TY  - JOUR
KW  - populism
KW  -  liberalism
KW  -  democracy
KW  -  fear
N2  - This paper takes a critical, synoptic view of the current upsurge of populism. Populism, it is argued, has long been a feature of liberal democracies in so far as claims are made for democracy to be as directly expressive as possible of the will of its subjects. Yet populisms are hybrid in form and parasitic on existing political arrangements. What unites them is more to do with what they oppose than what they espouse. Above all, it is the norms of liberalism that are brought into question by populist proponents of direct democracy with their characteristic hostility towards elites, experts and the so-called establishment. In so far as all populisms can be dangerous this lies in the degree to which they oppose the existing norms of liberalism and seek to undermine its moderating institutions. Rather than relying on generic theories of populism to explain contemporary developments, what needs investigation is the degree to which particular populisms prioritize fear over judgement, unqualified assertion over reasoned deliberation and resentment over the moderation of power.
ID  - discovery1555678
PB  - ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD
TI  - Populism: a deflationary view
AV  - public
Y1  - 2017///
EP  - 19
JF  - Economy and Society
A1  - Molyneux, M
A1  - Osborne, T
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2017.1308059
SN  - 1469-5766
IS  - 1
N1  - Copyright © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
VL  - 46
SP  - 1
ER  -