hicieron los
constitucionalistas). )
 En la sociedad global moderna, el populismo plantea preguntas incómodas sobre
aquellos que quieren apropiarse del sitio vacío del poder, pero también sobre
aquellos que desean subordinar la política a la razón tecnocrática y los dictados del
mercado.
 Al plantear preguntas incómodas sobre las formas modernas de democracia, y a
menudo representando la cara fea del pueblo, el populismo no es la forma más
alta de democracia ni su enemigo, sino un espejo en el que la democracia puede
contemplarse a sí misma, verrugas y todo, y descubrir qué se trata y de lo que
falta.
 Si el reflejo no siempre es una vista bonita, es porque, como ya sabían los antiguos
griegos, la democracia tiene una parte inferior, que llamaron demagogia, porque la
representación democrática nunca puede cumplir su promesa, y porque incluso el
régimen político más democrático es una mezcla de elementos de democracia con
otros de naturaleza no democrática en la que los principios de racionalidad
tecnocrática y tutela restringen o anulan el principio de la soberanía del pueblo.