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Anti-establishment versus authoritarian populists and support for the strongman
32 PaulHoule 18 9/1/2025, 3:19:36 PM frontiersin.org ↗
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_Uni...
I know what the mainstream answer to this is, but fundamentally, if you are pro democracy, how can you be against the choice of the majority of the people?
Populism is not 'doing what people want', it is a strategy of orienting a societal/political conflict on people vs. elites axis. But elites are usually right, that is why they are elites in their social hierarchies. For democracies to work properly, people have to trust elites (and elites have to be trustworthy).
It would seem that that would make you anti-democratic while trying to be pro democracy.
"Democracy" is a system (relative delegation of power to masses), "populism" is a drive (attempting the seduction of masses through visceral calls). Not the same plane.
> pro democracy, how can you be against the choice of the majority of the people
"Democracy" does not reduce to "accepting any will of any majority". An economy, in classical theory, fails if a base of informed rational agents is not built. Similarly, the "choice of the people" is theoretical, potential, ideal.
And I guess it's also where a politicians lies are more simple, direct which apparently is MUCH WORSE than the more sophisticated, poll-driven lies of the establishment politician's PR hacks.
That's why parties can do the opposite of what they promised [1,2], judges can issue wildly creative rulings [3], even directly contrary to referendums [4], universities can demand ideological loyalty oaths [5], a party can get 37% of votes but only 20% of seats [6], or even 14.3% of votes and only 0.77% of seats, newspapers can get banned [8], towns can be fined for not participating in mandatory celebrations [9], and activists can even be prevented from leaving their own countries to attend a political summit, despite EU free movement [10], and there's not a peep about endangering democracy or authoritarianism.
Don't take my word for it - here's German chancellor Olaf Scholz admitting it in a slip of honesty: As a strong democracy we are very clear: The extreme right should be out of political decision making processes. - https://xcancel.com/Bundeskanzler/status/1890709875644145935
[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-67506641
[2] https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2024/05/23/irony-labour-mea...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_California_Proposition_18...
[5] https://www.schoolinfosystem.org/2021/11/11/study-diversity-...
[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_French_legislative_electi...
[7] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ng-interactive/2024/jul...
[8] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/germany-bans-right-wing...
[9] https://nationalpost.com/opinion/ontario-town-fined-10000-fo...
[10] https://www.jpost.com/international/article-854322
For example look at the current dynamic in the US. Hefty and unpredictable import taxes are harming the domestic industries we still have left. But when you try to point this out to the average populist, they go right into the refrain about how we need to compete with China, like nobody else understands this goal or something. They're basically stuck on the simplistic gut-appealing mantra, and can't get past it to entertain criticism how the current policies are doing the exact opposite as being claimed.
They selected a few strongmen, as designated by the CIA, to illustrate their points: Italy, Hungary, Poland, Spain, Brazil, and Argentina. Only while the CIA disapproves of them, though. The CIA always changes their minds about them at exactly the same time they make a break with their past and announce that their country is open for foreign investment. Al Qaeda leaders in expensive suits.
Anti-establishment populists, the "good" kind, are represented by the organizations that employ people to write garbage like this, and whose primary messaging is that power can be wielded by loving and believing hard enough, and that everyone who does anything to threaten any institution is completely dominated and motivated by hate, cynicism, or ambition. We don't hate them, we love them, so to help them they should be under mandatory therapy; and to protect us, maybe that therapy should be done in a prison.
Could you substantiate that? The abstract looks compelling, but I don't want to waste time if this is a trash journal.
That was my first encounter with Frontiers Media, but they have a...history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frontiers_Media#Controversies