Suchergebnisse

Good news for democracy from Poland? It appears that in the recent general elections, the right-wing populist Law and Justice party (PiS), won most seats but not enough to allow it to form a coalition. Donald Tusk's Civic Coalition has a better chance of forming a coalition, which might put an end to PiS' eight years of rule. This, prima facie, seems like a victory of democracy over populism. While this is certainly true, in this post we wish to flag certain warning signs that this possible democratic rotation is not the end of the struggle for democracy but merely the beginning of this process. This is because even when populists are voted out of office, their legacy - at least partially - persists.

Vom 20.-22. September findet in Kiel die Tagung "Politics, Populism, Culture – The Politics of Populist Culture" statt. An den zwei Tagen werden unter anderem Themen verhandelt wie Visual Politics of Populism, Mass Media and Populism und Populist Rhetoric and Communication. Zudem wird das im nächsten Jahr erscheindende Buch "The Complexity of Populism" von Paula […]

Last Sunday, August 13, Argentina held elections to determine the candidates who will run in next October's national presidential elections. In a surprising turn of events, the far-right candidate Javier Milei, an outsider that started in politics around 2019, surged ahead in the preliminary elections, sending shockwaves through Argentina's political landscape which has traditionally favoured left-wing populism. In this blogpost, I argue that disillusionment with political establishment, extremely high inflation and crime are core reasons driving Milei's surprise success at the ballot box.

Wir suchen eure Beiträge! We're looking for your texts! English below! Der Ausgang der Wahlen in den USA hat zu vielen Diskussionen und Kontroversen geführt. Gleichzeitig weist der Diskurs innerhalb der Vereinigten Staaten erstaunliche Parallelen zu den Debatten in europäischen Ländern auf. Die beobachtbare Polarisierung und die Emotionalität des Diskurses...

– by Alex Holzienkemper German version of this article Rarely has so much uncertainty and concern arisen from a US election as in its 2016 installment. American liberals and many European observers are still in somewhat of a state of shock, shaking their heads in light of the puzzling nature...

Der Aufstieg des Populismus zeigt nicht nur, dass liberale Demokratien und deren internationale Kooperation durch einen autoritären Nationalismus à la Trump bedroht werden. Eine systematische Analyse verschiedener Populismen innerhalb der 'liberalen internationalen Ordnung' seit 1980 zeigt vielmehr, dass internationale Institutionen auch selbst Unterstützung für Populismus befeuern – und dies teilweise aus demokratisch nachvollziehbaren Gründen und je nach Populismusform nicht unbedingt in autoritär-nationalistischer Form. Um internationale Kooperation wieder demokratisch tragfähig zu machen und autoritären Populismus zu bannen, braucht es daher eine Abwendung von unkritischen Verteidigungen des institutionellen Status Quos und breite Bündnisse für demokratisierende Reformen.

The war in Gaza serves, this blog post argues, as the final nail in the coffin of Netanyahu's judicial overhaul. The Israeli political climate, relentless opposition and the political fallout after Hamas' surprise attack on Israel and the current war thwarted the judicial overhaul. However, populism is far from overcome. Therefore, the current failed judicial overhaul remains a warning sign for the democracy-seeking public in Israel and should raise demand for constitutional entrenchment of the democratic values of the Israeli state. As the judicial overhaul of 2023 has shown us – democracy is not safe if it hangs by the thread of a simple majority in parliament.

By Amélie Jaques-Apke. As Europe begins to emerge from a pandemic, we begin to evaluate emerging
political damages. Now more than ever, we must understand how radical right populist parties design their message toward vulnerable, crisis-shaken populations. The objective of this study is to reflect critically on the interplay between democracy and populism, exploring recent discursive developments of
the parties Vox and The League and its power relations, which are linked to the exogenous shocks provoked
by the pandemic. The author used qualitative techniques of content analysis, and conducted interviews with scholars and political actors, and group discussions with local actors for several months.

On 3 November 2023, the Italian Council of Ministers approved a constitutional reform bill to introduce the direct election of the Prime Minister in Italy. The reform would grant the Prime Minister significantly broader powers than those currently outlined in the Constitution. The proposal is now set to be evaluated by the Italian Parliament, and possibly submitted to a popular referendum if it is not approved by two-thirds of the members of both chambers. While it claims to ensure the continuity of governments – a known weak point of the Italian political system - it undermines the very foundation of parliamentary representation: the party system. Breathing the spirit of plebiscitary populism, this misguided reform, while seemingly looking towards Berlin for inspiration, risks in a worst-case scenario creating an atmosphere reminiscent of Capitol Hill on a fateful day a few years ago.