How and Where Populism Thrives
The contemporary challenge of populism is critically but not exclusively shaped by economic pressures, institutional weaknesses and declining confidence in governing elites and supra-national institutions, and not merely by the rise of identity politics. These are the core findings of Barry Eichengreen’s lucid, wide-ranging analysis of populist and proto-populist movements that have periodically threatened the stability of governments in the US and Europe.
By studying the rise of populist parties and demagogic politicians in 19th and early 20th century polities — from the US’S People’s Party and William Jennings Bryan in the 1890s, to the trade protectionism of the British radical politician Joseph Chamberlain, to the extreme authoritarianism of fascist Germany and Italy — he considers why some states were more susceptible to populist tendencies. Part of the durability of democratic governance has been a function of the existence of strong states, or the early provision of models of social insurance; part has also been due to new electoral systems designed to guard against extremism post-1945, global factors such as the stabilizing influence of the Cold War, rapid technological change and economic growth between 1950 and 1975, and labor-business corporatism after the Second World War.
These lessons from the past offer prescriptions for addressing the vulnerabilities of government in the US and across Europe, including the need to strengthen existing institutions within the EU, while combating growing inequality and adopting collective solutions to the challenge of immigration.