Full Description
Today, there is no comparable threat to Western democracies as the rise of right-wing populism. While it has played an increasing role at least since the 1990s, only the social consequences of the global financial crises in 2008 have given its break that led to UK's 'Brexit' and the election of Donald Trump as US President in 2016 but also promoted what has been called left populism in countries that were hit the hardest from both the banking crisis and consequential neo-liberal austerity politics in the EU like Greece and Portugal.
In 2017, the French Front National (FN) attracted many voters in the French Presidential elections; we have seen the radicalization of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in Germany and the formation of centre-right government in Austria. Further, we have witnessed the consolidation of autocratic regimes as in the EU member states Poland and Greece. All these manifestations of right-wing populism share a common feature: they attack or even compromise the core elements of democratic societies such as the separation of powers, protection of minorities, or the rule of law.
Despite a broad debate on the re-emergence of 'populism' in the transition from the twentieth to the twenty-first century that has brought forth many interesting findings, a lack of sociological reasoning cannot be denied as sociology itself withdrew from theorising populism decades ago and left the field to mainly political sciences and history. In a sense, Populism and the Crisis of Democracy considers itself as a contribution to start with filling this lacuna. Written in a direct and clear style, this set of volumes will be an invaluable reference for students and scholars in the field of political theory, political sociology and European Studies.
Contents
Volume 1: Concepts and Theory Introduction: Is There Such a Thing as Populism? I: Conceptual Debate 1. Populism as a Conceptual Problem 2. Why Populism? 3. Populism: An Ideal-Typical Assessment 4. How to Define Populism? Reflections on A Contested Concept and Its (Mis)Use in the Social Sciences 5. Populism and 'Unpolitics' Part II: Theoretical Approaches 6. 'We the People': Liberal and Organic Populism, and the Politics of Social Closure 7. Past Is Prologue: Electoral Events of Spring 2012 and the Old 'New' Nationalism in Post-Security Europe 8. The Coterminous Rise of Right-Wing Populism and Superfluous Populations 9. Toward A Strategy for Integrating the Study of Social Movement and Populist Party Mobilisation. Volume 2: Politics, Social Movements and Extremism: Introduction: Political Populism as A Symptom of the Great Transformation of Democracy Part I: Language, Media and the Law 1. The Micro-Politics of Right-Wing Populism 2. Populism 2.0, Social Media and the False Allure of 'Unmediated' Representation 3. From Protecting Individual Rights to Protecting the Public: The Changing Parameters of Populist-Driven Criminal Law and Penal Policy Part II: Dimensions of Right-Wing Populism 4. Right-Wing Populism in Context: A historical and systematic perspective 5 Populism and the radical right in Europe: The paradigmatic case of the French Front National 6 Ambivalences of cosmopolitanisms, elites and far-right populisms in twenty-first century Europe PART III Regimes, party systems, and political subjects 7 The role of populist parties and movements in transitions to hybrid regimes in Europe 8 Populism as a challenge for party systems: A comparison between Italy and Spain 9 'Citizens' or 'people'? Competing meanings of the political subject in Latin America. Volume 3: Migration, Gender and Religion: Introduction: Demography, democracy and right-wing populism PART I Populism and migration 1 The populist representation of the people in the Italian ius soli political debate: The Lega Nord and the Movimento Cinque Stelle 2 The migration crisis between populism and post-democracy 3 Immigration and populist political strategies: The Swiss case in European perspective PART II Populism and gender 4 Autochthonic populism, everyday bordering and the construction of 'the migrant' 5 Right-wing Western and Islamic populism: Reconsidering justice, democracy and equity 6 'Gender(ed) nationalism' of the populist radical right: An extreme typicality 7 Non-Western new populism: Religion, masculinity and violence in the East PART III Populism and religion 8 'Abendland in Christian hands': Religion and populism in contemporary European politics 9 The AKP and the new politics of the social: Fragile citizenship, authoritarian populism and paternalist family policies10 Trump, religion and populism.
