The end of populism

Twenty proposals to defend liberal democracy

Marcel H. Van Herpen

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9781526154132
  9781526154125
• eBook ISBN:
  9781526154149
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political Philosophy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The populist wave which has submerged Europe and the United States in recent years seems unstoppable. But is it? The end of populism offers answers and proposes concrete solutions to confront the rise of "illiberal democracy." Drawing on extensive original sources, this book refutes the populist claim that democracy is a "demand side" phenomenon, and demonstrates that it is rather a "supply side" phenomenon. Marcel H. Van Herpen argues that one can have "too much democracy" and shows how methods of direct democracy, such as popular initiatives, referendums, and open primaries, which pretend "to give the power back to the people, " have led to manipulation by populists and moneyed interests. Populist attacks on the judiciary, central banks, the media, and other independent agencies, instead of strengthening democracy, have rather undermined liberal democracy. The author formulates twenty original and bold proposals to bridge the gap between the people and the elites, fight corruption, improve political party funding, and initiate societal, educational, and macro-economic reforms to increase economic equality and alleviate the insecurity of the citizens. Elegantly written and clearly argued, this is an essential book for understanding the populist phenomenon.

Part I

The populist wave: why did it happen?

1

What is populism? Constructing an ideal type

There are many ways to define populism. We saw in the introduction that a fundamental characteristic of populist movements is an anti-elite attitude and a pretension to represent and defend the “real people” against the allegedly corrupt and incompetent elites. This characteristic is shared by all populist movements, whatever their ideological content and eventual differences. I would like to call this a “thin” definition. It is the method of a physician who takes X-ray pictures of his or her patients. Ignoring their outward appearances he or she looks straight through the flesh of their bodies at what is behind: their skeleton. The “thin” definition is a method of ultimate abstraction until one arrives at the “essence” or “core” of a phenomenon. This “thin” definition, however, also has many constraints. In order to reveal the essence it has to ignore many relevant details and the richness of the phenomenon as it develops in different countries and cultures. A “thin” definition of populism could be formulated as follows:

A political phenomenon in a modern liberal democratic society, in which a movement or a party claims to represent “the people” against the governing “elite” with the aim of replacing this elite and fundamentally changing the government’s policy.

This “thin” definition leaves many questions open, such as: who are the followers? Who are the leaders? What do the populists want? What methods do they use? Are they a danger to liberal democracy or, on the contrary, an expression of democracy? And so on. For this reason the German sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920) developed a “thick” method, which he called “ideal types” (Idealtypen). An “ideal type” is not, strictly speaking, a definition, and neither is it a copy of reality. It is rather a virtual concept in which all the relevant properties, found in different manifestations of the phenomenon, are collected. Weber called it, therefore, “an artificial construct.” In this construct the properties of different existent (or past) historical entities are gathered and accumulated.¹ The “thick” method can be compared to the work of an artist who makes a clay figure of a woman. The artist adds small details until the figure resembles the image of femininity that he has in his head. It may have the ears of his sister, the nose of his daughter, and the legs of the woman next door. It does not need to resemble any model which exists in reality. After the construction of the ideal type, existing historical phenomena can be compared with it to assess the distance between ahistorical phenomenon and the ideal type. This does not mean that the ideal type is, literally, an “ideal” or a norm. It is only a heuristic device to better understand the phenomenon. For Weber it is possible to construct an ideal type of religions, and equally of brothels. Ideal types are for sociologists heuristic instruments par excellence to analyze complex historical phenomena, such as “liberalism,” “imperialism,” or, in this case, “populism.”

The “thick” definition: constructing an “ideal type” of populism

One can distinguish three dimensions of the ideal type:

• organizational;

• ideological;

• institutional.

In the organizational dimension we find the socio-economic and psycho-social profile of the followers (“the people”) and their leaders. In the ideological dimension we find the explicit and implicit policy objectives of the movement, as well as its slogans and the way it uses the media for its propaganda. In the institutional dimension we find the ways of governance used by populist movements when they have gained power in their countries. In this chapter and the following two chapters we will analyze the organizational dimension of the ideal type, in particular the economic, psychological, and emotional profiles of the populist voter and the populist leader. In chapter 4 we will analyze the ideological dimension, and in chapter 5 the institutional dimension.

Blaming the government

Who are the voters of populist parties? There are many different kinds of populists, living in different countries, on different continents, often having different agendas. However, they all have one characteristic in common: they are dissatisfied with their situation. Of course, an individual can have many reasons for being dissatisfied. One can be passed over for a promotion, one can fail an exam, or one’s marriage can be on the rocks. In these cases one can blame one’s boss, one’s professor, one’s partner, or, eventually (reluctantly), oneself. In the case of a populist, the blame game primarily concerns the government. He or she blames the government for having lost a job, for being ripped off by the tax authorities, or for the fact that a business isn’t doing well. This does not mean per se that the government bears whole or even partial responsibility for these problems. It is the perception that counts. In this perception the government plays a key role in society and it plays this role badly, because it does not listen to the citizens. Democracy, apparently, isn’t working. “For the citizens,” writes Pierre Rosanvallon, “lack of democracy means not being listened to, decisions being taken without consultation, ministers who don’t assume their responsibilities, leaders who lie with impunity, a political class which is cut off from the world and is not sufficiently held accountable, [and] an administrative governance which remains opaque.”²

The increasing criticism of government action which we are witnessing today is not only caused by failing politicians, but must be partially explained by a shift in the balance of power between parliaments and governments in favor of the latter. While in the nineteenth century parliaments dominated the executive, in the twentieth century power shifted increasingly to the executive. Although criticism of parliaments and parliamentarians did not disappear, it was the governments which became the main targets of popular dissatisfaction. “Whilst before all criticism concerned a sense of being badly represented, it is, therefore, a sense of being badly governed that also has to be taken into account.”³ The mounting critical attitude toward governments would seem to be the logical result of the dominating position governments occupy in modern states and of the many new tasks they have taken upon themselves with the introduction of the welfare state.

The charisma of the populist leader

The organizational dimension of populism implies the presence of populist leaders. The leader is the engine of the movement, the central person around whom the movement crystallizes. Without a leader there is no populist movement. This leader is, as a rule, a charismatic person, who is not (or no longer) a member of the ruling elite. He must be perceived as an outsider – just like his followers. According to Max Weber, “‘Charisma’ must be called … an uncommon quality of a personality, because of which he is considered as gifted with supernatural or superhuman or, at least, uncommon specific powers or qualities, or as sent by god or as exemplary and therefore as a ‘leader’.”⁴ Weber added that the objective proof of this charisma is not important: the main point is that it is believed by the followers. Charisma was originally a religious phenomenon. The charismatic person was a “man of god” endowed with an uncommon spiritual and psychological power, often including the power to heal. In modern times charisma is secular and the reference to religion or to a supernatural world has almost completely disappeared. Even the likes of Hitler and Mussolini were said to be “charismatic.”

In his book The Fall of Public Man Richard Sennett has a chapter titled “Charisma becomes Uncivilized,” in which he analyzes how in modern times charisma has become not only secular but also vulgar. “Secular charisma,” he writes, “serves especially well the needs of a certain kind of politician … He, a politician of humble origins, founds a career on whipping up the public in attacks against the Establishment, the Entrenched Powers, the Old Order.”⁵ Sennett is clearly describing here the populist politician. Without using the term “charisma” Donald Trump is referring to this when he writes: “Even the most jaded journalists are realizing that Donald Trump is for real and that the people are responding to someone who is completely different from every other politician.”⁶ Trump presents himself here as someone who is “completely different” from the other politicians. Trump is a politician who seems to be led by his impulses. Sennett comments: “The politician who, in focusing our attention on his impulses … becomes a plausible leader by giving the appearance of spontaneously behaving according to these impulses, and yet being in control of himself. When this controlled spontaneity is achieved, the impulses seem real, therefore the politician is someone you can believe in.”⁷ Sennett rightly stresses the fact that the impulsiveness and the uncivilized behavior of the populist leader, which set him apart from other politicians, are perceived by his followers as a guarantee that he can be trusted. The fact that he does not use politically correct and woolly language, like the others, but expresses himself bluntly, but clearly, is seen as a sign of authenticity, and, therefore, of trustworthiness.⁸

The personalization of politics

The centrality of the charismatic leader further implies a personalization of politics. Apart from some simple slogans everything revolves around the personality of the leader.⁹ One of the first populist leaders to start this trend toward personalization was General Boulanger at the end of the nineteenth century in France, who distributed his portraits on a wide scale. “Promotion of the claimed charismatic qualities of a party leader, and pictures and film footage of his or her person striking appropriate poses, increasingly take the place of debate over issues and conflicting interests,” writes Colin Crouch. “Italian politics was long free of this until in the 2001 general election Silvio Berlusconi organized the entire centre-right campaign around his own persona, using omnipresent and carefully rejuvenated pictures of himself, a strong contrast with the far more party-oriented style that Italian politics had adopted after the fall of Mussolini.”¹⁰

Berlusconi called his party Forza Italia (‘Go Italy’): not referring to an ideology or a political program, but to the slogan used by Italian supporters to encourage the national football team. In the Netherlands the populist leader Pim Fortuyn went so far as to call his party Lijst Pim Fortuyn (List Pim Fortuyn), using his own name as the party label. Donald Trump, who is building his “Trump Towers” all over the world, would certainly have called his pa...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part I The populist wave: why did it happen?
• Part II Do we have too much democracy or not enough?
• Part III Twenty proposals to defend liberal democracy: reforming politics and education
• Part IV Twenty proposals to defend liberal democracy: reforming society
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index