Populism and the Causes of Democratic Discontent: The Road to the Current Predicament and How to Move Forward
What is the most appropriate and accurate depiction of the current state of democratic politics? “Populism” – “Libertarian Authoritarianism” – “Autocratic Populism”? How does the current surge in populist electoral results compare to historical antecedents? What ‘caused’ the present disillusionment with democratic institutions? What is the role played by socio-economic precariousness and disenfranchisement in citizens’ experiences of democratic politics? Who and what has been eroding public processes of democratic deliberation? Is it ‘globalization’, ‘the internet’ and social media? Is it information overflow, online hatred and ‘fake news’?
How can we trace back the origins of the current crisis? Is today’s exhaustion of democratic collective self-governance the result of post-Welfare State neoliberal policies? Was the post-1970s rise of individualism, responsibilization and income inequality – the 99% problem – inevitable? Is it reversible?
Speakers
Professor em. Daniel Drache, York University, Toronto
Professor em. Günter Frankenberg, Goethe University, Frankfurt
Helen Hayes, PhD cand., McGill University
Discussant: Simon Archer, Goldblatt Partners, LL.P. Toronto
Moderator: Professor Peer Zumbansen, McGill University
Background Readings for the Roundtable:
Ingolfur Blühdorn, The dialectic of democracy: modernization, emancipation and the great regression, (2020) 27 Democratization, 389-407.
Sheri Berman, The Causes of Populism in the West, (2021) 24 Annual Review of Political Science, 71-88.
Chahrazad Abdallah, Predatory Capitalism, (2022) 25 M@n@gement 89-92.
Michaël O’Neill, The trucker protests and the blatant failure of citizenship education, Policy Options, 11 April 2022.
Ben Dinsdale, Freedom, not Fear; Truckers, not Trudeau: Why Right-Wing Populism is Going Mainstream in Canada, Oxford Policy Review, 7 March 2023.
Kyle Hiebert, Tech-Fuelled Inequality Could Catalyze Populism 2.0, CIGI online, 19 October 2022.
Interview with Grégoire Chamayou, La Libération, 9 nov. 2018, link.
Interview with Oliver Nachtwey, Verso 2018, link.
Paul J. Maher et al, The Many Guises of Populism and Crisis, (2022) 43 Political Psychology, 819-826.
Sebastian Sevignani, Digital Transformations and the Ideological Formation of the Public Sphere: Hegemonic, Populist, or Popular Communication?, (2022) 39 Theory, Culture, Society, 91-109.