How we made the Hitchhikers Guide to Populism
A process documentation
When planning our project it was important to first consider the definition of populism and whether it meant different things to different people in our group. We accomplished this by crowdsourcing a definition from each member of our group. It became clear that populism has differing impacts depending on the country and the circumstances in which it finds itself it.
To apply the term “populism” and to broaden our horizons of the impact it causes in different countries we divided ourselves into groups of three and each group picked a case study to research. Examples we chose included Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in the USA, Nigel Farage in the UK, Marine Le Pen in France and we also studied the rise of populism in general in countries including Austria and The Philippines. We realized that there are many more similarities than differences between the populists in each country.
With this in mind, we began brainstorming our thoughts in order to pitch our main idea. We agreed on the concept of a travel guide, which we titled: “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to Populism”. We decided to focus on five different countries: China, Mexico, Syria, the UK and the USA. Our class was divided into two teams: the research team and the production team. The project is a balance between visuals such as infographics, videos, pictures and written text. We believe that the most effective way to communicate our ideas with the audience is to present our findings, problems and solutions in a variety of ways, using all types of media.
Videos are a powerful and engaging tool for communication, especially when attempting to reach a young, social media savvy audience. Our videos are a contrast from each other. ‘Breaking Barriers’ focuses on the power of general conversation and highlights that we are not so different after all no matter where we come from. This video was produced in a fun and lighthearted way, but carries an important message in an attempt to counter a common populist rhetoric, regarding anti-immigration and populist leaders “Us vs Them” mentality. On the other hand, ‘Syria Video’ tells a powerful narrative through a first-hand account of growing up in Syria combined with media representation. Despite its melancholic tone, the video is motivating rather than disheartening.
We produced two infographics to highlight the issues in China and the UK. This became a simple, yet effective way of communicating facts and statistics in a way which is easy to understand. The UK has experienced a rise and recent decline in populism, meanwhile China’s authoritarian rule has made it difficult for populism to find its place in the country currently.
As a result, this process led to the creation of our all inclusive travel guide, even allowing users the opportunity to make their own contributions by adding the problems and solutions related to populism in their own country. This will allow our work to continue developing and grow beyond our time here as a team at the Salzburg Global Seminar. Happy Traveling!
