populism

News

Some Like it Dark – In Conversation with Alessandro Nai

Who is a dark politician? How do dark politicians perform in the elections and in handling crises? What does being “dark” mean for female politicians? Why some people like it dark? In this conversation with Kasia Krzyżanowska, Alessandro Nai discusses his newest book “Dark Politics. The Personality of Politicians and the Future of Democracy,” co-authored with Jürgen Maier.

22.03.2024

News

Again, What Is Populism? 

Am I kidding? We still do not know what populism is? We do not know what we are talking about when we talk about populism? We are ignorant about the topic of an entire subdiscipline of political science? After tons of publications, various handbooks? With entire research centers, networks and an academic journal dedicated to populism studies? Well, not quite.  

1.02.2024

News

Black Knight and Pied Piper. Silvio Berlusconi: Populist Pioneer or Symptom of Italy’s Crisis?

In this op-ed, Stefano Bottoni discusses Silvio Berlusconi's political legacy in Italy.

27.06.2023

Clara Mattei: Why is austerity so persistent in spite of its incapacity to achieve economic growth and balanced budgets?

In this interview with RevDem assistant editor Giancarlo Grignaschi, Clara Mattei – Assistant Professor in the Economics Department of The New School for Social Research – talks about her new book "The Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism" (University of Chicago Press, 2022). The manuscript explores the historical origins of austerity and its intellectual underpinnings in interwar Britain and Italy. During this interview, the author presents the main arguments of the book, the comparison between the two countries, the role of politics and the decline in electoral participation, the relationship between austerity and populism, and the recent problem of rising inflation.

27.04.2023

News

“A Pandemic of Populists”: RevDem online book discussion

On 28 March the Review of Democracy hosted an online debate on "A Pandemic of Populists" (CUP, 2022) by Wojciech Sadurski (University of Sydney). Hosted by CEU Democracy Institute Workgroup Lead Researcher Dimitry Kochenov, the debate brought together perspectives from Barbara Grabowska-Moroz (CEU), Zuzana Vikarská (Masaryk University), and Thiago Amparo (FGV Sao Paulo Law School).

14.04.2023

The Greatest Hits — Populist Edition. In conversation with Johannes Voelz

In this conversation with Kasia Krzyżanowska, Johannes Voelz discusses his theory of the aesthetics of populism, explains how Pierre Bourdieu and Norbert Elias can help us understand contemporary populism, elaborates on the concept of a (Trump) rally, talks about the culture of a dichotomized world, and shares his insights on the role of culture in helping to ease the deep political conflicts. 

20.03.2023

Book Reviews

A Crafted Gem: Giuseppe Martinico reviews ‘Anti-Constitutional Populism’

A review by Giuseppe Martinico of a book Anti-Constitutional Populism edited by M, Krygier, A. Czarnota, W. Sadurski (Cambridge University Press 2022)

6.09.2022

Book review: Giuseppe Martinico, Filtering Populist Claims to Fight Populism: The Italian Case in Comparative Perspective (CUP 2021)

Julian Scholtes, a lecturer in EU and Public Law at Newcastle University, reviews "Filtering Populist Claims to Fight Populism: The Italian Case in Comparative Perspective" by Giuseppe Martinico, "a wonderfully written in-depth analysis of the constitutional dimensions of populism in Italy."

12.04.2022

Historians and Populism: Regional Perspectives and Entanglements

In light of the recent solidifying of what could be named as ‘populist international’, we are opening a conversation on one of the first areas and people that were targeted: history and historians. Populist regimes and their supporters feed themselves on historical myths, distortions and subversion of the public debate on historical themes.

5.04.2022

‘In the Name of the Family’: Conference Report on the Budapest Demographic Summit

The authors summarize and contextualize the content of the summit to argue that the conference not only provided an opportunity for its participants to address the ‘demographic crisis’ in Europe and the ‘family politics of conservative’ governments,’ but also amounted to an attempt to develop a transnational narrative for such self-declared conservatives that could unite political and ideological actors on various continents.

24.11.2021

How populists change parliaments

In their op-ed, Aleksandra Maatsch and Eric Miklin argue populist parties are both willing and able to weaken or even disempower representative institutions.

9.11.2021

Krygier: Institutionalizing and Deinstitutionalizing the Rule of Law

Martin Krygier on how to understand the rule of law crisis from a teleological perspective.

22.09.2021

Populism and Antipopulism: Beyond the Post-1989 Paradigm

Petr Agha, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Copenhagen in the iCourts Centre of Excellence for International Courts of the University of Copenhagen, discusses the clash between populism and antipopulism, and the implications for Europe, in conversation with Oliver Garner.

8.06.2021