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This paper is a review of Cesarale's book. The aim of this paper is to discuss the possibility of a political and theoretical radical space outside the framework of the capitalist mode of production. The work of the author depicts a useful political map of the positions of "radical thought".

Recensione a: William A. Galston, La minaccia populista alla democrazia liberale, Castelvecchi 2019.

The aim of this essay is to clarify the theoretical relationship between populism and democracy. Two symmetrical and often discussed theses are examined: a) there is no populism without democracy; b) there is no democracy without populism. According to the first thesis, supported by Yves Meny and Yves Surel, populism —which is interpreted as a weak form of ideology— can only develop where the democratic ideals have appeared on the horizon. In this sense, populism may be considered as a parasite of democracy. The second thesis is more controversial. It may be found in the work of two scholars who could not be more distant in their style, background, and ideological orientation. The first is Mauro Calise, who theorises and supports a model of «leader democracy». The second is Ernesto Laclau, who advocates for a form of «radical» democracy. This apparent coincidence may be explained by the fact that democracy and populism have become extremely polysemic terms. Thus an exercise of «conceptual cleaning» is needed. The author proposes a redefinition of both notions, starting from the analysis of a classic Aristotelian text about the democracy of demagogues. On the basis of these redefinitions, it is argued that populism can be considered as the antithesis of the model of representative and constitutional democracy established after the Second World War in Europe. This model is based on the relativization of the democratic principle, the participation in the political process of citizens organized in parties (as opposed to the «people»), the «absence of bosses» (Kelsen), and the existence of many forms of institutional and social mediation of the «popular will». Populism, on the other hand, exalts the principle of rule of the people in opposition to rule of law, and is founded on an organicistic conception of the «people», a strong leadership, and a direct relationship between the leader and the masses.

The assault on Capitol Hill will remain in the social imaginary as the symbol of Donald Trump's presidency: the January 6, 2021 epiphany was both a failed coup and a collective ritual of the QAnon «myth», played outside the Internet. Starting from a famous book by the historian Paul Veyne, this article proposes to analyze what is now called the «crisis of the boundaries between true and false» discussing the hypothesis according to which the concentration in the public debate on issues related to the «truth» is a key element to understand Trump's populism along with the spread of falsehoods by the so-called «conspiracy» theories. The tension between democratic principles and the revaluation of truth in politics —operated, for example, by some theories of post-truth— will be analyzed starting from the myth of Q, highlighting its relevance, first of all, as an identity ritual of ideological endorsement to Trumpism, in an age claimed to be post-ideological.

This article engages liberal-democratic constitutionalism by focusing on its fundamental characters and definitions; the implications of populism and illiberal turns will be investigated as well, especially in the second part of the essay. The first section of this paper addresses the critical and interpretative paradigms of contemporary constitutional theory, by illustrating the dichotomy between dualist and monist under-standings of democracy. Conversely, the second section addresses the relationship between populism and constitutionalism to illustrate the paradigm of the so-called populist constitutionalism as an illiberal form of constitutional democracy.

Contemporary populism could be read as a form of social-ism, i.e, a political discourse marked by the languages and the -isms of social networks. On the basis of this assumption, the aim of this paper is to explore and analyse three specific semiotic aspects of the social-ist language. First, the relationship between moods and noises that characterizes the enunciation in and of the social networks, in which screaming plays a fundamental role. Second, the prerequisite and consequences of shots/ slams, whose roots are to be found in the correlation between the language of social media and that of neotelevision. Third, the forms of political provocation, rewritten, nowadays, by the communicative and interactional logic of digital media. The reasoning we develop is inspired by the analysis of texts - tweets, Facebook and Instagram posts, messages and conversations extracted from Whatsapp public groups - taken from both the Italian and Brazilian context. Nevertheless, we believe our findings are potentially generalizable, since they seem to resume how, on an international scale, the languages of politics - and, vice versa, the politics of language - are nowadays constructed and articulated.

International audience ; Tele-electronic populism, the extraordinary and violent upgrade of the traditional populism, is the most impressive political form in the contemporary scenario: its most resounding innovation. Due to its strong drive to represent directly the entire population, it seeks to go through the left-right dichotomy, simply exiling the role of the parties and of the traditional ideological storytelling. It is an update of the oriented marketing, soaked with all codes of the mainstream tv-shows: impertinence, participation, fan culture drawn by social network and conventional populism. Why is evil imagery the source of this phenomenon? Which cultural and societal features do neo-populist forces express? How far do they represent a discontinuity towards the order of the things?

International audience ; Tele-electronic populism, the extraordinary and violent upgrade of the traditional populism, is the most impressive political form in the contemporary scenario: its most resounding innovation. Due to its strong drive to represent directly the entire population, it seeks to go through the left-right dichotomy, simply exiling the role of the parties and of the traditional ideological storytelling. It is an update of the oriented marketing, soaked with all codes of the mainstream tv-shows: impertinence, participation, fan culture drawn by social network and conventional populism. Why is evil imagery the source of this phenomenon? Which cultural and societal features do neo-populist forces express? How far do they represent a discontinuity towards the order of the things?

The series of notes gathered in this paper mirrors the complexity of populism: from the tendency to have a negative use of the concept to its semantic and rhetoric-communicative vagueness; from an undetermined historical-theoretical integration of the concept to a theoretical-practical, cultural and ideological differentiation (which invites us to discuss 'populisms' instead of 'populism'); from the problem of the classification of different forms of populism to the study of new expressions of it (which, prevalently, is an effect of the vast circulation and use of new social technologies); and from the opportunity to deepen fundamental mechanisms that are the bases in formation of the populist representational discourse, movement and active response to the necessity of a wide interdisciplinary work of research. By sketching hypothesis, collecting questions and indicating problematic cruxes, this paper tries to discuss the possible contribution of philosophy (which is prevalently identified with critical hermeneutics), and the ideal interdisciplinary set-up (which is essentially defined considering a possible connection between social psychology, sociology, political science, philosophy, communication theory and new media).