The Rise of Populism

The anti-globalization wave today overlaps the rise of populism. Over the past few years, more and more politicians who are in favor of more populist ideologies around the world are gaining supporters, and some of them are being elected to really make policy changes. While the media keeps warning the society against the rise of capitalism, it is important for people to understand what populism truly represents, and practical ways to deal with its detrimental effects. Even though some argues that populism is an inherently harmful ideology, this paper will argue that populism is a neutral trend of thoughts that constitutes the stability of a functioning democracy, while economic factors are driving it to a potentially dangerous level.

While we are seeing the term populism on mass media frequently, there is not a clear and universal definition of populism that everyone would agree on. However, the term is used to identify a phenomenon everyone can observe in our society: people are leaning towards an ideology and rhetoric that the elites who are running the country are corrupt, and the system must be reformed on behalf of the people. (Bryant & Moffitt, 2019) Progressive populists and conservative populists tend to take on different views about how this reform should take place. Progressive populists, Bernie Sanders, for example, tend to embrace the idea of democratic socialism, an ideology that is best represented by the Nordic Model. It concentrates more on economic reform to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor to eventually lead to a relatively equal society. The conservative populists, however, focus more politically and often connects populism to conservatism ideology such as nationalism. Donald Trump, as the most influential conservative populist politician perhaps in the contemporary world, believes the establishment politicians running the country are selfish and corrupt, and the establishment should be overturned.

Many people argue that populism is threatening democracy and the relatively stable social system we are living in. They warned against the chaos and danger that could occur if populist politicians were fully in power. The threat includes destroying the democratic institutions they consider as corrupt creations. For example, “systematically hollow out and undermine… courts, regulatory agencies, intelligence services, the press, and so on.” (De Witte, 2020) De Witte also provided a real-life circumstance in which the governing populist party of Hungary destroyed its judicial independence. This applies to not only the right-wing populist forces, but progressive populists can also lead to problems, especially in developing countries. Formal President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, a typical left-wing populist, undermined the democratization of Venezuela and dramatically increased the corruption in his government as a result of his reform. These are all concrete arguments of how populists cause troubles. However, it cannot put a negative mark on the nature of populism.

Despite the fact that populist leader and their supporters are acting to threaten contemporary social institutions, we must be aware of the neutral nature of populism itself and understand the root causes that lead us to where we are today. The idea of populism, which is to speak for the general public and to consider the elites as corrupted, is an essential part of securing a modern democratic system. As James Miller (2018) argues: “popular insurrections and revolts in the name of democracy… form the heart and soul of modern democracy as a living reality.” In other words, populism provided the people with the weapon to fight against injustices imposed by oppressors and ruling classes; thus, their fundamental political rights can be secured. Modern democracy today results from a balance between elitism and populism. That is why we have well-educated leaders to make major decisions while people are still equipped with democratic rights to influence politics under strict laws. This balance effectively prevented the comeback of mob rules or dictatorships, the two major political catastrophes that happened in human history. The real issue we are facing today is why the balance is getting broken, and people are getting more and more convinced by a detrimental form of extreme populist ideology rather than the mature and well-balanced system we have constructed over the past years.

This question may have multiple answers, but one of the most important answers is the economic inequality that is continually deteriorating. One argument made by political scientists is that populism often flourishes when wealth is concentrated at the top of society. (Glazer, 2014) The rise of populism in the United States is correlated with a wide gap in wealth distribution. When we are making a comparison between economic statistics from 1990 to 2016, when Donald Trump was elected, we can observe that Gini Coefficient, a major indicator of economic inequality, rose from 0.43 to 0.48. A more intuitive comparison is that the median U.S. household income over the same period of time rose by 10.4%, while U.S. dollars inflated 83.6%. In other words, while the U.S. is achieving economic growth using means like outsourcing, the purchasing power of an average U.S. citizen has dramatically decreased, and only the rich got richer. This phenomenon demonstrates the unbalanced distribution of the profit from outsourcing and economic globalization between the corporates and the working class. While the companies took away nearly all the benefits, it is reasonable that the people start to become resentful. As a result, they appeal to the only valve that is authorized by law: to elect the politicians who are also trying to overturn the corrupted system. Such popular will formed a wave that scholars define as the rise of populism.

The urgent need to dissolve extreme populism that is getting out of control reemphasized the importance of narrowing the gap in wealth distribution, which requires the working class to get a fair share from new economic and technological developments such as outsourcing and automation. When we are dealing with turbulent public opinions, it is always better to solve the origin of the problem rather than shutting people up. As Melissa De Witte (2020) pointed out: “we need to understand, not just condemn, why so many voters find populist politicians so appealing.” A new distribution system will have to take place in order to combat the high level of populism that is jeopardizing democracy.

What we also need to be aware of is that the rise of populism is not purely an economic matter, even though economic factors are considered influential. Idealistically, Bernie Sanders is a better candidate in reducing economic inequality compared to Donald Trump, yet it was Donald Trump who was elected. This result revealed many other factors that are involved, such as the resistance of American people against an ideology with socialist characteristics and the negative feelings towards immigrants. Therefore, reducing populism will require not only economic regulation and redistribution but also political efforts from so-called elite politicians to fulfill the voters’ concerns, as well as educational efforts to reduce existing biases.

In conclusion, when we talk about the threat of populism, we are talking about an abnormal imbalance between the populist forces and elitist forces that secure a functioning democracy. As such imbalance is heavily a result of financial inequality, the redistribution of wealth along with social and political efforts will be needed to mitigate the rising extreme populism and prevent dangerous consequences.