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Dr. Laurenz Guenther is a Research Fellow at the Toulouse School of Economics.

Dr. Guenther: European Politics Is Shifting from Economics to Culture

May 27, 2026

by ECPS_admin Editor’s Choice European Observatory Home Interviews Migration

In this provocative ECPS interview, Dr. Laurenz Guenther, Research Fellow at the Toulouse School of Economics, challenges dominant interpretations of populism, migration politics, and democratic crisis in Europe. Rather than viewing the rise of the populist radical right primarily as an external threat to liberal democracy, Dr. Guenther argues that it reflects deeper “representation gaps” between mainstream parties and large segments of European electorates, particularly on migration and cultural issues. He contends that European politics is undergoing a profound transformation in which “culture has, overall, become the more dominant dimension of political conflict.” Contrasting with many ECPS interviews emphasizing democratic backsliding and illiberalism, Dr. Guenther argues that liberal democracies can regain legitimacy not by suppressing cultural anxieties, but by responding to them more effectively within democratic and liberal constitutional frameworks.

At a time when much of the scholarly and public debate on populism focuses on democratic backsliding, authoritarian drift, disinformation, and the dangers posed by the populist radical right, Dr. Laurenz Guenther offers a strikingly different interpretation of Europe’s political transformation. Rather than treating right-wing populism primarily as an external threat to liberal democracy, Dr. Guenther argues that its rise reflects deeper failures within liberal-democratic representation itself. In this sense, his perspective stands in contrast to many previous ECPS interviews, which have largely emphasized the illiberal, exclusionary, and anti-pluralist dangers associated with populist movements.

A Research Fellow at the Toulouse School of Economics, Dr. Guenther has become an increasingly influential voice in debates surrounding migration politics, democratic responsiveness, cultural polarization, and the rise of the populist radical right in Europe. Through his research on “representation gaps” and issue voting, he argues that mainstream European parties have become “systematically more culturally liberal than large segments of their electorates,”particularly on immigration. According to Dr. Guenther, this disconnect has created fertile ground for populist challengers who successfully position themselves closer to voter preferences on culturally salient issues.

Central to Dr. Guenther’s argument is the claim that European politics is undergoing a profound structural transformation. As he puts it in this interview, “politics in the average European country has shifted from something like a 60–40 balance in favor of economic issues to perhaps 40–60 in favor of cultural issues. We may even be moving toward something like 70–30.” In his view, “culture has, overall, become the more dominant dimension of political conflict.” This diagnosis sharply departs from conventional analyses that continue to treat class, redistribution, or neoliberal economics as the primary organizing principles of political competition.

Throughout the interview, Dr. Guenther advances several arguments that challenge dominant liberal assumptions surrounding migration and populism. He contends that mainstream parties increasingly lose credibility when they dismiss or underrepresent concerns surrounding migration, demographic change, asylum policy, and cultural identity. “The main threat,” he argues, “comes from failing to represent people,” which can push voters toward increasingly radical alternatives. Unlike many scholars who interpret tougher migration policies primarily as democratic erosion, Dr. Guenther views the recent convergence of mainstream parties toward stricter border and asylum policies as, at least partly, a democratic response to voter preferences.

At the same time, the interview also explores some of the most sensitive and controversial questions currently shaping European politics: the relationship between migration and demographic transformation, the growing salience of Islam and civilizational identity, the future of multiculturalism, and the normalization of culturally conservative politics across Europe. Yet despite his stark assessment of Europe’s political trajectory, Dr. Guenther ultimately rejects the idea that liberal democracy and more restrictive migration policies are necessarily incompatible. “If handled intelligently,” he argues, “Europe does not necessarily have to choose between these two paths.”

Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Laurenz Guenther, lightly edited for clarity and readability.

When Mainstream Parties Fail to Respond, Populists Fill the Void

Demonstrators of the Austrian Identitarian movement form a guard of honor of flags in Vienna, Austria on June 11, 2016. Photo: Johanna Poetsch.

Dr. Guenther, welcome! To begin, in your work on “representation gaps,” you argue that mainstream European parties have become systematically more culturally liberal than large segments of their electorates, particularly on immigration. To what extent do you see the rise of populist radical-right parties as reflecting a broader crisis of democratic representation and political responsiveness within liberal democracies?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: I think these representation gaps, and this “crisis of representation,” as you call it, are one major factor behind the rise of populism. They are certainly not the only factor, but I do think they have contributed significantly to populism’s growing appeal. The failure of mainstream parties to reflect the attitudes of many citizens has created space for new populist parties to step in and represent these voters by proposing policies that are closer to their preferences on issues such as immigration. When these issues then became much more salient — for instance, during the refugee crisis — this provided a shock that led many voters to reconsider their political choices and ultimately support populist parties instead.

Europe’s Political Elites Often Misjudge Public Opinion on Immigration

Your analysis of Germany suggests that the AfD’s rise was driven not only by anti-immigration sentiment itself, but also by the perception that established parties were unwilling to openly engage with public concerns over migration. How can democratic societies address legitimate anxieties surrounding migration while resisting xenophobia, exclusionary nationalism, and anti-minority politics?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: You are right that the key challenge for mainstream parties is to be very precise in how they approach these issues. Choosing the right policy is largely a matter of accurately assessing public opinion. You do not want to be too far to the right on immigration, but you also need to be sufficiently responsive to public concerns. At the same time, immigration is a multidimensional issue. A party may adopt a much tougher position on certain questions, such as the asylum system, while remaining more lenient on issues like skilled migration.

To find the right balance, parties need a very strong understanding — and reliable measurement — of where citizens actually stand on these questions. My impression is that many mainstream parties do not really have that understanding. There are studies asking politicians directly where they believe voters are positioned, and often even leading politicians misjudge what the majority position actually is. Without that understanding, parties cannot position themselves effectively.

Culture Has Become Europe’s Dominant Political Cleavage

Across your writings, you emphasize the growing salience of the “cultural dimension” of politics. Does this imply that traditional economic left-right divisions are increasingly being displaced by conflicts centered on migration, multiculturalism, identity, religion, and national belonging?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: Yes, I think this is true to a large extent. As you suggest, the cultural dimension of politics has become significantly more important and, in my view, continues to grow in importance. The economic dimension is still relevant, of course, but its relative weight has declined. Over roughly the last 15 years, politics in the average European country has shifted from something like a 60–40 balance in favor of economic issues to perhaps 40–60 in favor of cultural issues. We may even be moving toward something like 70–30. So, while economics still matters, culture has, overall, become the more dominant dimension of political conflict.

Ignoring Voters’ Concerns Fuels Political Extremism

You argue that even conservative mainstream parties in Europe are often more culturally liberal than the median voter. How should liberal-democratic parties respond to cultural representation gaps without normalizing anti-immigrant rhetoric, Islamophobia, or hostility toward diversity and pluralism?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: I am personally not convinced that these normalization effects are particularly strong in practice. I think the main threat comes from failing to represent people, which can lead them either to become more extreme in response or to support almost anyone who appears willing to represent their concerns, including the most extreme parties.

This goes back to your earlier question about how far mainstream parties should go in responding to these issues. I would reiterate that parties need a strong understanding of where public opinion actually stands and then position themselves in a way that fills the representation gap. In many cases, I do not think they do this effectively because they lack reliable measurements of public attitudes.

A second point I would emphasize is that mainstream parties need to have some trust in their own voters and in the broader public. One concern I often hear from politicians is that voters may be highly extreme, deeply Islamophobic, or otherwise illiberal, such that representing their views could itself become anti-liberal. But when I look at survey evidence and at what people actually say when asked about their attitudes toward Islam or related issues, I do not get the impression that most people hold highly extreme views. On the contrary, most people have fairly reasonable preferences.

And if you want democracy to function successfully, you ultimately have to trust people to some extent. Even liberal democracy, with all its institutional checks on majority rule, ultimately depends on the assumption that majorities will vote in a broadly reasonable way. If you believe that people are fundamentally unreasonable and should not be represented, leaving large representation gaps open, then it becomes difficult to sustain a genuine democratic outlook. So, even for the sake of democratic consistency, politicians need to trust people at least to some degree and take their preferences seriously.

Europe May See the Rise of Economically Left but Culturally Conservative Parties

In your work on the decline of Die Linke and the rise of Sahra Wagenknecht’s BSW, you suggest that culturally conservative left-wing politics may become increasingly electorally viable. Could Europe be entering a new political configuration in which economic redistribution is increasingly combined with restrictive migration and culturally conservative agendas?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: Yes, I think this could certainly happen. Wagenknecht’s party is a good example. In the beginning, it was quite successful. Although its momentum has weakened somewhat since then, its first result in a German national election was still a considerable achievement for a newly established party. It narrowly missed entering parliament.

In Germany, it is actually very rare for a new party to enter parliament in its first national election. So, compared to other parties — even compared to the AfD or the Greens in their early stages —the BSW performed very well. To me, this demonstrates the electoral potential of combining these kinds of policy positions.

Moreover, in most European countries, we still do not really have parties that combine economically left-wing policies with culturally conservative positions in a consistent way. But I do think this combination has significant potential. As political competition becomes more intense and fragmented, we are seeing more new parties emerge, and I think some parties adopting this formula could become very successful.

Europe’s Migration Shift Reflects the Growing Power of Populist Parties

Many mainstream European parties have recently adopted tougher migration policies, including externalization agreements, stricter asylum rules, and expanded border controls. Do you interpret the EU’s recent migration pact as an attempt to restore democratic legitimacy and public trust—or as evidence that populist radical-right actors have successfully shifted European politics toward a more restrictive and securitized migration paradigm?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: I think it is more the latter. It appears to me that mainstream parties are primarily responding to pressure from populist right-wing parties, as well as to broader public demands — in other words, to these representation gaps — rather than making an independent decision to become more representative or responsive. The growing electoral strength of populist right-wing parties may have pushed mainstream parties to reconsider their own positions and reflect on whether they made strategic mistakes by adopting such liberal stances on migration. But overall, this shift is driven mainly by political necessity.

In the European Parliament, for example, populist parties have become strong enough that centrist parties are increasingly compelled to cooperate with them on certain issues. I see the new migration pact as a reflection of this broader development, and I suspect this trend will continue.

At the same time, this places mainstream parties in a very difficult position. Even though they are now implementing more restrictive migration policies, they are not especially well-positioned to benefit from them electorally. Many voters are unlikely to reward them because these policy shifts are perceived as responses to populist pressure rather than as genuine convictions.

From the perspective of mainstream parties, this creates the worst of all worlds. They are unable to pursue the policies they would actually prefer — because many mainstream politicians still personally favor more liberal migration policies — yet they also fail to gain significant electoral advantages from adopting tougher measures. To benefit electorally, they would either have needed to shift earlier or would now need to adopt a much stronger repositioning.

Uncertainty About Demographic Transformation Drives Migration Anxiety

Pakistani or Indian migrants in Copenhagen. — Pakistani or Indian migrants in Copenhagen, Denmark, September 22, 2017. Photo: Dreamstime.

Your research suggests that immigration has become one of the most politically salient issues driving right-wing populist growth across Europe. Why do you think migration possesses such extraordinary mobilizing power compared to issues such as inequality, housing, or climate change, which many critics argue are themselves deeply shaped by capitalism and broader structural economic forces?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: All of the issues you mention are very important, and they matter greatly to voters as well. It is not that issues such as inequality, housing, or climate change are unimportant; rather, immigration appears to matter even more to many voters. One reason for this — and I think this is something that is still not openly discussed, though I suspect it will become a major debate in the future because it touches on very sensitive questions — is that immigration is closely connected to demographic change.

The migration Europe is experiencing is not random. A significant share comes from non-European regions such as the Middle East, North Africa, and Sub-Saharan Africa. If these migration patterns continue over a long period of time, they could fundamentally reshape the demographic structure of European societies in the long run.

This raises a number of important questions that, in my view, are often not openly addressed because of political sensitivities. Liberal democracies tend to understand people primarily as individuals, and discussions about ethnicity or the ethnic composition of societies are often viewed as potentially dangerous, especially given Europe’s historical experiences with exclusionary nationalism and discrimination.

At the same time, this reluctance to engage with such questions means that many concerns people consider legitimate are not openly discussed. As a result, citizens often do not clearly understand where political parties stand, nor do they easily find what they regard as reasonable research about how demographic changes may affect society over time. This creates a considerable degree of uncertainty, and when people face uncertainty, they often become highly risk averse. I think this uncertainty is one of the key factors driving much of the fear or caution surrounding immigration.

Migration Politics Is Reshaping Traditional Party Loyalties

In your writings, you argue that voters increasingly engage in “issue voting,” particularly on migration and cultural questions. Does this trend weaken traditional party loyalties and create structurally favorable conditions for populist outsiders, anti-establishment movements, and increasingly polarized democratic politics?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: Yes, it currently does have those implications. But in principle, it would not necessarily have to. In my view, the reason issue voting produces these effects today is precisely because of the representation gaps we discussed earlier. Take, for example, a voter who historically had strong ties to the SPD but now votes primarily based on immigration policy. That voter may no longer feel able to support the SPD because, on immigration, most people hold positions that are considerably more conservative than those of the party itself. So, issue voting weakens traditional party loyalties under these conditions, but only because parties such as the SPD have positioned themselves in a comparatively liberal way on these questions.

Liberal Democracy Can Respond to Migration Concerns Without Becoming Illiberal

One of the central arguments advanced by liberal-democratic parties is that populist radical-right actors threaten institutional checks and balances, minority protections, and democratic pluralism once in power. Yet you argue that this critique loses credibility if mainstream parties appear unwilling to acknowledge issues voters consider important. How can democracies balance responsiveness to majority concerns with the protection of liberal norms, human rights, and minority communities?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: I think this question is very similar to issues we discussed earlier, especially regarding where exactly the line should be drawn. That, in many ways, is the central challenge. One more concrete point I would make is that anti-immigration attitudes among many citizens are, in my view, largely driven by attitudes toward asylum seekers specifically. If you ask people whether there should be fewer or more asylum seekers coming into the country, most people tend to say fewer rather than more. But when you ask about other forms of immigration — and most migration actually takes place outside the asylum system — the responses are often much more moderate. Many people say they are generally fine with it, or that they might prefer slightly more or slightly less immigration, but there is no comparably strong tendency. So, when people describe themselves as “anti-immigration,” what they often mean in practice is that they want fewer asylum seekers.

For that reason, I think that a much more restrictive asylum system — for example, limiting asylum numbers to levels similar to those of 20 years ago, or designing an asylum framework that operates primarily within Europe — would likely appease many citizens and close a large part of the representation gap without necessarily being anti-liberal.

After all, this was effectively the kind of system many European countries had in the past. Before the signing of the New York Protocol, asylum systems limited largely to Europe were common across the continent. And if you look at Germany 20 years ago, the asylum system was considerably more restrictive than it is today. Germany experienced an asylum crisis in the 1990s during the Yugoslav wars, and afterward the constitution was amended specifically to prevent a similar situation from recurring.

The constitutional framework that emerged was extremely restrictive and essentially stated that anyone arriving from a safe country — which in practice applied to almost everyone entering Germany — would not qualify for asylum. Later, under Merkel, it was argued that international agreements such as the Geneva Convention overrode this constitutional interpretation. According to many critics, including some legal scholars in Germany, it was this reinterpretation that made the asylum system much more liberal in practice and created broader opportunities for migration.

So, in Germany’s case, a different interpretation of existing law alone could significantly tighten the asylum system again. It might not even require major new legislation and would, in effect, return the country to a situation more similar to that of 20 years ago. And 20 years ago, Germany was still a liberal democracy, just as it is today. It was not a hostile or oppressive environment for migrants.

Therefore, I do think it is possible to strike the right balance — one that avoids anything resembling fascism or authoritarianism while still responding to public concerns. Again, the reason I believe this is possible is that, if you actually look at what Germans and other Europeans say about immigration, very few people hold genuinely extreme views. Many of the concerns they express are, from their perspective, relatively reasonable.

Many Europeans Increasingly View Migration Through a Civilizational Lens

For right-wing populists in the Western world, “the others” primarily include immigrants but also extend to “welfare scroungers,” regional minorities, individuals with “non-traditional” lifestyles, communists, and others. Photo: Shutterstock.

Across Europe, debates over migration increasingly intersect with concerns about Islam, security, demographic change, and national identity. To what extent do you believe contemporary anti-migration politics should be understood as part of a broader civilizational and cultural backlash against multiculturalism and demographic diversity?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: We touched on this a little earlier, and I do think this is a key component of the debate. It is important that you raise this point, because I do not think it is discussed often enough. What we are witnessing in many European countries is significant demographic and ethnic change driven by patterns of immigration, the regions migrants are coming from, and differences in birth rates. Many people — on both sides of the debate — interpret these developments as part of a broader civilizational or cultural struggle. In many European societies, populations of African and Middle Eastern descent are growing, and Muslim communities are becoming more numerous as well.

Given Europe’s long history of conflict between civilizations and religious groups, these developments make many people uneasy. For that reason, the issue needs to be discussed openly and addressed seriously.

One point I have written about is the importance of political parties communicating a clearer sense of where they believe these developments are ultimately leading. The population of North African and Middle Eastern countries exceeds one billion people — larger than Europe’s population combined — and these regions generally have much younger populations, whereas Europe is aging rapidly.

There is also a strand of liberal thinking that argues borders should effectively be abolished and that people should be free to move wherever they wish. I do not think most political parties explicitly advocate such a position, but these ideas are present in public debate, and ordinary citizens encounter them regularly in newspapers and political discussions.

If such policies were ever fully implemented, Europe would, over time, become majority Muslim and majority composed of people of African and Middle Eastern descent. Many Europeans would strongly oppose such an outcome. If people begin to feel that this is the direction developments are heading, then the political reaction could become far more intense than the current rise of right-wing populism.

So, the question many people are asking is: where is this process ultimately leading? How much demographic and ethnic change is expected? Is there some kind of endpoint, or are these demographic shifts expected to continue indefinitely? If current trends persisted over many decades, then in some countries Muslims could eventually become a majority among younger generations.

The problem is that liberals often do not openly address these long-term questions. It is extremely important to have a serious discussion about them, supported by realistic projections and rigorous research examining the potential social consequences of demographic change.

At the same time, this is also a very difficult topic for researchers. Conducting serious research on these issues can be extremely challenging because, if findings portray ethnic change negatively or identify tensions associated with it, publishing such work while maintaining one’s academic career may become very difficult.

Europe’s Populist Right Has Become a Stable Electoral Force

In your analysis of the European Parliament elections, you argue that culturally conservative parties are likely to continue rising until the “cultural representation gap” narrows. Does this suggest that the normalization of populist radical-right politics is becoming a long-term structural feature of European democracy rather than a temporary protest phenomenon?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: Yes, I think so. In the beginning, many mainstream parties were effectively betting that right-wing populism was simply a temporary bubble that would eventually burst. But that expectation has clearly failed. By now, survey data also show that supporters of right-wing populist parties are often among the most loyal voters — people who say they will continue voting for these parties no matter what happens. So, I think these parties are now very firmly established within European politics.

Migration Politics Now Mirrors Everyday Public Sentiment

Your work highlights how mainstream parties increasingly converge toward tougher migration positions, citing figures such as Mette Frederiksen, Emmanuel Macron, and Friedrich Merz. Do you see this convergence as democratic adaptation to voter concerns—or as evidence that populist radical-right narratives are increasingly hegemonizing European political discourse?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: It is, in many ways, both. I certainly see populist actors as the main driving force behind this shift. They succeeded in making migration and cultural issues far more politically salient, and public debate has increasingly moved closer to the way populists initially framed these questions.

Part of the reason may simply be that populists often discuss these issues in a language that resembles how many ordinary people talk about them in everyday life — whether in informal conversations, bars, or other social settings. And at some point, media debates and broader public discourse inevitably adapt to public preferences and concerns. From that perspective, the response of mainstream parties can also be interpreted as a democratic adaptation — an attempt to respond to shifting voter priorities and broader public sentiment.

Democratic Stability Depends on Taking Citizens’ Concerns Seriously

Much contemporary debate frames populism primarily as a threat to liberal democracy. Yet your work suggests populist success may also reflect unresolved failures within liberal democracy itself. Do you think European democracies can regain stability and legitimacy without fundamentally rethinking representation, participation, and democratic responsiveness on culturally divisive issues such as migration and integration?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: Yes, it is definitely possible. And this ultimately comes back to my understanding of public opinion: namely, that the concerns many people — indeed, most people — have are generally reasonable, and that it is entirely possible to build political systems and adopt policy solutions that respond to those concerns. In fact, I would argue that, only a few decades ago, many European countries already had systems and policy frameworks that functioned in this way. So, in a sense, we already know how to do it. There are also countries today that have immigration policies which are broadly popular while still remaining clearly within liberal-democratic boundaries and far from anything extreme. Mette Frederiksen’s Denmark would be one example, and Sweden’s recent policymaking would be another.

Europe Can Strengthen Borders Without Abandoning Liberal Democracy

And finally, Dr. Guenther, looking ahead, do you believe Europe is moving toward a new political equilibrium in which migration restriction, stronger borders, and culturally conservative policies become normalized across both mainstream and populist parties—or do you still see the possibility of a renewed democratic consensus grounded in pluralism, human rights, diversity, and inclusive multicultural citizenship?

Dr. Laurenz Guenther: If handled intelligently, Europe does not necessarily have to choose between these two paths or treat them as mutually exclusive. I certainly believe we will see stronger borders and more restrictive asylum policies in the future. At the same time, I do not think that other forms of immigration necessarily need to be restricted, nor do I see a strong electoral incentive for parties to target them more broadly.

So, I think immigration policymaking can become much more specific and targeted, focusing primarily on restricting those forms of immigration that are perceived as having negative effects on European societies. Immigration can, of course, have both very positive and very negative effects, and much depends on who immigrates.

In my view, Europe is currently experiencing some forms of immigration that do have negative consequences, but if we look at immigration overall, I think these cases still represent a relatively small share. Addressing them therefore requires a very specific and carefully targeted policy response. And I think doing so is entirely compatible with the broader principles you mentioned. It is consistent with liberal values in general. So, while I do expect Europe to move toward more conservative immigration policies in certain areas, I still believe liberal democracy has a strong chance of being preserved.

Dr. Paul: India Under Modi Has Become a Civilizational Populist Electoral Autocracy

May 25, 2026

by ECPS_admin Authoritarianism Editor’s Choice Home Interviews

In this ECPS interview, Dr. Maggie Paul argues that India under Narendra Modi is best understood as a “civilizational populist electoral autocracy,” in which Hindutva politics operates not only through elections and state coercion, but also through affective mass culture, media infrastructures, and majoritarian common sense. Drawing on her work on “futurist nostalgia,” saffronization, and the securitization of the “Bangladeshi infiltrator,” Dr. Paul examines how the BJP mobilizes emotions, historical memory, migration anxieties, and cultural narratives to reshape democracy and citizenship in contemporary India. The interview also explores the transnational dimensions of Hindutva mobilization, democratic erosion, bureaucratic exclusion, and the emerging cracks within the BJP’s hegemonic project.

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

In an era marked by democratic backsliding, affective polarization, and the global resurgence of majoritarian populism, India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi has become one of the most consequential cases for understanding how nationalism, media, religion, and state power can converge to reshape democratic life. Far from operating solely through electoral competition or overt repression, the contemporary Hindutva project increasingly functions through what Dr. Maggie Paul describes as a broader “affective economy” that mobilizes emotions, historical memory, cultural nostalgia, and civilizational anxieties to construct a new political common sense.

In this wide-ranging interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Dr. Maggie Paul, Lecturer in Politics at La Trobe University, examines how the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has transformed Hindutva from a political ideology into what she calls an “affective mass culture” embedded across cinema, digital media, bureaucracy, migration policy, and every day public life. Drawing on her influential co-authored work on “futurist nostalgia,” Dr. Paul argues that Hindutva politics “does not merely romanticize the past” but instead projects “a future-oriented civilizational populism” centered on the promise of restoring a glorious Hindu civilization through the symbolic framework of Ram Rajya.

According to Dr. Paul, the BJP’s political success rests not simply on electoral dominance, but on its ability to institutionalize a majoritarian cultural common sense. “What the BJP has achieved,” she argues, “is the normalization of a particular way of being Indian—of shaping what ‘being Indian’ is supposed to feel like.” Through multi-platform media infrastructures, WhatsApp ecosystems, cinema, religious spectacle, and transnational networks, Hindutva mobilization has generated what she describes as “a majoritarian fear and anxiety circulating across multiple platforms.”

The interview also explores how migration and citizenship have been securitized through the figure of the “Bangladeshi infiltrator,” a discourse that Dr. Paul traces back to colonial governance structures. In her analysis, Hindutva politics has expanded these colonial categories into a broader process of “migrantizing the citizen,” particularly targeting Muslims and marginalized communities through bureaucratic exclusion, citizenship legislation, and mass electoral revisions such as the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise.

At the same time, Dr. Paul emphasizes that coercion remains central to the Hindutva project. “Hindutva populist mobilization legitimizes coercive practices,” she explains, noting how violence, incarceration, bulldozer demolitions, and punitive state measures are reframed as acts of national protection within a broader civilizational narrative.

Reflecting on the broader trajectory of the Modi era, Dr. Paul ultimately argues that contemporary India cannot be adequately understood through a single conceptual framework. Competitive authoritarianism, ethnocratic majoritarianism, and civilizational populism each capture only part of the picture. Instead, she concludes, “the current Indian regime is best understood as a hybrid of all these elements,” which she characterizes as “a civilizational populist electoral autocracy.”

Yet despite the apparent hegemony of Hindutva populism, Dr. Paul also points to emerging cracks within the system—particularly among younger generations confronting unemployment, precarity, and frustrated aspirations. Echoing Antonio Gramsci, she reminds us that “hegemony is never total or complete,” and that democratic resistance in India may ultimately depend not only on institutional opposition, but also on the mobilization of alternative affective imaginaries rooted in India’s pluralistic and syncretic traditions.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Maggie Paul, lightly edited for clarity and readability.

Civilizational Populism and the Reimagining of India’s Future

A man chanting songs with a dummy cow in the background during the Golden Jubilee
celebration of VHP – a Hindu nationalist organization on December 20, 2014 in Kolkata, India. Photo: Arindam Banerjee.

Dr. Maggie Paul, welcome! To begin, in your work on “futurist nostalgia,” you argue that Hindutva politics does not merely romanticize the past but projects an idealized Hindu future through mythological symbols such as Ram Rajya. In light of the BJP’s sweeping victories in Assam and West Bengal in the 2026 state elections, to what extent do these outcomes reflect the consolidation of a future-oriented civilizational populism built around cultural nostalgia, Hindu majoritarianism, and the promise of national renewal under Narendra Modi?

Dr. Maggie Paul: Thank you for that question, Selçuk. The concept of futurist nostalgia is something my co-author, Associate Professor Priya Chako—who is essentially the primary author—and I developed while analyzing the case of India and the BJP’s populist mobilization strategies through Ernesto Laclau’s theorization of populism. In other words, we approached populism as a logic of political articulation, or a discursive construction of “the people.” In the paper, we sought to foreground the role emotions play in this discursive construction, which we understand as a unificatory rather than a homogeneous formation.

What we argued is that emotions help cultivate a vague sense of solidarity among disparate groups and actors who may otherwise be divided along lines of religion, caste, class, or region, but are nevertheless brought together into a broader collective identity. We highlighted that this process often operates through a populist signifier. In many contexts—not only in India—this signifier is embodied in the figure of the leader himself. In the Indian case, this is reflected in the figure of Narendra Modi, but also in affective signifiers such as the Hindu deity Ram and the reformulated concept of Ram Rajya.

This is essentially an affective formation rooted in nostalgia for a lost golden age of “Hindu civilization.” However, in our paper, we also frame it as projecting a future-oriented aspiration. We emphasize how emotions are central to empowering this affective populist signifier. These emotions include negative ones, such as a sense of historical injury, woundedness, and victimization at the hands of multiple actors, but also positive emotions, including pride and a sense of collective purpose directed toward realizing the ideal of Ram Rajya.

BJP’s Bengal Victory and the Politics of the ‘Outsider

We therefore characterized this phenomenon as a future-oriented civilizational populism, one in which a market-based cultural infrastructure is constructed for a “new India” that combines modern developmentalism and neoliberal growth with a broader cultural reawakening. It is a vision of India that fuses these various emotional registers through the populist signifier of Ram Rajya. That was the core idea behind futurist nostalgia.

Turning to the present elections, I do think this kind of affective mobilization of civilizational populism played a significant role. In Bengal, for example—which represented the BJP’s most important victory—the incumbent Trinamool Congress was characterized as an anti-Hindu party aligned with the figure of the “outsider,” namely Muslims.

I should add that this affective mobilization around Ram Rajya serves not only a unificatory function, but also the creation of an antagonistic frontier. In other words, it constructs an “outsider.” Most prominently, this can refer to minorities such as Muslims, but it can also include established elites or opposition parties portrayed as catering to these outsiders and thereby obstructing the realization of a glorious civilizational future. So, the framework operates simultaneously as a unifying force and as a mechanism for constructing political antagonism.

In the Bengal elections, this formulation was clearly visible. The Trinamool Congress was portrayed as a party serving “outsiders” or Muslims and therefore as anti-Hindu. The figure of the “infiltrator” also played a central role. The ruling party was accused of encouraging illegal immigration, framed in India as “infiltration,” and its electoral success was attributed to these alleged outsiders.

Why Bengal’s Resistance to Hindutva Began to Fracture

At the same time, there was the introduction of an acontextual celebration of Ram Navami, a Ram-associated festival that historically has not been particularly prominent in Bengal. The BJP nevertheless promoted it consistently in the years leading up to the election as it sought to establish itself in the region. In other contexts, Ram Navami mobilization has often been associated with a more aggressive or masculinized form of Hinduism, and that dynamic was also imported into Bengal. This, in turn, compelled the Trinamool Congress to engage on the terrain of Hindutva politics as well.

So yes, these affective and civilizational populist strategies certainly contributed to the BJP’s remarkable success in Bengal. However, I would also complicate the argument somewhat, because the concept of futurist nostalgia alone cannot fully explain the outcome.

First, the Trinamool Congress had been in power for more than fifteen years, which generated strong anti-incumbency sentiment. There was also a widespread perception of economic stagnation, alongside forms of syndicalist politics associated with everyday criminality and highly extractive relationships between party cadres and ordinary citizens. These grievances against the incumbent government were significant.

Second, Bengal’s own political history must be taken into account. Bengal has often been portrayed as a region resistant to Hindutva-style populism for a variety of reasons: the intellectual project of the Bhadralok, or upper-caste and upper-class elites associated with the Bengal Renaissance; the long legacy of Left governance; and a trans-religious regional Bengali identity. All of these factors historically constrained the success of BJP-style Hindutva mobilization.

At the same time, however, Bengal also contains historical roots of Hindu nationalist mobilization. An insightful analysis published in Himal Mag discussed how the conflation of Indian civilization with Hindu civilization has important roots in Bengal nationalism led by upper-caste elites. In that sense, there has long existed a latent Islamophobia and a mobilization around “Hindu identity” and civilizationalism within Bengal’s own political history.

But third, and perhaps most importantly, we must also consider institutional corruption. Several scholars of Hindu nationalism and populism, including Christophe Jaffrelot, have shown how the BJP and the broader Hindutva right have captured institutions—not only the legislature, but also the judiciary and executive. What these elections highlighted, however, was not merely institutional capture, but institutional corruption as well.

Competitive Authoritarianism and BJP’s Electoral Consolidation

This is why concepts such as competitive authoritarianism are also important explanatory frameworks for understanding the Bengal victory. Factors such as systematic gerrymandering in Assam, designed in ways that benefit majoritarian voting and the ruling party, are crucial. Similarly, opposition leaders facing corruption allegations were absorbed into the BJP, after which those allegations were effectively abandoned. All of this matters politically.

There is also the issue of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, which involved an extensive revision of electoral rules that disproportionately affected minorities and contributed to mass disenfranchisement. Broadly speaking, around nine million potential voters were removed. Although this was framed as a neutral bureaucratic and technical exercise, the reality is that it disproportionately affected minorities, as well as women, who often face more complicated challenges in proving citizenship through official identification documents.

So, I think institutional corruption and competitive authoritarianism also need to be incorporated as central explanatory factors in understanding these electoral outcomes

The BJP’s Construction of an Affective Mass Culture

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former US President Donald Trump met to discuss the betterment of the relations of India and US at Heydrabad House in New Delhi on February 25, 2020. Photo: Madhuram Paliwal.

Your scholarship highlights how nostalgia operates as a political technology that binds collective identity through emotional attachment to a mythologized past. To what extent has the BJP succeeded in transforming Hindu nationalism from an ideological project into an affective mass culture embedded in cinema, digital media, and every day public life?

Dr. Maggie Paul: I really appreciated the term you used — “affective mass culture.” I think the BJP has been remarkably successful in constructing an affective infrastructure through multiple forms of media. It is distributed, multi-platform, and operates across a wide range of media ecosystems in order to produce what you rightly describe as an affective mass culture—one that promotes a particular “common sense” within Indian public life. It circulates the affective economy I referred to earlier: positive emotions associated with pride in “Hindu civilization”, alongside animosity toward constructed antagonistic frontiers. In that sense, it has been extraordinarily effective.

This reminds me of the work of the cultural anthropologist Arjun Appadurai, who speaks about cultural resonance. What the BJP has achieved is the normalization of a particular way of being Indian—of shaping what “being Indian” is supposed to feel like. In that regard, its success has been substantial.

At the same time, I want to emphasize that this phenomenon must also be understood in relation to neoliberal governance. The concept of Ram Rajya, for instance, is not only about the construction of temples or monuments. It is equally tied to aspirational middle-class cultural consumption and to religious tourism as a broader circuit. All of this is deeply connected to neoliberal governance structures.

Additionally, this phenomenon cannot be understood solely within the domestic sphere. It is fundamentally transnational. A recent article published by the Transnational Institute described Hindutva mobilization as one of the most effective forms of transnational right-wing populist mobilization. Beginning with Hindu right-wing organizations and networks operating across various parts of the world—particularly in Western countries—these actors are able to advance Hindu culture wars even beyond India itself.

Modi’s Global Spectacles and the Transnationalization of Hindutva

At the same time, they create large-scale spectacles centered around Modi as the symbolic focal point: Modi at Madison Square Garden, Modi leading the G20, or Modi at the White House. These spectacles are then reflected back into the domestic affective economy, reinforcing and intensifying populist mobilization within India. So, this is very much a transnational phenomenon and must be understood in those terms.

I also draw on Appadurai’s discussion of the “fear of small numbers,” particularly his analysis of the role minorities play in affective mobilization. What emerges is a kind of predatory anxiety among the majority directed toward minorities—most prominently Muslims in this case. Importantly, this anxiety is not grounded in empirical data or any objectively measurable threat. Rather, it stems from a subjective feeling that minorities obstruct the achievement of cultural completeness.

This is therefore a deeply affective phenomenon, and I do not think it can simply be countered through logic or rational argumentation. That is precisely what this form of mass culture has managed to sustain and mobilize: a majoritarian fear and anxiety circulating across multiple platforms.

Moreover, this process is not confined to television alone, although television—often referred to as “godi media” (the term refers to Indian media outlets perceived as excessively supportive of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. S.G.)—certainly plays a major role in reproducing populist narratives through primetime broadcasts. It also operates through other infrastructures, especially the WhatsApp networks that the BJP has built with remarkable effectiveness. This has been extensively studied by scholars, as well as by digital wellness platforms examining the BJP’s expansive WhatsApp ecosystem.

This infrastructure consists of numerous WhatsApp groups, alongside thousands of workers associated with the BJP IT Cell, who continuously circulate and recirculate narratives centered on the “fear of small numbers.” In doing so, they sustain this broader affective economy of civilizational populism.

So, this kind of multi-sided mobilization—the infrastructure the BJP has managed to construct—is extremely potent.

The Saffronization of India’s Cultural Imagination

In “Ram Rajya 2.0,” you discuss how popular cinema increasingly reifies binaries between the “native Hindu” and the “foreign Muslim invader.” How significant has the saffronization of Indian cinema and popular culture been in normalizing authoritarian majoritarian politics under Narendra Modi?

Dr. Maggie Paul: By saffronization, we mean a kind of re-contextualization or re-telling of the country’s history in ways that suit the Hindutva agenda, while also invoking pride in a muscular Hindu identity. It cements an upper-caste, upper-class Hindu past, as well as a Hindu future, while marginalizing other histories—those of minorities, lower castes, and others. That is essentially what we mean by the saffronization of popular culture.

What I would emphasize, however, is that this process is structurally complex. It is not simply straightforward propaganda, and propaganda theory alone cannot fully explain it. Rather, it involves the creation of an ecosystem that simultaneously incentivizes these narratives while also incorporating coercive elements, thereby producing a broader process of normalization. So, it is far more complicated than direct propaganda.

That said, there are also very explicit examples. In our article for Red Pepper, we highlighted the phenomenon of Hindutva pop culture, in which a form of violent spectatorship is cultivated. This includes pop music with blatantly Islamophobic lyrics set to highly catchy tunes. It also operates through the neoliberal dynamics of digital algorithmic profit-making. In other words, platform economies themselves reward such content because algorithmic systems generate visibility, engagement, and profit for those producing it. Kunal Purohit has written an excellent book, H-Pop, which explores this phenomenon in considerable detail.

We also discuss in our article how, since 2014 and the rise of the BJP, there has been a wave of films built around remarkably similar plotlines. I will not go into all of them, but examples include Padmaavat, Tanhaji, and Kesari. These films tend to retell medieval history through a recurring narrative structure in which an excessively villainous Muslim ruler or invader is positioned against a Hindu warrior hero who, against all odds, struggles to defend Hindu dharma from this threatening Muslim figure. There has been an entire wave of films circulating this type of storyline. What this does is draw audiences into the perception of an ongoing civilizational struggle through these narratives.

Building an Affective Mass Culture Through Reward and Coercion

At the same time, there is also an infrastructure of reward. Films that explicitly advance Hindutva mobilization narratives are strategically encouraged by the government. Modi, for example, has publicly praised films such as The Kashmir Filesand The Kerala Story, both of which were highly controversial and presented highly selective or empirically questionable histories rather than nuanced accounts. These films are systematically encouraged by the government, granted tax-free status, and in some cases formally rewarded—The Kerala Story, for instance, received a National Award.

Alongside this reward structure, however, there is also a coercive structure. Celebrities who become even mildly critical can face retaliation in the form of tax raids or other punitive state measures. What emerges, therefore, is a complex ecosystem in which the promotion of civilizational narratives aligned with the current political order is rewarded, while those who are even slightly critical are penalized through state mechanisms.

So yes, it is a complex structure, but one that has nevertheless been highly effective in instituting what you described as an affective mass culture.

How Cultural Common Sense Legitimizes Coercion

Volunteers of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on Vijyadashmi festival, a large gathering or annual meeting during Ramanavami a Hindu festival in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh on October 19, 2018. Photo: Pradeep Gaurs.

You describe saffronization as both overt and subtle, confrontational yet normalized. How should we understand the relationship between cultural normalization and democratic erosion in India today? Is authoritarianism becoming embedded less through coercion alone and more through cultural common sense?

Dr. Maggie Paul: There is definitely both. In my previous answer, I discussed how multi-sided media platforms, together with various cultural projects, have been highly successful in instituting the kind of common sense you referred to.

Sometimes this process is explicitly confrontational, as in the plotlines of films I mentioned earlier, such as The Kashmir Files or The Kerala Story, where there is a stark Manichean divide. But at other times it operates much more subtly. For instance, the recent success of the highly controversial film Durandar was widely praised for its technological innovation and cinematic sophistication, and, like many earlier films, it performed extremely well commercially. Yet it relied on much subtler forms of mobilization. Fantasy was textured with fragments of evidence, creating a hybridized narrative structure that partially obscured its ideological messaging. It was not as overtly confrontational or straightforward as some of the other films I discussed earlier. So, there are both explicit and subtle cultural projects operating simultaneously.

At the same time, coercion has never disappeared. It has always been present, and I do not think coercion can be treated as secondary. In fact, it has been a primary feature of Hindutva populist mobilization from the very beginning. We should not forget that, particularly because it is not only continuing but escalating.

This includes the lynching of Muslims, which was in many ways how this entire process began, as well as violence directed against other communities, including Christians and Dalits. It also includes the neoliberal extraction of resources in tribal areas and the heavy policing of resistance to that extraction, alongside the incarceration of political activists—particularly student activists, and especially Muslim student activists. There has also been the jailing of political opponents, something the BJP engaged in quite explicitly during the previous general elections.

The Civilizational Logic Behind Authoritarian Enforcement

So, coercion has never gone away. It remains a very significant feature of Hindutva populist mobilization in India. What civilizational populism and affective mobilization do, however, is to lend legitimacy to this coercion in the eyes of the broader public.

For instance, the jailing of political opponents or student activists can be framed as a form of law enforcement or as something necessary for the protection of the nation, because these individuals are characterized as anti-national within this broader civilizational framework. In that sense, Hindutva populist mobilization legitimizes coercive practices.

Similarly, explicit violence against minorities can be presented as a form of “justice” or “swift justice.” This is reflected in the distinctly Indian phenomenon of “bulldozer nationalism,” in which anyone perceived as creating trouble can have their property demolished—most often members of minority communities.

So, coercion is always there: ever-present and escalating. But the creation of this broader common sense around populist mobilization lends that coercion a far wider legitimacy within Indian public life.

How Migration Became a Civilizational Security Threat

Your work on the “Bangladeshi infiltrator” demonstrates how migration has been securitized through the language of war, invasion, and demographic aggression. How central was this discourse to the BJP’s electoral consolidation in Assam and West Bengal during the 2026 elections?

Dr. Maggie Paul: This question is directly connected to the work I have been doing for my doctoral thesis. I want to introduce a certain degree of nuance here, because my central argument is that scholarship often presents Hindutva as a rupture within Indian nationalism—a radical break from the secular postcolonial polity that emerged after independence.

What I explore in my doctoral dissertation, which focuses on the securitization and political history of the “Bangladeshi infiltrator,” is how labor migration from Bangladesh came to be framed through the language of security and invasion. My research demonstrates that this discourse is deeply rooted in the colonial state apparatus and extends far beyond the postcolonial period. In fact, it goes back to the colonial era, and the state infrastructures established during India’s experience under British rule. These infrastructures were inherited by the postcolonial state, and what Hindutva politics has done is to further perfect and radicalize them.

What I mean by this is that the legal architecture used to police “foreign nationals”—most notably the Foreigners Act of 1947—is itself a colonial phenomenon. The postcolonial state largely retained this framework, and it remains the principal legal apparatus used to punish “foreigners.” It is important to foreground the colonial origins of this law because it was originally designed to establish British monopoly control over Indigenous mobility. In practice, it was highly racialized: during colonial rule, it was overwhelmingly used against Indians, while Europeans were never targeted under the same legislation. It also granted local state authorities extensive discretionary powers to determine who could be suspected of being a “foreigner.” Much of this structure has remained intact within the postcolonial state apparatus. Indeed, some scholars argue that it has been further strengthened under the BJP, particularly through newer legislation such as the Immigration Foreigners Act, which significantly expands the state’s punitive capacity.

Secondly, the figure of the “infiltrator” itself has colonial precedents. During the late colonial period, particularly in Bengal and Assam, the figure of the land-hungry peasant migrant was already being constructed as an invading presence. Colonial governance technologies such as the census and identity categorization were mobilized to produce the image of the peasant migrant as a demographic threat. This became the precursor to what later evolved into the postcolonial figure of the “infiltrator.” So, the image of the migrant as invader unquestionably has colonial roots.

From Citizen to ‘Infiltrator’ in Modi’s India

What the BJP and Hindutva populism have done, however, is redirect this colonial category toward the citizen. One of the central findings of my research is that the category of the “infiltrator” has been mobilized in order to shift minority and marginalized citizens into the category of migrant. In other words, it is a process of migrantizing the citizen.

Importantly, this was not something invented by the BJP. Even before the BJP came to power, bureaucratic mediation over who counted as an Indian citizen and who did not was already taking place at the local level. What the BJP has done is scale this process up dramatically through large bureaucratic projects such as the NRC, the National Register of Citizens, and now the SIR, combined with citizenship amendment legislation. So, the key transformation lies in the expansion of scale.

At the same time, within the Hindutva universe, the figure of the “infiltrator” acquires a specifically civilizational meaning. Because Hindutva mobilization is fundamentally a form of civilizational populism, the enemy is understood not only in geopolitical terms, but also in demographic terms. “The infiltrator”—essentially coded as Muslim, whether a transnational migrant or an internal Muslim citizen—is framed as a form of demographic aggression against the Hindu nation.

As a result, bureaucratic violence directed against this infiltrator figure is not presented as violence at all, but rather as protection and security for the Hindu nation. That is why this discourse is politically so powerful.

And to answer your question directly: yes, this discourse was absolutely mobilized in Assam and West Bengal during the 2026 elections. These are border states, and the issue of “infiltration” carries enormous affective and political resonance there. Whether through the SIR exercise, or through portraying the incumbent government in Bengal as a party appeasing infiltrators, this discourse played a major role in electoral mobilization. In Assam, for instance, the chief minister openly boasted that he had pushed “infiltrators” “back into Bangladesh.” So, the figure of “the infiltrator” was unquestionably central to the BJP’s mobilization strategies in both Assam and West Bengal.

India as a Civilizational Populist Electoral Autocracy

Members of the All India Muslim Students Federation (MSF) protest against the Karnataka Government’s Hijab ban in educational institutions, at Delhi University, New Delhi, India, on February 9, 2022. Photo: Pradeep Gaurs.

And finally, Dr. Paul, after the BJP’s dramatic expansion across India’s states and the weakening of regional and Left alternatives, how should scholars conceptualize the current Indian regime? Are we witnessing competitive authoritarianism, ethnocratic majoritarianism, or the emergence of a new model of populist civilizational democracy under Modi?

Dr. Maggie Paul: I think it is something of a hybrid. All of these concepts can only do partial work in fully describing what is unfolding in India today.

When we speak of competitive authoritarianism, for instance, the concept points to formally democratic but fundamentally unfair electoral practices. That is certainly part of the picture, but it remains incomplete, because Modi’s popularity cannot be explained solely through electoral victories. He has also been remarkably successful in projecting himself as a signifier of the will of Hindu civilization. He has effectively become the “Hindu Hriday Samrat,” the prince of Hindu civilization, as we discussed earlier. So, competitive authoritarianism alone does not fully capture the phenomenon.

Similarly, ethnocratic majoritarianism points to the emergence of a two-tiered citizenship structure in which Hindus become primary citizens, while minorities are relegated to second-tier citizenship. That is also clearly happening through bureaucratic violence and legislative practices, including amendments to citizenship laws in India. But again, that concept is also incomplete.

And finally, there is civilizational populism. As we discussed earlier, the affective mobilization around restoring a glorious Hindu past for a future Hindu civilization has been extremely successful. Yet that concept alone risks overlooking the coercive practices and institutional corruption highlighted by frameworks such as competitive authoritarianism.

So, I think the current Indian regime is best understood as a hybrid of all these elements. I would characterize it as a civilizational populist electoral autocracy.

At the same time, I want to emphasize that this project contains significant internal contradictions. At the moment, it is undeniably hegemonic. It has successfully instituted a majoritarian common sense through the affective economy of mass media and cultural mobilization, as we discussed earlier. But, as Antonio Gramsci argued, hegemony is never total or complete.

This kind of populist mobilization brings together disparate actors who project their own aspirations onto a common populist signifier—whether that is Ram Rajya or the figure of Modi himself. These groups carry their own histories of marginalization. This includes lower-caste and lower-class voters who, for instance, voted for the BJP in significant numbers during the Bengal elections, which itself represents an important political development.

The ‘Cockroach Janta Party’ and Youth Disillusionment

What I want to stress is that all of these actors bring their own experiences of marginalization and aspirations into this populist project. For the time being, the populist signifier is able to contain these aspirations. But if the promised renewal associated with this futurist Ram Rajya does not materialize in tangible ways—if there are no meaningful material benefits—then cracks begin to appear.

I think this became particularly visible in a very recent phenomenon that emerged just within the past week: a youth-led mobilization in digital spaces calling itself the “Cockroach Janta Party.” It began as a form of parody after comments by the Chief Justice of India comparing unemployed youth to cockroaches and parasites engaged in anti-national activities instead of productive work.

This parody movement became a vehicle for expressing broader material frustrations, particularly among young people facing rising unemployment, blocked aspirations for government jobs, repeated examination leaks, and wider forms of economic precarity. In many ways, the “Cockroach Janta Party” reflected a crack in the cultural common sense that BJP-style civilizational populism has managed to institutionalize.

So, I think this demonstrates that the current hegemonic project is not complete. Spaces of resistance remain possible. Much of that resistance, however, also has to operate at the level of affect. It cannot rely solely on logic or rational critique. It must mobilize alternative affective politics rooted not only in material realities, but also in alternative historical imaginaries and traditions within India itself.

India remains a deeply pluralist society, and many people continue to be emotionally attached to its syncretic and pluralistic traditions. That affective register, too, can potentially be mobilized as a counter to the hegemonic project of Hindutva civilizational populism.

Özgür Özel, leader of Turkey’s main opposition CHP and a recent target of political judicial intervention, attends the inauguration of a cultural center named after the late Manisa Metropolitan Mayor Ferdi Zeyrek. Photo: Idil Toffolo / Dreamstime.

Turkey’s Managed Permanence: Lawfare, Institutional Capture, and the End of Democratic Uncertainty

May 22, 2026

by ECPS_admin Authoritarianism Commentaries Economics Editor’s Choice Home

In this timely and deeply analytical essay, Professor Ibrahim Ozturk examines how Turkey is moving beyond competitive authoritarianism toward what he terms a system of “managed permanence,” in which elections formally survive while meaningful democratic alternation becomes increasingly constrained. Focusing on the judicial intervention into the CHP, the encirclement of opposition municipalities, media capture, and the erosion of institutional autonomy, Professor Ozturk argues that the Erdoğan regime is no longer merely repressing opposition actors, but actively re-engineering the political field itself. The essay further explores how lawfare, economic fragility, transactional geopolitics, and institutional decay have become mutually reinforcing dynamics. Ultimately, the piece warns that Turkey’s crisis is no longer only democratic or economic, but fundamentally a crisis of institutional credibility and constitutional uncertainty.

By Ibrahim Ozturk

When Hungary’s 2026 elections produced an early wave of enthusiasm around the idea that “dictators, too, can be defeated,” the reaction was understandable but premature. In a recent ECPS long-read commentary on Péter Magyar and Hungary’s hybrid-authoritarian rupture, I warned against romanticizing Orbán’s defeat as automatic democratic restoration, and stressed that comparative analogies travel badly: what may be cooking in the neighbor’s house does not necessarily fall onto our plate — Turkey is not Hungary, and each authoritarian case rests on its own institutional, geopolitical, social, and economic architecture.

Turkey has now confirmed that warning with brutal speed. Before the optimism generated by Hungary’s rupture could settle into a broader democratic lesson, Ankara moved in the opposite direction: the main opposition was judicially destabilized, municipal autonomy was further encircled, a major university’s operating license was revoked, and the already fragile boundary between competitive authoritarianism and managed permanence narrowed even further. The message is unmistakable: authoritarian regimes may sometimes lose elections, but they do not necessarily accept political contingency — and in Turkey’s case, the regime appears determined to prevent meaningful alternation before it can happen.

Thus, Turkey has entered a new and more dangerous phase of competitive authoritarianism. The issue is no longer confined to the imprisonment of opposition figures, the removal of elected mayors, or the selective deployment of criminal investigations. The deeper transformation now concerns the legal and institutional re-engineering of the opposition itself. The court decision annulling the Republican People’s Party (CHP)’s 2023 congress—effectively removing Özgür Özel and reinstating Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu as party leader—marks a qualitative escalation: the judiciary is no longer merely disciplining opposition actors from the outside; it is intervening directly in the internal sovereignty of the main opposition party. Reuters reported that the ruling annulled the CHP’s 2023 leadership election, suspended Özel and the party executive, and reinstated Kılıçdaroğlu, while the CHP’s elected executives denounced the decision as a judicial coup.

In Turkish legal terminology, the concept of “absolute nullity” may appear technical. Politically, however, it functions as a mechanism of retroactive delegitimation. A past party congress is declared void; the current leadership is suspended; a former leadership is restored; and the organizational continuity of the opposition is plunged into legal uncertainty. The outcome is not merely a leadership change. It is the construction of a “lame-duck opposition”: formally present and electorally significant on paper, yet institutionally constrained, internally fragmented, and increasingly vulnerable to judicial veto.

From Electoral Defeat to Judicial Containment

The turning point came with the local elections of March 31, 2024. In those elections, the CHP delivered President Erdoğan and the AKP their most significant electoral defeat in decades, while retaining Istanbul and Ankara—long regarded as key opposition strongholds—and achieving major gains across the country. CHP secured approximately 37 percent of the nationwide vote, narrowly surpassing the AKP, and won municipalities in 36 of Turkey’s 81 provinces. The outcome was Erdoğan’s biggest electoral setback and Ekrem İmamoğlu had emerged as his “default nemesis.”

The result fundamentally altered the regime’s threat perception. The opposition was no longer merely a parliamentary minority or a symbolic protest bloc. It had acquired administrative capacity, access to local budgets, service-delivery networks, public visibility, and presidential contenders with nationwide appeal. İmamoğlu, Mansur Yavaş, and the renewed CHP leadership under Özgür Özel represented not only electoral competition, but the emergence of an alternative governing infrastructure.

The regime’s response has followed a recognizable authoritarian playbook: do not abolish elections outright; hollow them out. Do not ban the opposition; fragment, criminalize, and bureaucratically paralyze it. Do not formally dissolve local governments; restrict their fiscal instruments, remove or prosecute their elected leaders, and make every municipal decision vulnerable to criminalization. In this sense, the CHP ruling should not be read as an isolated party-law dispute. It is part of a strategy to convert the main opposition from an electoral threat into a controlled, divided, and procedurally disabled actor.

Lawfare and the Collapse of Rule of Law

The CHP case sits inside a wider pattern of lawfare against opposition mayors, party officials, journalists, lawyers, academics, and civil society actors. Freedom House’s 2026 assessment classifies Turkey as “Not Free,” with a score of 32 out of 100, including 16/40 for political rights and 16/60 for civil liberties. This is not a marginal decline. It signals a political system in which elections continue, but the freedoms necessary for meaningful electoral competition are structurally impaired.

The rule-of-law picture is equally severe. The World Justice Project’s 2025 Rule of Law Index places Turkey 118th out of 143 countries. Turkey also ranks near the bottom of its region and among upper-middle-income countries. The index measures constraints on government powers, absence of corruption, open government, fundamental rights, regulatory enforcement, civil justice, and criminal justice — precisely the institutional foundations now under stress in Turkey’s opposition cases.

This matters because authoritarianism in Turkey does not operate primarily through overt illegality. More often, it functions through excessive legality: sprawling investigations, procedural ambiguities, retroactive annulments, prolonged pre-trial detention, anonymous witnesses, and charges that are difficult to contest because the process itself becomes the punishment. In such a system, the courts do not need to formally ban the opposition as a political force. They can exhaust it, fragment it, delegitimize it, and keep it in a permanent state of defensiveness.

The logic is as coercive as it is punitive. Opposition figures are pressured through detention, threats to personal assets, indictments, reputational attacks, and the prospect of escalating sentences. Where evidentiary standards are weak or politically contested, mechanisms such as anonymous witnesses and “effective remorse” provisions can become instruments of narrative production: lower-level actors are pressured to implicate higher-ranking opposition figures, while refusal may expose both them and their families to further legal vulnerability. This is not merely prosecution; it is political extraction through criminal procedure.

Of course, the authoritarian acceleration did not begin with the most recent CHP case. It was dramatically intensified after the failed coup attempt of July 15, 2016, which the government used to consolidate emergency rule, neutralize the unresolved political consequences of the December17–25, 2013 corruption allegations, and restructure the judiciary, bureaucracy, media, and civil society under executive command. Many opposition actors, including the CHP, underestimated or tolerated the early stages of this process; today, as thousands of cases reach the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) under Article 7 and Article 3 concerns, the same emergency-state machinery has expanded from alleged Gülenists to Kurds, socialists, liberals, journalists, mayors, academics, and now the main opposition itself.

Capturing the Public Sphere

Judicial pressure becomes far more effective when it operates inside a captured information environment. Turkey’s media landscape is already deeply distorted. In the 2026 World Press Freedom Index, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranks Turkey 163rd out of 180 countries, with a score of 27.94. RSF’s country profile places Turkey in the “very serious” category and notes that media pluralism remains under severe pressure.

Media repression in Turkey has evolved beyond the traditional closure or capture of media outlets into a hybrid authoritarian system of digital censorship, where online news links and social media content are removed without effective judicial review on elastic grounds such as national security, public order, religious or family values, and the unity of the state, while those who escape imprisonment may still be silenced through account suspensions and platform-level restrictions.

This means that electoral competition is distorted not only through courts, prosecutions, and candidate bans, but also through unequal access to information. When opposition leaders are criminalized, government-aligned media amplify the accusations, while independent journalism operates under conditions of fear, fines, arrests, ownership pressure, and regulatory intimidation. Elections may still take place, but voters encounter the opposition through a public sphere heavily structured by executive power.

This is the contemporary version of “open voting, secret counting.” Today, the mechanisms are more sophisticated. The ballot may remain secret, and the counting process may remain formally observable, yet the media landscape, judiciary, party autonomy, local government capacity, candidate eligibility, and financial environment are all subjected to sustained political pressure. Elections survive as ritualized procedures; democratic alternation is rendered increasingly improbable.

Municipal Counter-Power and Administrative Encirclement

The The attack on the CHP is inseparable from the broader assault on opposition-run municipalities. After the 2024 local elections, Istanbul, Ankara, and other major cities represented not merely electoral victories, but alternative centers of political legitimacy. Municipal governments possessed the capacity to deliver services, develop their own patronage networks, expose failures of the central government, and cultivate presidential contenders with executive credibility.

This is why the restriction of municipal autonomy has become so consequential. Turkish media reports indicate that recent legal changes now require presidential approval for municipalities and their affiliated entities to establish companies, acquire shares, or join cooperatives. Opposition critics argue that these measures transform local economic initiative into a permission regime ultimately controlled by the presidency.

The corruption data help explain why this matters. Transparency International’s 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) gives Turkey a score of 31/100, ranking it 124th out of 182 countries. The CPI is not simply about bribery; it is about discretionary public power, weak accountability, and the erosion of impartial administration. In Turkey’s case, this means that municipal resources, public tenders, regulatory approvals, media licensing, universities, and courts increasingly operate within a political economy of executive discretion.

The closure of Istanbul Bilgi University on the same political night adds another layer to this broader pattern. The Erdoğan regime revoked the university’s operational license, effectively forcing it to shut down, after the institution had already been seized by the state through a criminal investigation the previous year. Under Decree-Law No. 667, 15 private and foundation universities were closed in July 2016. This pattern later continued with the closure of İstanbul Şehir University in 2020 and the revocation of İstanbul Bilgi University’s operating license on May 21, 2026, effectively bringing another major academic institution to an end.

This pattern demonstrates that university autonomy—like municipal autonomy, media autonomy, and party autonomy—has increasingly become conditional on executive tolerance rather than protected by constitutional guarantees. Universities, municipalities, opposition parties, media outlets, and civil society organizations all represent potential alternative centers of legitimacy. The current trajectory seeks not necessarily to abolish all of them outright, but to render their survival contingent upon executive tolerance.

The Constitutional Horizon: Erdoğan’s Problem of Time

The deeper strategic horizon concerns the presidency itself. Erdoğan’s rule faces a constitutional time problem. Current constitutional provisions limit the presidency to two terms, although scenarios involving early elections and constitutional reinterpretations have long been debated. Erdoğan’s coalition partner, Devlet Bahçeli, has already floated the possibility of a constitutional amendment that would allow Erdoğan to extend his tenure beyond the existing limits. In 2024, Bahçeli openly proposed such an amendment, while also acknowledging that Erdoğan would otherwise be serving his final term unless early elections were called.

This is precisely why the organizational integrity of the opposition matters so much. A unified CHP under Özgür Özel, with Ekrem İmamoğlu or Mansur Yavaş as credible national contenders, would constitute a serious obstacle to any attempt to redesign the constitutional calendar. By contrast, a fragmented CHP operating under sustained judicial pressure provides the ruling bloc with greater room for maneuver. Under such conditions, the government can call early elections when the opposition is weakened, pursue constitutional changes within an asymmetric political environment, or manufacture the appearance of pluralist consent through a domesticated opposition.

The objective is not necessarily to abolish elections altogether. It is to eliminate uncertainty. Turkey is increasingly moving toward a model of managed permanence: the ballot box remains, but the possibility of democratic alternation becomes structurally disabled.

External Complicity: Europe’s Dependency and Trumpian Transactionalism

The external environment has facilitated this authoritarian acceleration in Turkey. The European Union remains rhetorically committed to democracy and the rule of law, yet its leverage over Turkey has steadily weakened. The European Commission continues to define Turkey as a candidate country and an essential partner on issues such as climate policy, migration management, security, counterterrorism, and trade. CEPS has similarly arguedthat EU–Turkey relations increasingly expose the limits of transactionalism, noting that bilateral engagement now extends across energy security, foreign and security policy, trade, counterterrorism, and defense connectivity amid growing uncertainty in transatlantic relations.

This dependence produces a familiar European dilemma: democratic values are invoked rhetorically, but meaningful conditionality remains weak. The EU may express concern, but concern alone does not impose political cost. Turkey’s strategic role in migration control, NATO, Russia policy, Black Sea security, Middle Eastern diplomacy, and regional energy corridors has created an external environment that is increasingly permissive of democratic backsliding.

The United States under Trump adds another layer of transactional permissiveness to this environment. This does not necessarily mean that Washington explicitly endorses every domestic crackdown carried out by the Erdoğan government. It does, however, suggest that Erdoğan is increasingly able to exchange geopolitical utility for international normalization. The German Marshall Fund cited remarks by US Ambassador Tom Barrack in 2025 indicating that Trump wanted to give Erdoğan what he needed — “legitimacy” — within the framework of a more transactional and deal-oriented bilateral relationship.

This pattern is hardly new in American foreign policy. Across the Middle East and Latin America, Washington has often found authoritarian partners easier to manage than democratic societies. The rhetoric of democracy promotion has frequently coexisted with the practical support of rulers who provide security cooperation, military access, migration control, energy stability, or regional alignment. Turkey now appears to be increasingly drawn into this older geopolitical pattern: a strategically useful authoritarian partner whose domestic repression is treated as secondary to broader strategic bargaining.

The Political Economy of Repression

Authoritarian continuity also carries mounting economic costs. Every major judicial or administrative intervention against the opposition produces immediate financial repercussions. Following Ekrem İmamoğlu’s arrest in March 2025, the Turkish central bank reportedly sold roughly $50 billion in reserves and subsequently raised interest rates to 46 percent amid severe market turbulence. The EBRD similarly stated that the central bank sold more than $40 billion in foreign exchange during the weeks after İmamoğlu’s detention, reducing net reserves excluding swaps from above $60 billion to below $20 billion.

A similar pattern re-emerged following the CHP ruling. BIST 100 index fell sharply, while the Turkish lira reached a record low near 45.74 against the US dollar. Analysts warned that renewed political instability was once again undermining the currency at an already fragile moment. JPMorgan further projected that the central bank could be forced to raise interest rates from 37 percent to 40 percent in an attempt to stabilize the lira.

Inflation remains the clearest macroeconomic symptom of collapsing credibility. In April 2026, Turkey’s monthly inflation rate surged to 4.18 percent, while annual inflation reached 32.37 percent. By comparison, the OECD projects average headline inflation across the G20 at approximately 4.0 percent in 2026. Turkey’s inflation is therefore not merely above target; it stands several times higher than the broader G20 benchmark.

These cumulative distortions are also visible in Turkey’s growing decoupling from comparable emerging-market economies. Both inflation and the interest-rate premium required to sustain lira-denominated assets have risen far above emerging-market averages, making borrowing costs one of the clearest macroeconomic expressions of authoritarian-risk pricing.

Foreign direct investment also reflects the cost of institutional erosion. World Bank-based data show Turkey’s FDI net inflows at only 0.887 percent of GDP in 2024. For a G20-sized economy that claims to be a regional hub for production, logistics, energy, and finance, this is strikingly weak. Investors may still buy high-yield bonds or short-term assets, but a durable, productive investment requires legal predictability, property-rights protection, judicial neutrality, and confidence that political shocks will not suddenly destroy the investment environment

There are also signs that Turkey’s liquid external buffers have come under mounting pressure. Reporting based on US Treasury data indicated that Turkey’s holdings of US Treasury securities fell sharply in March 2026 as authorities sought to defend the lira, although such figures should be treated cautiously, since holdings are often routed through custodians and third countries.

The broader point, however, is unmistakable: political repression carries significant balance-sheet costs. It necessitates reserve sales, interest-rate hikes, credibility-restoration measures, and repeated interventions aimed at containing market panic. Turkey is therefore not experiencing a conventional emerging-market volatility cycle. It is paying a compounded authoritarian-risk premium.

Repression undermines confidence; weakened confidence places pressure on the lira; pressure on the lira forces reserve depletion or higher interest rates; elevated rates suppress growth and investment; deteriorating economic performance intensifies political anxiety; and that anxiety, in turn, generates further repression. This is the circular political economy of authoritarianism.

Conclusion: The Cost of Managed Permanence

Turkey’s crisis is no longer merely a crisis of democracy, nor solely a crisis of macroeconomic management. It has become a crisis of institutional credibility. The same political system that imprisons rivals, captures media institutions, weakens municipalities, subordinates the judiciary, and intimidates universities also generates persistent inflation, currency fragility, reserve depletion, heightened corruption risk, and declining long-term investment confidence.

The CHP ruling is therefore not simply a procedural dispute within a political party. It is a constitutional event. It signals that the regime is prepared to intervene directly in the organizational structure of the main opposition party in order to reshape the political field ahead of the next presidential contest. The intended outcome is increasingly clear: Erdoğan should not confront a united, administratively capable, and electorally confident opposition at the precise moment when his own constitutional future becomes uncertain.

The irony is that this strategy may stabilize the regime in the short term while simultaneously deepening Turkey’s long-term fragility. No country can indefinitely finance authoritarian control through reserve depletion, high interest rates, coercive legality, and transactional diplomacy. The more the regime suppresses political competition, the more costly economic stabilization becomes. The more it seeks external legitimacy, the more sovereignty it implicitly trades away. And the more it attempts to manufacture a controlled opposition, the more clearly it reveals that genuine electoral competition has become the central threat to its survival.

Turkey’s crisis, therefore, is not only about Erdoğan, the CHP, İmamoğlu, Özel, Kılıçdaroğlu, or even the 2028 election itself. It is about whether a country with a long electoral tradition will gradually be reduced to a system of formal voting without meaningful democratic alternation. The answer will depend not only on domestic resistance, but also on whether Europe and the United States continue treating Turkey’s authoritarian consolidation as an acceptable price for strategic convenience.

Dr. Amir Ali: Democratic Backsliding Is Global, but India’s Crisis Is Unfolding on a Far More Dangerous Scale

May 19, 2026

by ECPS_admin Authoritarianism Editor’s Choice Home Interviews

In this ECPS interview, Dr. Amir Ali, Assistant Professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University, offers a sobering assessment of India’s democratic trajectory after the 2026 state elections. He argues that while democratic backsliding is global, India’s crisis is unfolding on “a particularly worrying scale,” driven by polarized electoral mobilization, institutional weakening, and Hindutva majoritarian consolidation. Dr. Ali examines the BJP’s breakthrough in West Bengal, anti-Muslim rhetoric in Bengal and Assam, voter-roll deletions, and the narrowing of Indian pluralism into a majoritarian national project. Comparing India with Turkey, Hungary, Brazil, and Trump-era America, he warns that India is increasingly marked by institutional complicity, shrinking opposition space, and the remaking of “the people” around Hindutva identity.

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Over the past decade, India has increasingly become central to global debates on populism, democratic erosion, nationalism, and the transformation of liberal constitutionalism. Once widely celebrated as the world’s largest democracy and as a paradigmatic example of postcolonial pluralism, India now occupies a far more contested position within comparative political analysis. The 2026 state elections—marked by the BJP’s (Baharatiya Janata Party) historic breakthrough in West Bengal, the consolidation of Hindu majoritarianism in Assam, and the continued dominance of Narendra Modi’s political project—have intensified concerns regarding institutional capture, majoritarian citizenship, the shrinking space for dissent, and the future of secular democracy in South Asia.

In this context, the insights of Dr. Amir Ali, Assistant Professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University, offer a powerful and deeply unsettling diagnosis of India’s current political trajectory. Drawing on his extensive scholarship on populism, Hindutva nationalism, democracy, secularism, inequality, and the transformation of the public sphere, Dr. Ali situates India’s democratic crisis within a broader global wave of democratic backsliding, while insisting that the Indian case now possesses a uniquely dangerous scale and intensity.

“Democratic backsliding,” he argues, “is certainly not unique to India; it is occurring across the world. But in India, it is unfolding on a particularly worrying scale.” For Dr. Ali, what distinguishes India is not simply the electoral success of the BJP, but the convergence of “a highly polarized form of electoral mobilization together with the apparent complicity of constitutional institutions.” In his view, this combination signals “the deteriorating condition of Indian democracy.”

Throughout this wide-ranging interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Dr. Ali examines how Hindutva has evolved from a project of symbolic domination into what he describes as an attempt at “the complete erasure of many aspects of Muslim society.” Reflecting on recent developments in West Bengal, he argues that the public sphere is no longer merely being “imprinted with Hindutva national symbols,” but is increasingly shaped by efforts to erase Muslim cultural, symbolic, and religious visibility altogether.

The interview also explores the transformation of Indian nationalism itself. According to Dr. Ali, the BJP has systematically narrowed the “bandwidth” of Indian nationalism, replacing the plural and inclusive vision associated with Gandhi, Nehru, and Ambedkar with a far more exclusionary conception of national belonging. The rhetoric of the “infiltrator,” he argues, functions as a mechanism of otherization designed to portray Muslims as outsiders who do not truly belong to the nation.

Equally significant is Dr. Ali’s analysis of institutional decline. He contrasts the relative independence once exercised by figures such as T. N. Seshan and James Michael Lyngdoh with the contemporary weakening of institutional autonomy under BJP dominance. In his assessment, the Election Commission increasingly appears “an instrument in the hands of the ruling party,” while electoral revision exercises have contributed to the disenfranchisement of Muslim voters.

At the same time, Dr. Ali situates India within a broader comparative landscape alongside Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Viktor Orbán, Jair Bolsonaro, and Donald Trump. Yet he argues that India differs in one crucial respect: unlike Brazil, Hungary, or the United States, he currently sees no realistic possibility of Narendra Modi being electorally removed from power in the foreseeable future.

What emerges from this conversation is not simply an analysis of electoral politics, but a broader meditation on nationalism, democracy, populism, austerity, institutional decay, and the remaking of “the people” in contemporary India. Dr. Ali’s reflections offer a sobering portrait of a democracy increasingly defined by majoritarian consolidation, emotional polarization, and narrowing citizenship—while also illuminating the profound global significance of India’s political transformation.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Amir Ali, lightly edited for clarity and readability.

The BJP Now Seeks Domination from Parliament to Panchayat

Narendra Modi. — Narendra Modi files his nomination papers from the Vadodara Lok Sabha seat in Gujarat amid tight security and supporter turnout. Photo: Nisarg Lakhmani | Dreamstime.

Dr. Amir Ali, welcome! To begin, how do you interpret the BJP’s 2026 breakthrough in West Bengal, a state historically shaped by anti-colonial cosmopolitanism, Left politics, and subaltern mobilization? Does this mark the consolidation of Hindutva as a truly national hegemonic formation?

Dr. Amir Ali: The electoral dominance of the BJP now appears almost invincible. What the BJP has managed to do is to perfect the art of winning at the ballot box. This ambition is captured very clearly in the slogan “Parliament to Panchayat”—with Parliament referring to the national legislature and panchayat referring to local government institutions. The slogan reflects an almost insatiable desire to dominate every level and aspect of Indian politics. In terms of electoral strategy and political consolidation, the BJP has become extraordinarily effective.

At the same time, there is a growing sense of resentment in India regarding the seeming invincibility of the BJP. This stems not only from its electoral mobilization, but also from what has become a major complaint of the opposition—one with which I am largely sympathetic—namely, the existence of an uneven playing field. Even institutions such as the Election Commission, which is constitutionally expected to function as a neutral body, are increasingly perceived as taking decisions that favor the ruling BJP. This dynamic broadly summarizes the recent elections in major states. You mentioned West Bengal, which was of course the most significant case, but we also saw similar patterns in Kerala and Puducherry.

What is particularly worrying is that this points toward a form of near-total political domination. In any parliamentary or electoral democracy, it is unhealthy when a single party becomes so dominant that the opposition is effectively shut out from meaningful avenues of dissent and political expression. That is how I would interpret the current moment.

Hindutva Now Seeks to Erase Muslim Visibility

In your work on the Indian public sphere, you argue that Hindutva seeks to institutionalize its own symbols, norms, and values as the legitimate markers of the Indian state. How does the BJP’s victory in West Bengal alter the symbolic architecture of India’s public sphere?

Dr. Amir Ali: That is a very good question. My work on the public sphere is now almost two decades old, and at the time the Hindutva project was not nearly as aggressive as it is today. Back then, I was trying to understand the attempt not only to inflect the public sphere, but also to create a form of cultural domination within it. What we see today, under this much more assertive form of Hindutva associated with Modi’s BJP, is an attempt at the complete erasure of many aspects of Muslim society in particular.

In West Bengal, for example, one of the most recent flashpoints has concerned the offering of namaz, Friday prayers. There was a confrontation between the police and Muslim worshippers in the Park Circus and Park Street areas of Calcutta, which are Muslim-majority neighborhoods.

Compared to the period when I wrote that earlier work on the public sphere, the current attempt to dominate public space is now characterized by a drive toward the disappearance and erasure of aspects of Muslim society and culture. This includes the renaming of streets, for example, as well as the use of bulldozers, which I find deeply troubling. These bulldozers have frequently been used to target Muslim properties under the justification of anti-encroachment drives.

So, the public sphere today is no longer merely about imprinting it with Hindutva national symbols. It has escalated into an effort to erase aspects of Muslim symbolic, cultural, and religious practices altogether. And that is extremely worrying.

Anti-Muslim Rhetoric Has Become Progressively Harsher

India-Muslims. — Muslims celebrate Eid al-Fitr at Jama Masjid in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, marking the end of Ramadan and the beginning of the Islamic month of Shawwal, August 29, 2014. Photo: Nisarg Lakhmani / Dreamstime.

To what extent do the results in West Bengal and Assam reveal the BJP’s capacity to forge cross-class Hindu consolidation while deepening the political marginalization of Muslims, migrants, and minorities?

Dr. Amir Ali: In both West Bengal and Assam, the election campaigns were marked by some of the most vitriolic political rhetoric I have ever witnessed. The Assam Chief Minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma, employed a particularly dangerous form of language. Muslims were openly targeted, and there was a clear suggestion that they somehow needed to be made to suffer. Although these remarks were made in Assamese, that was broadly the substance and political effect of what was being communicated.

Similarly, in West Bengal—which for decades was shaped politically by the Left Front and, over the last fifteen years, by the Trinamool Congress—both political formations had at least attempted to maintain a relatively inclusive approach toward Muslims.

What I observed in the BJP’s rhetoric, however, was a very systematic, deliberate, and deeply aggressive targeting of Muslims. That constituted one major dimension of the party’s electoral mobilization. The more troubling dimension, however, concerned what became known in West Bengal as the “special intensive revision” of the electoral rolls. As a consequence of that exercise, a significant number of Muslim names were reportedly removed from the voter rolls. Several political analysts examining the constituency-level data pointed out that, in some constituencies, the BJP’s margin of victory was actually smaller than the number of voters who had been deleted. Now, electoral revision is, of course, a legitimate administrative exercise. But it should never be conducted immediately before elections, as happened in Bihar in 2025 and again in Bengal.

So, the concern is not only the escalation of increasingly vicious anti-Muslim rhetoric. Over the years, I have observed a very clear trend in which the BJP’s electoral language toward Muslims has become progressively harsher and more hostile. But the even more serious concern is the role of constitutional institutions—particularly the Election Commission of India, which was once widely regarded as a highly trusted institution. In this case, however, it appeared unwilling to stand up to the BJP government and was increasingly perceived, in the words of some commentators, as the BJP’s “B team.” Even the Supreme Court of India appeared reluctant to intervene decisively or raise difficult questions regarding the Election Commission’s conduct.

To my mind, this combination—a highly polarized form of electoral mobilization together with the apparent complicity of constitutional institutions—represents another sign of the deteriorating condition of Indian democracy. Democratic backsliding, as political scientists describe it, is certainly not unique to India; it is occurring across the world. But in India, it is unfolding on a particularly worrying scale.

The ‘Infiltrator’ Rhetoric Places Muslims Outside National Belonging

How should we understand the rhetoric of “infiltration” in Bengal and Assam—as electoral strategy, civilizational anxiety, bureaucratic exclusion, or a new grammar of majoritarian citizenship?

Dr. Amir Ali: It is fundamentally an attempt to otherize—to create a sense of fear within the Hindu electoral base regarding Muslims. The problem with nationalism, especially when it operates within a narrow bandwidth, is that it often produces precisely this kind of otherization. Historically, India witnessed different forms of nationalism, particularly during the anti-colonial struggle against British rule. The independence movement led by Gandhi, Nehru, and Ambedkar articulated a broader and more inclusive nationalism—one capable of incorporating Muslims and emphasizing the country’s diversity. Indian secularism itself was often understood through this principle of inclusivity: the coexistence of Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, and numerous other religious communities within a shared political framework.

What we see under the BJP, however, is a deliberate narrowing of that nationalistic bandwidth. And that narrowing inevitably involves a systematic process of otherizing Muslims. The rhetoric of the “infiltrator” fits directly into this logic. One of the most effective ways for the BJP to consolidate its electoral base is to cultivate fear and insinuate that Muslims somehow do not truly belong in India.

Statistically, the idea of the infiltrator does not correlate with the actual number of people entering the country. Of course, there will always be cases of undocumented migration. But the manner in which this rhetoric has been mobilized and deployed during elections serves a different purpose: it seeks to portray Muslims as ghuspetia—to use the Hindi term—meaning outsiders or intruders who do not belong here. This reflects a broader nationalist framework in which Muslims are not regarded as fully part of India because Islam is perceived as a religion that is not indigenous to the subcontinent. In that sense, the rhetoric appeals to an extremely narrow conception of nationalism. And any nationalism with a narrow bandwidth becomes deeply divisive. The purpose of nationalism should be to include, incorporate, and encompass diverse peoples. But the “infiltrator” rhetoric, and the way it has been deployed, represents a clear process of otherization and a systematic attempt to place Muslims outside even the boundaries of national belonging.

Indian Pluralism Is Being Replaced by National Oneness

Hindus perform ritual bathing in the Ganges River in Varanasi (Benares), one of Hinduism’s holiest cities in northern India. Photo: Dreamstime.

You have written about the fragility of diversity in liberal polities. Do these elections suggest that Indian pluralism is being transformed from a constitutional ideal into a conditional concession granted by majoritarian power?

Dr. Amir Ali: I would think so, yes. That is a very important question. India has always been regarded as a deeply plural and diverse country. We have many languages, many religions, and many different kinds of people across the country. Historically, it was precisely this diversity that was celebrated. Quite often, that celebration may have been symbolic, but at least the principle existed. The idea of “unity in diversity,” for instance, was one of the central ways in which India understood itself.

What we are witnessing now, however, is an attempt to construct the idea of a certain kind of oneness. Prime Minister Modi’s rhetoric has consistently revolved around this notion. He repeatedly invokes slogans such as “one nation, one election,” which appears likely to become the next major political development if the BJP succeeds in implementing it—and, of course, the BJP has largely succeeded in advancing its broader agenda.

So, what we are seeing is a movement away from the celebration of plurality and diversity toward the assertion of a singular national identity. Modi also speaks of “one nation, one ration card” and “one nation, one tax.” This emphasis on national oneness stands in sharp contrast to the pluralism you are referring to.

I would, however, add a slight twist to your question. I do not think this is even about conditional concession anymore. The emerging message is that Muslims simply do not belong. A concession would still imply that minorities are allowed to exist on the condition that the majority accepts them. But the trajectory of the BJP’s electoral and ideological rhetoric increasingly casts Muslims as outsiders altogether.

If we return to major Hindutva ideologues such as Savarkar and Golwalkar, they were very explicit in arguing that Muslims should occupy the position of second-class citizens. Their argument was that although a Muslim’s birthplace may happen to be India, the center of his or her religious allegiance lies outside India, thereby rendering Muslims inherently suspect.

So, I think we have moved beyond the idea of conditionality. What we are now witnessing is an attempt to portray Muslims as complete outsiders who do not belong here at all. And if they are allowed to continue existing within the nation, it is only under conditions determined by the BJP and its Hindutva majoritarian base. In other words, Muslims are expected to conform entirely to the ideological and political framework established by the BJP’s Hindutva nationalist agenda.

Administrative Majoritarianism Is Reshaping Indian Democracy

Does the controversy over voter-roll deletions in West Bengal signal a shift from electoral majoritarianism to administrative majoritarianism, where democratic exclusion is achieved through procedural and bureaucratic means?

Dr. Amir Ali: Yes, I think so. It is very unfortunate, because I have observed the Election Commission over many years. Before the BJP government came to power—which has now been in office for twelve years—the Election Commission was regarded as a very powerful and independent institution.

Let me give you two examples. Back in the 1990s, there was a highly assertive Chief Election Commissioner, T. N. Seshan. Many of his reforms were extremely significant. For example, he introduced photo identity cards in the early to mid-1990s. Election commissioners such as Seshan were able to stand up to politicians, including ruling parties, and make it clear that they were not beholden to the government of the day, but were instead accountable to the Constitution and the Indian state.

Then, in the early 2000s, there was another assertive Chief Election Commissioner, James Michael Lyngdoh. In 2002, following the Gujarat riots, when Mr. Modi was Chief Minister of Gujarat, Lyngdoh openly resisted pressure from the government and insisted that state assembly elections could not be held immediately after the riots. He argued that elections should only take place once those who had been displaced and were living in refugee camps had returned to their homes.

My point is that, in earlier periods, the powers granted to the Election Commission under Articles 324 and 325 of the Indian Constitution were exercised independently and, at times, even in opposition to the government in power. As a result, India had elections that were widely regarded as free, fair, and clean.

Now, however, with the Election Commission no longer acting with the same degree of independence—and with the current Chief Election Commissioner, Gyanesh Kumar, often accused of siding with the BJP government—we are witnessing the Commission itself becoming, to a significant extent, an instrument in the hands of the ruling party.

The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, which resulted in the large-scale disenfranchisement of Muslim voters in particular, is one example of this broader trend in which Muslim citizens of this country are being denied something as fundamental as the right to vote.

Hindutva Narrows What It Means to Be Hindu

How do you assess the relationship between Hinduism and Hindutva in the wake of these elections? Is Hindutva further narrowing the philosophical and plural traditions of Hinduism into a more disciplined nationalist ideology?

Dr. Amir Ali: Yes. I think Hindutva is a form of religious nationalism and the problem with this particular form of nationalism is that it offers only one way of interpreting what it means to be Hindu. You referred to the broader philosophical confidence that Hinduism historically possessed—the idea that there are multiple ways of being Hindu. Many scholars have written about this. I am not deeply familiar with the full literature, but I have encountered arguments emphasizing Hinduism’s certain catholicity, its all-encompassing nature. What Hindutva has done, as a form of Hindu nationalism, is essentially to tell Hindus that this is the only legitimate way to be Hindu. And many people who do not subscribe to the Hindutva ideology have made precisely this point.

In my response to your earlier question, I referred to the idea of a narrowing bandwidth. I would bring that idea back here. What Hindutva nationalism is doing is significantly narrowing this bandwidth. It is not only imposing conditions upon Muslims—the point I made in an earlier answer—but also imposing conditions upon adherents of the broader Hindu philosophical tradition itself. It effectively tells believers that this is the only acceptable way to be Hindu, and that if you do not behave in this particular manner, then you are somehow not a good enough Hindu.

This is very unfortunate because the philosophical foundations of these traditions run very deep within Indian civilization. They represent centuries upon centuries of gradual intellectual and spiritual development. Hindutva, by contrast, as a form of nationalism—like nationalism more generally—is a relatively recent development. As a political scientist, I would argue that nationalism is a modern phenomenon that emerged largely over the past two centuries alongside processes of modernization. So, what we are witnessing is a kind of tyrannical logic inherent in modern nationalism imposing itself upon a philosophical and religious tradition that is far richer and more historically layered than the rigid framework Hindutva seeks to enforce.

To return to your point about narrowing: yes, there is clearly such a narrowing taking place. But quite remarkably, and intriguingly, the condition is not only being imposed upon Muslims, who remain the principal targets of Hindutva politics. It is also being imposed upon believers within the Hindu philosophical and religious tradition itself, by insisting that this alone is the proper way to be Hindu.

The important thing about India, however, is that many people have pushed back against this. Many have defended the broader spirit of catholicity and the all-encompassing character of Hindu traditions. But yes, this narrowing bandwidth, as I keep describing it, is a matter of profound concern. And one hopes that India will generate a philosophical and intellectual response capable of confronting this particular form of politics.

Populism and Austerity Are Pushing India Toward Fascistic Politics

In your analysis of populism and austerity, you describe Modi’s politics as a “populism of the fiscally tight-fist.” How do welfare schemes, direct transfers, and beneficiary politics reshape the relationship between citizenship, dependency, and political loyalty?

Dr. Amir Ali: That is a good question, and I will try to answer it in two different parts. Let me begin with Mr. Modi’s populism. His populism is not a redistributive form of populism. Rather, it is a populism based on a certain kind of targeted largesse—a targeted distribution of very meager material benefits. This is meant to keep the targeted population at a basic level of subsistence and sufficiently beholden to return and vote for Mr. Modi. That is how his populism functions.

It is unlike, for example, the redistributive populisms of mid-twentieth-century Latin America. What we see instead is a form of populism combined with a very conservative fiscal stance. That is why I describe it as a “fiscally tight-fisted populism.” It is not willing to distribute substantial material benefits broadly. Rather, it relies on the targeted dispersal of very limited material largesse. The purpose is to keep a certain segment of the population beholden to Mr. Modi so that they continue voting for him. The Hindi term for this category of people—the immediate beneficiaries of this populism—is labharthi. In Hindi, labharthi refers to a kind of beholden beneficiary. The logic behind this benefaction is that Mr. Modi’s electoral support base remains consolidated. That is one dimension of his populism.

The other aspect is that it also veers, rather strangely, toward a form of austerity. I am one of those people who believes that austerity is a very dangerous idea. When I describe it that way, I am drawing on the work of the Brown University economic historian Mark Blyth, who famously called austerity a “dangerous idea.” It is dangerous because austerity politics tends to push societies in a much more fascistic direction. This argument about austerity moving politics toward fascism is also made by the Italian economist Clara Mattei in her work on austerity, where she argues that economists invented this idea and paved the road to fascism. So, Mr. Modi’s populism is a very curious mixture: on the one hand, a highly limited and meager distribution of material benefits, and on the other hand, a form of fiscal conservatism—hence my characterization of it as fiscally tight-fisted populism.

The third point I would add is that all of this ultimately leads toward a form of austerity politics. The most recent example came only last week, when Mr. Modi urged Indian citizens to refrain from traveling abroad, to stop buying gold, and appealed to farmers not to purchase fertilizers because fertilizer supplies were allegedly being constrained by developments in the Strait of Hormuz. So, once again, what we saw was Mr. Modi using this language of austerity to engage in a kind of virtue signaling toward the Indian public, telling citizens what they should and should not do.

On the one hand, many of us believe that the government has made a series of poor policy decisions, and then the government turns around and instructs citizens, in an almost didactic manner, about how they ought to behave. So, this is a very unusual form of populism—one that combines populism with austerity. And this fusion of populism and austerity creates a deeply unsettling kind of politics that travels dangerously far down the road toward fascism.

Aspirational Politics Has Fused with Anti-Muslim Otherization

Does the BJP’s model combine neoliberal individual aspiration with majoritarian collectivism? How was this tension visible in the 2026 state elections?

Dr. Amir Ali: To answer that question, let me go back to 2014, when Mr. Modi first came to power at the parliamentary level and became Prime Minister. Around that time, his rhetoric was almost completely devoid of any communal appeal. He was not talking about religious symbolism or anything of that kind. Instead, he consistently emphasized the language of development.

He appealed to an aspirational middle class. The political message being conveyed was that the middle class should improve its standard of living. The aspiration being promoted was a rather narrow one: owning a car, owning a flat, securing a good job, and earning a decent amount of money. There is nothing inherently wrong with those aspirations. But the problem is that this approach denies the idea that politics is ultimately about a broader form of solidarity.

So, I agree with the premise of your question. It is indeed a form of political appeal in which a narrow conception of material advancement is emphasized. But by 2026, this developmental logic — if we can call it that way — had fused with a far more vicious form of what I earlier described as the otherization of Muslims. What we have in India right now is a very curious combination. On the one hand, the BJP’s electoral appeal continues to focus on improving people’s material conditions. But at the same time, in an almost cruel manner, it suggests that the conditions of some people can only improve if the conditions of certain other people are simultaneously degraded. And the group being targeted in this way is obviously Muslims. This particular form of targeting, which became especially visible during the 2026 state assembly elections, was not present when Mr. Modi first came to power in 2014.

So, over these twelve years under Mr. Modi’s leadership, the earlier aspirational appeal has gradually fused with a much harsher political logic—one that implies that the only way for some people to live better is to ensure that others do not. And that, to my mind, is the most worrying and unfortunate development in Indian politics over the past twelve years.

Modi’s ‘People’ Excludes Muslims and Dissenters

You have argued that populism creates a caricature of “the people.” In Modi’s India, who counts as “the people,” and who is rendered suspect, external, or anti-national?

Dr. Amir Ali: The phrase “caricature of the people” actually comes from the political theorist Hannah Arendt in her work The Origins of Totalitarianism. What we see in India right now is the mobilization of a particular kind of highly excitable public. Quite often, this mobilization takes place on the streets. When “the people” are invoked, the term obviously refers to Mr. Modi’s electoral base. It certainly does not include Muslims, nor many of the other groups to whom the Hindutva logic does not appeal. So, this caricature consists of a very voluble, excitable, and frenzied support base that Mr. Modi commands.

Let me give you one example. Recently, a video circulated widely on social media showing a Trinamool Congress politician and Member of Parliament, Mahua Moitra, being heckled on a flight. She is a very prominent and articulate parliamentarian who has been outspoken in her opposition to the regime. When we speak about the caricature of “the people,” it is precisely this kind of public that can be easily mobilized to heckle anyone who opposes the regime’s political agenda. The fact that this incident occurred on a domestic flight is also significant. In India, only a certain section of society can regularly afford air travel. Poor people generally travel by train or bus. So, the fact that this kind of heckling is taking place on flights suggests that the caricature of “the people” includes a sizable segment of people who possess the financial means to travel by air as well.

So, it is not confined only to the labharthi, or the beholden beneficiary. It extends across the economic spectrum. And again, this ability to easily mobilize and rouse people into targeting anyone who opposes the BJP’s political agenda captures, to my mind, what this construction of “the people” is really about.

Let me add one more thing. It is certainly not “We, the People,” the phrase used in the Preamble to the Constitution of India. “We, the People” is a constitutionally mediated appeal to the people; it is not this. What we are seeing instead is a set of people who can very easily be mobilized through the BJP’s mechanisms of political mobilization.

The Opposition Is Playing with Loaded Dice

Do the opposition’s defeats in West Bengal and elsewhere reveal not only organizational weakness, but a deeper inability to articulate an emotionally compelling counter-public to Hindutva nationalism?

Dr. Amir Ali: That is partly true. The opposition does seem to suffer from a lack of political imagination. Its major agenda appears to revolve around constructing some form of anti-Modi platform. But the problem with relying entirely on an anti-Modi position is that it ultimately ends up reinforcing Mr. Modi himself, and the opposition needs to recognize this.

Having said that, I also believe we have now reached a stage in Indian politics where the electoral route has, more or less, been closed off to the opposition. The problem with attempting to play the game of electoral democracy against the BJP is that it resembles playing with loaded dice. The dice are clearly weighted in favor of the BJP, particularly given the enormous resources the party commands. In terms of financial resources alone, the Congress Party is a very distant second.

But beyond the BJP’s sheer material advantages, there is also the manipulation of the electoral mechanism itself in ways that increasingly favor the ruling party. As I mentioned earlier, the Election Commission of India, which was once an exceptionally powerful constitutional institution, no longer appears to possess the same degree of independence, authority, or institutional strength.

So, this is a very bleak situation for the opposition. There is certainly a lack of political imagination. But the more troubling reality is that the political playing field itself is no longer level. It is now so heavily tilted in favor of the BJP that even if the opposition were able to develop a very powerful counter-narrative—which, so far, it has failed to do—it still might not be sufficient to bring the opposition back to power in the foreseeable future. That would be my rather bleak assessment.

India Lacks the Institutional Pushback Seen Elsewhere

How do India’s 2026 state elections compare with global cases such as Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s Turkey, Viktor Orbán’s Hungary, Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil, or Trump-era America in terms of institutional capture, emotional polarization, and the remaking of “the people”?

Dr. Amir Ali: That is a really good question. Let me take those countries one by one. Turkey, for example—of course, Erdoğan has been in power for over twenty-three years now. There are similarities, but those similarities only go so far.But let me take the case of Bolsonaro and Brazil. The fact that Bolsonaro was voted out of power is significant. Similarly, Mr. Trump was voted out of power after his first term—although he later returned following the Biden interlude. And in Orbán’s Hungary, the fact that Mr. Orbán was eventually voted out of power also represents an important distinction.

What we see in India right now is very different. As far as I can tell, sitting here in late May 2026, I do not see any realistic possibility of Mr. Modi being voted out of power in the foreseeable future. That is the difference with Brazil, where Bolsonaro was removed electorally. That is the difference with Hungary, where Orbán was voted out of power quite decisively. And it is also the difference with the United States, where after the first Trump presidency there was significant institutional pushback. To my mind, that is what fundamentally distinguishes those cases from India.

As a political scientist, I also have not witnessed the kind of institutional pushback that many scholars anticipated would emerge in India. Instead, what we have seen is a kind of complete institutional folding-in. And that represents something deeply unfortunate—something that the framers of the Constitution may never even have envisioned. Back in 1975, when Indira Gandhi imposed the Emergency, which was a very unfortunate chapter in Indian politics, elections were eventually held, and Mrs. Gandhi was voted out of power. Today, however, the possibility of the BJP being voted out of power does not appear to exist anywhere in the near future. And that, to my mind, represents the deeply unfortunate situation in which India currently finds itself.

India Remains in the Mist and Fog of Hindutva Domination

Local people throwing flowers on Volunteers of Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) during march past in Vasundhara, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh on October 19, 2018.

Finally, do these elections indicate the emergence of a durable Hindutva “historic bloc” linking welfare beneficiaries, aspirational middle classes, sections of subaltern groups, and corporate power—or do you see contradictions that could destabilize this project before 2029?

Dr. Amir Ali: I do not see any kind of destabilization of this bloc, as you call it, happening before 2029. I may be wrong, and I hope I am wrong. But right now, what we do see is precisely the kind of mobilization that you referred to. There is a certain form of subaltern Hindutva that Mr. Modi has been able to stitch together.

If I may answer this question with some historical perspective, I would go back three decades. In the 1990s, what prevented the BJP from coming to power was a particular set of social groups in India referred to as the OBCs, the Other Backward Classes. There were political parties opposed to the BJP in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, the two most important and populous states in northern India, politically speaking.

What we have seen under Mr. Modi has been the ability to bring the OBC vote very much onto the Hindutva side. Earlier, the OBC vote would go to parties such as the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh, which is still a significant political force, or in Bihar to the Rashtriya Janata Dal under the charismatic politician Lalu Prasad Yadav.

What has emerged over the last three decades, and especially during Mr. Modi’s twelve years in power, is this very unusual alliance between corporate capital and a certain form of subaltern Hindutva. Now, obviously, contradictions will emerge, because what we have witnessed in India is a very clear transfer of resources toward certain business houses that support Mr. Modi. When these business groups are disproportionately favored, the life prospects of people lower down the social hierarchy are inevitably adversely affected.

When exactly these contradictions will begin to play themselves out politically is anybody’s guess. I do not think one can ever fully predict, prophesy, or foresee politics. But clearly, what we are seeing in India is an economy that is increasingly under strain. There have been decisions taken by the Modi government that have clearly been damaging for the economy.

Ten years ago, for example, there was demonetization, when ninety-seven percent of the currency in circulation was effectively invalidated within six hours in the name of combating terrorism and other stated objectives. There was no convincing economic rationale behind it. So, the contradictions will eventually emerge, especially as the appeasement of corporate capital intensifies and the worsening life conditions of subordinate social groups become too glaring to ignore.

To my mind, however, this would represent a political process much larger than the logic of five-year electoral cycles. That logic of periodic elections is something that Mr. Modi and the BJP have mastered and dominated very effectively. The transformation, when it comes, will not necessarily manifest itself through elections alone, but through a much broader societal transformation. And that transformation is tied to larger global developments. We are witnessing a transformation of the world order itself. It is only within that broader transformation that we may eventually see a major shift within India as well. Perhaps that will ultimately mark the end of Hindutva domination. But right now, we remain very much within the mist and fog of Hindutva domination. We do not yet know how or when it will end.

Dr. Loxton: Democratic Backsliding Is Driven More by Populism than Authoritarian Successor Parties

May 15, 2026

by ECPS_admin Authoritarianism Editor’s Choice Home Interviews

Dr. James Loxton argues that today’s democratic backsliding is driven less by authoritarian successor parties than by populist leaders who promise to return power to “the people” but then concentrate it in their own hands. In this ECPS interview, he explains how authoritarian legacies often survive democratization through parties, institutions, networks, and political brands. Yet, looking at Hungary, Turkey, Brazil, and the United States, Dr. Loxton identifies populism as the more significant common thread. He also discusses “authoritarian inheritance,” the appeal of authoritarian nostalgia, and the rise of gray-zone regimes marked by “competitive authoritarianism,” where elections continue but the playing field is “fundamentally uneven and unfair.”

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Dr. James Loxton, Senior Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the University of Sydney and one of the leading scholars of authoritarianism, democratization, and party politics, argues that the contemporary crisis of democracy cannot be understood simply through the persistence of old authoritarian elites. While much of his influential scholarship has focused on “authoritarian successor parties” and the enduring legacies of dictatorship after democratic transition, Dr. Loxton warns that the principal engine of democratic backsliding today is increasingly populism itself. “When I think about the democratic backsliding occurring across much of the world today,” he tells the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), “I see populism—not authoritarian successor parties—as the more significant common thread.”

In this wide-ranging interview, Dr. Loxton explores why authoritarian actors, institutions, and political cultures so often survive democratization rather than disappear with regime change. Challenging conventional understandings of democratic transition, he argues that most transitions are not revolutionary ruptures in which authoritarian systems are swept away entirely. “It is extremely rare for all aspects of the old regime simply to disappear and be replaced by a completely blank slate,” he explains. Instead, authoritarian legacies persist through constitutions, institutions, party organizations, and political networks that continue operating long after democratization formally occurs.

At the center of Dr. Loxton’s work is the concept of “authoritarian inheritance,” the idea that ties to a former dictatorship can function not only as liabilities but also as electoral assets. “Having roots in a dictatorship can sometimes be as much of an asset as it is a liability for parties operating under democracy,” he argues. In some cases, voters consciously embrace authoritarian legacies because they associate former regimes with “stability,” “order,” or “national strength”. In others, historical memory itself becomes distorted through nostalgia, revisionism, and digital propaganda. Reflecting on cases such as Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in the Philippines and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Dr. Loxton warns of the growing appeal of what he calls “authoritarian nostalgia parties,” particularly among younger generations with no lived experience of dictatorship.

Yet Dr. Loxton also draws a crucial distinction between authoritarian successor parties and the broader populist dynamics reshaping democratic politics today. Looking at countries such as Hungary, Turkey, Brazil, and the United States, he argues that the deeper pattern is not simply authoritarian continuity but the rise of leaders who campaign against elites in the name of “the people” and then centralize power once in office. “Populist leaders run for office promising to smash the elites and return power to ‘the people,’” he notes. “Then, once in office, they proceed to concentrate power in their own hands and tilt the political playing field in their favor.”

The interview also explores Dr. Loxton’s reflections on “competitive authoritarianism,” the influential concept developed by Steven Levitsky and Lucan A. Way to describe regimes occupying the gray zone between democracy and dictatorship. For Dr. Loxton, these hybrid systems capture one of the defining political realities of the 21st century: democracies increasingly hollowed out not through military coups, but through elections, populism, institutional manipulation, and the gradual erosion of liberal norms from within.

Here is the edited version of our interview with Dr. James Loxton, revised slightly for clarity and flow.

Transitions Rarely Begin from a Blank Slate

Campaign propaganda for Peruvian presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori painted on a wall along the Pan-American Highway in Lima, Peru on April 29, 2021. Photo: Christian Inga / Dreamstime.

Dr. Loxton, welcome. Let me begin with a broader question about authoritarian continuity across generations and democratic systems. In your work on authoritarian successor parties, you argue that former regime elites often survive democratization by transforming themselves into competitive democratic actors. To what extent do you think this organizational continuity explains the remarkable intergenerational resilience of authoritarian politics in many contemporary democracies?

Dr. James Loxton: I think a good place to start is by considering what a regime transition actually is. Many people, when they imagine a transition from dictatorship to democracy, picture some kind of big bang in which the old regime is completely obliterated, and a new democratic order is created from scratch. But what I have tried to show in my work—and what many other scholars have demonstrated as well—is that this is almost never the case. It is extremely rare for all aspects of the old regime simply to disappear and be replaced by a completely blank slate. Legacies of the old dictatorship almost always persist in one form or another. In many countries, for example, constitutions created under authoritarian rule continue to be used by democratic governments. That is a very common pattern.

What I have focused on in my own research is political parties that emerge from former dictatorships and continue to operate after a transition to democracy. I call these authoritarian successor parties, and they are extraordinarily common. When I first began studying this topic more than a decade ago, I expected the numbers to be high, but I was still surprised by just how widespread the phenomenon turned out to be.

I examined every new democracy established between the 1970s and 2010 and looked at whether an authoritarian successor party emerged and whether that party was eventually elected back to office. What I found was that in roughly three-quarters of all new democracies, an authoritarian successor party emerged as a viable political actor. In more than half of all new democracies, voters freely and fairly used the ballot box to return the “bad guys” to power. So, this is not a marginal phenomenon at all; it is an incredibly common one.

Authoritarian Inheritance Can Outlive the Dictator

Your concept of “authoritarian inheritance” highlights how former ruling elites retain organizational resources, networks, and legitimacy after democratic transitions. Could we extend this framework to explain why voters in democratic systems continue electing the children, relatives, or political heirs of authoritarian rulers decades after democratization?

Dr. James Loxton: Yes, I think so. The term I use to make sense of authoritarian successor parties is authoritarian inheritance. The basic idea—although it is quite an uncomfortable one, and it certainly makes me uncomfortable—is that having roots in a dictatorship can sometimes be as much of an asset as it is a liability for parties operating under democracy. This can take many forms, ranging from connections to business elites to, more disturbingly, possessing a political brand that voters actually find attractive. Such parties are able to say: “Remember that dictatorship? Remember how you liked it? Well, we are going to continue that legacy. We are going to continue to represent the old regime. Vote for us.”

Let me give you an example. Right now, Peru is in the middle of a presidential election. The first round has already taken place, and the country is now heading into the second round. One of the top two candidates is Keiko Fujimori. She has run for president three times before. On each occasion, she reached the second round and then lost by a very narrow margin. We will see whether she is luckier on her fourth attempt. Who is she? She is the daughter of former Peruvian autocrat Alberto Fujimori, who served as the country’s president-slash-dictator during the 1990s.

In fact, just before our interview, I was looking at her official campaign website. On the very first page, if you scroll down to the bottom, there is a section titled “Positive Legacies,” where she highlights what she views as her father’s major accomplishments—stabilizing the economy, ending hyperinflation, and defeating a powerful guerrilla insurgency in the country. So, she is fully embracing the legacy of her father. Will she get elected? We will see. But it clearly appears to be a message that resonates with many Peruvian voters.

Authoritarian Memory Can Become an Electoral Resource

In “Why We Elect Former Dictators and Their Children,” you suggest that authoritarian legacies can be politically normalized over time. Under what conditions does collective memory fail to generate democratic accountability, allowing authoritarian family dynasties to reinvent themselves electorally rather than remain politically stigmatized?

Dr. James Loxton: I’m going to push back a little bit on the way that question is framed. The idea of “collective memory failing” suggests that if people vote for someone like Keiko Fujimori, or for parties such as the KMT in Taiwan or the PRI in Mexico—former ruling parties of authoritarian regimes—they must somehow be mistaken or have misremembered the past. In some cases, that may indeed be true. But in other cases, it is almost certainly the case that people do remember the old regime, and they simply liked it. They liked the way the old regime operated. They felt safer, they felt things were more stable, things were more predictable. Whatever the reason may be, they simply viewed that period positively. So, now the regime has changed, and citizens are free to vote for whomever they want. Who do they choose? In some cases, they choose the people they already like—whether that means the old ruling party, a family member of the former ruler, or even the former dictator himself.

Democracy Does Not Always Bury the Old Regime

Many authoritarian successor parties appear to thrive not despite democratization, but because of it. Does this suggest that electoral democracy itself may unintentionally provide institutional shelter for authoritarian continuity, especially in weakly institutionalized democracies?

Dr. James Loxton: Again, I think all this really shows is that voters do not always vote the way I might want them to vote, or the way you might want them to vote, or the way the people watching this video might want them to vote. Let’s suppose you are a conservative and would really like everyone always to vote for the Conservative Party. But guess what? Some people vote for the left. Or let’s suppose you are a leftist and want everybody to vote for the Social Democratic Party. Well, many people are conservatives, and so they vote for conservative parties.

Why do I say that, and why do I think this is particularly important when it comes to authoritarian successor parties and, more specifically, former dictators and their children? The reason is that these phenomena involve political actors who run for office under democracy but have roots in former dictatorships. What makes them unique is that, unlike constitutions imposed by former regimes, or amnesties granted to militaries responsible for human rights abuses, these are not institutional arrangements simply forced upon society and made difficult to remove under democracy.

That is not the case with authoritarian successor parties, former dictators, or the children of former dictators. Voters must willingly cast their ballots for these people. And it turns out that this is exactly what happens in most new democracies. In fact, across most of the so-called third-wave democracies—those established from the mid-1970s onward—voters have freely and willingly used the ballot box to support political actors who had some connection to the former dictatorship.

The Greater Danger Today Is Populist Power-Grabbing

US President Donald Trump and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán arrive for a working dinner at the NATO Summit in Brussels, Belgium on July 11, 2018. Photo: Gints Ivuskans / Dreamstime.

Your scholarship frequently emphasizes the “double-edged” nature of authoritarian successor parties: they may stabilize democracy by incorporating former regime actors, yet simultaneously preserve authoritarian enclaves. In today’s context of democratic backsliding, do you believe the balance has shifted more decisively toward the harmful side of that equation?

Dr. James Loxton: What you say is true. Authoritarian successor parties are, in many ways, a double-edged phenomenon. On the one hand, they can be surprisingly helpful because they provide a political voice for people who supported and identified with the old regime. On the other hand, they can also be harmful. They may protect undemocratic constitutions or shield human rights violators from accountability. In some extreme—though actually quite rare—cases, they can undermine the new democracy itself and push the country back toward authoritarianism.

But when I look around the world today at countries such as Hungary until very recently, Turkey, the United States, or Brazil until recently—cases where democracy has either come under severe stress or, in some instances, broken down altogether—I do not see authoritarian successor parties or the children of former dictators as the primary common denominator. Rather, the recurring pattern is that populist leaders run for office promising to smash the elites and return power to “the people.” Then, once in office, they proceed to concentrate power in their own hands and tilt the political playing field in their favor. So, when I think about the democratic backsliding occurring across much of the world today, I see populism—not authoritarian successor parties—as the more significant common thread.

Some Populists Turn Dictatorship into a Golden Age

In recent years, we have seen populist leaders invoke nostalgia for “strong states,” “order,” and “national greatness.” How much of contemporary populism do you see as a repackaging of authoritarian inheritance into emotionally resonant democratic narratives?

Dr. James Loxton: It depends on the case. A common populist message is the promise to “make X great again”—whether that means making America great again, Turkey great again, Hungary great again, or something similar. If a country has an authoritarian past, then celebrating that past can certainly become part of the populist appeal. But that is not true in every case.

At the same time, I find the phenomenon of authoritarian nostalgia both fascinating and extremely widespread. And I want to return to something I mentioned earlier: the idea that voters often do remember the old regime and vote accordingly, even if that may make some of us uncomfortable to acknowledge. However, there are also cases in which the public memory of the past is clearly inaccurate or heavily distorted. The best contemporary example, in my view, is the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos Jr., or Bongbong Marcos, as he is commonly known.

If we look across authoritarian regimes globally and consider those marked by extreme corruption and incompetence, the Marcos dictatorship ranks very high on the list. This was not a case like Park Chung-hee’s South Korea or the KMT in Taiwan—authoritarian regimes that were undoubtedly repressive but also highly developmental. The Marcos regime was essentially a kleptocracy. Yet, when Bongbong Marcos ran for president, he fully embraced his father’s legacy and presented it as a kind of golden age. He described his father as a genius, while a vast network of supporters produced YouTube videos and social media content portraying the Marcos years in a completely misleading way.

This narrative appears to have resonated with many Filipino voters who were frustrated with the many grievances facing the Philippines today. So, in some cases, people genuinely remember the past and vote accordingly, while in other cases, historical memory itself becomes seriously distorted.

Former Regime Elites Can Colonize the Party System

Your work on authoritarian diasporas argues that former authoritarian elites often disperse across multiple parties after transitions rather than remain concentrated in a single successor organization. Could this fragmentation actually make authoritarian influence more durable and difficult to detect within democratic systems?

Dr. James Loxton: Yes. This is part of a research project I worked on with Timothy Power at Oxford. Tim is an expert on Brazil, which provides a particularly interesting case. In 1985, Brazil’s two-decade-long military regime came to an end, and the country transitioned to democracy. Yet for roughly the next 20 years, the party system remained heavily dominated by figures connected to that military regime. The dictatorship had created an official party and organized elections while still under authoritarian rule. Then, once democratization occurred, politicians from that party dispersed across the political spectrum. In effect, they colonized the broader party system.

Now, the official party of the old regime did continue to exist. It performed relatively well and, in fact, still exists today, although under several different names over the years. But the real influence of the broader authoritarian diaspora—the wider coalition that had governed Brazil during military rule—was far more consequential and far more influential than one might assume simply by looking at the authoritarian successor party itself.

Young Voters Can Embrace Dictatorships They Never Experienced

One of the most striking developments globally is the rehabilitation of authoritarian reputations among younger generations with no lived memory of dictatorship. How should scholars understand the role of generational distance, digital media ecosystems, and historical revisionism in the electoral resurgence of authoritarian heirs?

Dr. James Loxton: The case of Bongbong Marcos in the Philippines is a very clear example. He appears to enjoy substantial support among younger voters. Another example is Bolsonaro in Brazil. Bolsonaro was a relatively low-level figure—a captain in the Brazilian military—and a young man during the years of military rule. Yet he has fully and enthusiastically, and often quite provocatively, embraced the legacy of the old dictatorship. In doing so, he has attracted considerable support from many Brazilian voters, including younger generations.

I find this to be a deeply disturbing phenomenon: people who never directly experienced authoritarian rule nevertheless developing a kind of fantastical understanding of what those regimes were actually like. We see this not only in Brazil and the Philippines, but also in countries such as Spain and Chile. We also see it in what I call “authoritarian nostalgia parties.” These are not necessarily parties that emerged organically from the old regime itself. In many cases, decades have passed since the return to democracy. Yet these parties place nostalgia for the former authoritarian order at the very center of their electoral appeal. And unfortunately, this phenomenon appears to be becoming increasingly common.

Democracy Requires More Than Elections

In “Authoritarianism: A Very Short Introduction,” you discuss authoritarianism not simply as a regime type but as a broader political logic. Do you think contemporary democracies are increasingly experiencing what we might call the “authoritarianization of democratic culture,” even before formal regime breakdown occurs?

Dr. James Loxton: No, actually, in that book I very clearly present authoritarianism as a regime type. An authoritarian regime is one that fails to meet all the criteria associated with what is commonly known as the procedural minimum definition of democracy. To qualify as a democracy, a regime must have free and fair elections, universal suffrage, and protections for a broad range of civil liberties. If any one of those elements is absent, then the regime is not democratic; it is authoritarian.

Authoritarian Actors Do Not Always Need Populism

In several countries, authoritarian successor parties have successfully repositioned themselves as defenders of democracy against allegedly corrupt or dysfunctional democratic elites. Is anti-establishment populism today becoming the primary mechanism through which authoritarian actors regain democratic legitimacy?

Dr. James Loxton: Some authoritarian successor parties do adopt a populist message, presenting themselves as challengers to entrenched elites and claiming to speak on behalf of “the people.” Others, however, do not. It really varies from case to case. Just like politicians more broadly, some choose to campaign as populists, while others pursue very different strategies. Ultimately, it depends on the specific party or candidate in question.

Authoritarian Branding Survives Radio, Television, and X

Your research demonstrates that authoritarian successor parties often inherit organizational advantages such as party brands, territorial networks, and clientelist infrastructures. In the digital age, have these inherited assets become less important than affective polarization, social media mobilization, and charismatic personalization? Or do old authoritarian networks still matter beneath the surface?

Dr. James Loxton: The term authoritarian inheritance functions as a broad umbrella concept encompassing a wide range of assets that authoritarian successor parties—or, in the case of my more recent work, former dictators themselves or their children—can draw upon. Now, some of these assets are probably less important than they once were. I still believe that having a strong territorial organization matters, but perhaps it matters somewhat less in the age of social media and digital communication. However, one element that I think remains just as important as ever is the power of the party brand.

And this brings us back to a deeply uncomfortable—but fundamentally important—idea that we need to take seriously if we want to understand why these actors so often succeed electorally under democracy. The key point is that an association with the old regime may actually function as an asset. Some people may look back at that regime, accurately or inaccurately, and conclude: “You know what? I really liked that. I would like more of it.” That kind of political branding remains highly relevant regardless of whether parties are communicating through radio, television, or X.

Some Regimes Combine Democracy and Dictatorship

Supporters of Brazil’s former President (2019–2022) Jair Bolsonaro hold signs during a demonstration in São Paulo, Brazil, on September 7, 2025. Photo: Dreamstime.

And finally, Dr. James Loxton, if authoritarianism today increasingly survives not through coups, but through elections, constitutional manipulation, and dynastic succession, do we need an entirely new conceptual vocabulary beyond the classic democracy-authoritarianism binary to understand 21st-century regime evolution?

Dr. James Loxton: I’m a student of Steven Levitsky. He was my PhD supervisor, and he has had a profound influence on how I understand politics. Levitsky, together with his longtime collaborator Lucan A. Way, coined the term “competitive authoritarianism” to describe a hybrid regime that combines elements of both democracy and authoritarianism. One of the things I find particularly fascinating is how widely the concept of competitive authoritarianism has spread—not only within academia, but increasingly in broader public discourse as well. You now hear journalists and commentators regularly using the term in mainstream political discussions.

I think this is one of the most important concepts political science has produced over the past few decades because it so effectively captures cases such as Hungary until very recently or Peru in the 1990s. These are systems where elections still exist and where the opposition retains at least some possibility of winning, however limited. Opposition parties continue to operate, and dissenting voices can still communicate their messages—perhaps not through the main state broadcaster, but through alternative forms of media. So, we are not talking about fully closed regimes like Russia or North Korea.

There is genuine political competition, but the playing field is fundamentally uneven and unfair. That is the great danger in countries such as the United States today. In fact, Levitsky and Way argue that the United States is no longer a full democracy and has drifted toward a form of competitive authoritarianism. Similarly, Brazil under Bolsonaro appeared to be moving in that direction, and that is essentially what Hungary became under Fidesz.

So, to be honest, I still find the democracy-versus-dictatorship binary useful. At the same time, I also recognize that some regimes occupy a gray zone in between—systems that combine important features of both democracy and dictatorship.

Prof. Slobodian: For Musk and Muskism, Democracy Is Yesterday’s Problem

May 15, 2026

by ECPS_admin Digital-populism Editor’s Choice Home Interviews

Professor Quinn Slobodian, Professor of International History at Boston University and one of the leading scholars of neoliberalism and the contemporary far right, argues that “Muskism” represents a profound transformation in the relationship between capitalism, technology, and democracy. In an interview with the ECPS, Professor Slobodian contends that Elon Musk embodies a new political-economic order grounded not in liberal individualism but in “a cybernetic understanding of human society” shaped by digital networks, AI, and technocratic management. According to Professor Slobodian, Musk no longer treats democracy as a meaningful political ideal: “For Musk, democracy almost appears to be yesterday’s problem.” The interview explores neoliberalism, authoritarianism, Silicon Valley’s “state symbiosis,” digital sovereignty, and the growing convergence between platform capitalism and far-right populism.

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Giving an interview to the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Professor Quinn Slobodian, Professor of International History at Boston University, argues that “Muskism” marks a profound shift in the relationship between capitalism, technology, and democracy. In his view, Elon Musk should not be understood merely as an eccentric billionaire, but as the embodiment of a new political-economic formation built on the infrastructures of platform capitalism, artificial intelligence, military technology, and state dependency.

For Professor Slobodian, Muskism cannot be separated from neoliberalism. “It’s impossible to understand how we arrive at Muskism without considering the effects of neoliberalism,” he explains. Decades of neoliberal policy helped create the conditions under which private actors could assume functions once performed by public institutions. Yet Muskism also departs from classical neoliberalism. Rather than beginning with “consumer sovereignty” or “individual freedom,” it rests on “a kind of cybernetic understanding of human society,” imagining society as “a networked totality that must be engineered and managed to produce optimized outcomes.”

This is where the headline of the interview becomes central. According to Professor Slobodian, Muskism radicalizes neoliberal efforts to constrain democracy, but goes further by treating democracy as increasingly obsolete. While earlier neoliberal thinkers such as Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman remained deeply concerned with democracy as a social force, Musk, he argues, does not even “offer lip service to traditional political ideas such as civil society, deliberation, or representation.” For Musk, these concepts belong to “an outdated era of social and political life” supposedly surpassed by “technological acceleration, digital connectivity, and new forms of mediated decision-making.” As Professor Slobodian puts it starkly: “For Musk, democracy almost appears to be yesterday’s problem.”

The interview also explores Professor Slobodian’s concept of “state symbiosis.” Contrary to the familiar image of Silicon Valley elites as anti-state libertarians, he argues that today’s tech oligarchs increasingly seek not to escape the state but to merge with it. Muskism, in this sense, is not about “withering away the state,” but about selling “sovereignty as a service”—from orbital launches and satellite connectivity to AI tools for state administration.

Professor Slobodian further warns that Muskism represents “a radical departure from the liberal tradition,” replacing ideas of human dignity, agency, and representation with optimization, efficiency, and programmable social systems. At the same time, he situates Muskism within broader far-right and populist transformations, arguing that many contemporary right-wing movements are not simply anti-neoliberal reactions, but “the bastard offspring of neoliberalism itself.”

Here is the edited version of our interview with Professor Quinn Slobodian, revised slightly for clarity and flow.

Muskism Begins with the Network, Not the Individual

Professor Slobodian, welcome. In Muskism, you conceptualize Elon Musk less as an individual eccentricity than as the embodiment of an emerging political-economic order. To what extent do you see “Muskism” as a successor to neoliberalism, and to what extent is it better understood as neoliberalism mutating into a post-democratic or neo-feudal formation?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: It’s impossible to understand how we arrive at Muskism without considering the effects of neoliberalism. The basic idea that private actors can perform functions previously carried out by states better than public institutions can is really the premise on which Musk gains his initial foothold in both government and markets. A clear example is SpaceX, which got its start in 2002 through major contracts with the Pentagon and the Department of Defense.

The extent to which power has been transferred to business leaders like Musk is itself a symptom of neoliberalism. What we find distinctive about Muskism, however—and what differentiates it from neoliberalism—is partly the way it justifies itself. Rather than appealing to the language of consumer sovereignty or even individual freedom, Muskism—and this is shared more broadly among his cohort of tech leaders—rests on a kind of cybernetic understanding of human society and even of the relationship between the state and business.

Instead of viewing government as an institution that creates the conditions for individual free-market decision-making, which is the traditional neoliberal position, the Musk approach imagines society as a networked totality that must be engineered and managed to produce optimized outcomes.

So, rather than beginning with the individual, as neoliberalism ultimately does, Muskism begins at the level of the network—and that network is always already digital, a computerized world. In that sense, it feels quite different from the animating ideas of the neoliberal era, even if the extraordinarily concentrated wealth and power of someone like Musk could only emerge after decades of neoliberal policy.

Musk Treats Democracy as Something to Be Hacked

Your work repeatedly emphasizes the “encasement” of markets from democratic interference. Do contemporary tech oligarchs represent a new phase of this neoliberal project—one in which democracy is no longer merely constrained institutionally but rendered technologically obsolete through algorithmic governance and AI-driven administration?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: It does radicalize the trends that I and others have emphasized in the past when talking about neoliberalism, in the sense that it, like neoliberalism, is concerned with constraining the space for citizen input and citizen action to ensure that outcomes align with a preconceived idea of how law and policy should function.

In Globalists and other works, I and others have discussed how the creation of counter-majoritarian institutions and forms of international economic law that sit above the decision-making power of sovereign governments serve to guarantee market outcomes, even in the face of hesitation or resistance from populations. So, there was always this tension between protecting capitalism and respecting democracy. At times, democracy itself seemed to have to be partially suspended in order to secure the kind of capitalist outcomes policymakers wanted. The difference with Musk and Muskism is that there is far less serious consideration of the legitimacy of democracy altogether.

Even thinkers like Friedrich Hayek or Milton Friedman—or, at the more radical end, figures such as Murray Rothbard and the anarcho-capitalist tradition—however wary they were of democracy, majoritarianism, or populism, still understood democracy as something they had to contend with. There was, in a sense, a kind of respect for the social force democracy represented and for the symbolic value it held for ordinary people. What is extraordinary about someone like Elon Musk is that he does not even offer lip service to traditional political ideas such as civil society, deliberation, or representation. These concepts seem to him to belong to an outdated era of social and political life that has been transcended by technological acceleration, digital connectivity, and new forms of mediated decision-making.

So, democracy is no longer even something to be worried about in the way Hayek, for example, was endlessly preoccupied with it. For Musk, democracy almost appears to be yesterday’s problem. The technocratic engineering mentality he brings into politics treats democracy as just another technical issue to be hacked and aligned with one’s own interests.

This also applies to his relationship with the European far right—to perhaps anticipate a question you might ask—because the conventional journalistic interpretation of his ties to figures such as Alice Weidel, Tommy Robinson, or far-right actors in Poland and elsewhere is that they reflect ideological sympathy or a shared commitment to anti-immigrant politics or even white supremacist ideas. But I do not think that is the most accurate way to understand it. I think Musk sees far-right parties in highly functional terms. He views them as the parties of the future, destined to replace the legacy formations of social democracy, Christian democracy, and political centrism.

From that perspective, it makes sense for him to align himself with what he sees as the future engines of European politics—not out of any principled commitment to self-determination or popular sovereignty, but because such alliances are more functional for his business interests.

This very thin understanding of politics—one that treats politics memetically and as a series of engineering problems—is difficult for many people to grasp because we still instinctively assume that popular sovereignty remains an important political force. What is striking about Musk is that he no longer seems to believe it even requires attention.

Silicon Valley No Longer Wants to Escape the State

Silicon Valley Technology Center in San Jose, California. Photo: Joe Sohm / Dreamstime.

You argue that Silicon Valley elites are not anti-state libertarians but proponents of “state symbiosis.” How does this alter conventional understandings of authoritarianism? Are we witnessing the emergence of a privatized authoritarianism in which sovereignty is increasingly outsourced to platform monopolies?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: One of our main goals with the book was to reshape the conversation around Silicon Valley ideology. It has become quite common to describe Silicon Valley leaders as libertarians, and at one point that may indeed have been a reasonably accurate characterization. But that is far less true today.

One important thing to recognize is that digital capitalism has now existed for several decades, and Silicon Valley’s business model has changed dramatically since the mid-1990s, when internet infrastructure was first handed over to private interests. There have essentially been three distinct phases during this period, and the politics associated with Silicon Valley have largely reflected the dominant economic model of each phase.

At the dawn of the internet in the late 1990s, it was still possible to imagine the web as a genuinely de-territorialized space existing outside the boundaries of any single nation-state, enabling radical new forms of interaction, value creation, and community. That vision had a certain plausibility. It also aligned with clear business interests, since companies were attempting to build a parallel digital world of retail and payments. So, when Peter Thiel in the 1990s declared, “I’m a libertarian, and what I’m trying to do at PayPal is create stateless money,” that framing was not entirely implausible. It was a reasonable way to understand what was emerging at the time.

Roughly a decade later, after the dot-com boom and bust, the dominant model became Web 2.0: social media, platforms, apps, Uber, Facebook, Twitter, and so forth. These businesses were largely asset-light. They required relatively little capital expenditure and functioned primarily by creating open digital spaces in which users generated data that could then be monetized through advertising.

Even during that period, Silicon Valley ideology did not need to engage very seriously with the state. These companies portrayed themselves as building a parallel world of socialization and commerce that required little from government beyond permission to continue operating and generating profits.

What changes in the present moment is the rise of generative AI and the renewed focus on hard-tech industries. Just today, for example, there was a report about Anduril—the defense startup focused on drones, missiles, and military logistics—which doubled its valuation over the last year from $30 billion to $60 billion.

Musk now increasingly sees the state itself as his market: selling orbital launches to governments, selling satellites—or access to satellites—for battlefield operations and rural connectivity, and selling XAI chatbot software for government administration. This shift toward military technology and generative AI has fundamentally altered Silicon Valley’s relationship with government, and with it, its political philosophy. It no longer makes much sense to call yourself a libertarian when the government is your primary customer. Nor does libertarianism fit a situation in which companies rely on government to open federal lands for drilling, rewrite regulations, and guarantee preferred access to contracts. The fusion between state and private actors has become impossible to ignore.

At the same time, I do not think it is convincing to interpret all of this simply as the hollowing out or withering away of the state. You asked whether this represents the privatization of sovereignty away from government. We would describe it instead as “sovereignty as a service.” Certain state functions are privatized, but this process simultaneously expands state capacity. Access to low-Earth orbit, for example, or to integrated bureaucratic databases that can be queried across agencies in previously impossible ways—these developments do not diminish state power; they increase it.

Muskism Is About Becoming Part of the State

For that reason, it is important to understand Musk and Muskism as more than simple forms of rentierism or crony capitalism. Personally, I think terms such as “techno-feudalism” can be misleading because they suggest a backward or regressive form of capitalism in which private actors merely carve out digital fiefdoms and extract rents from dependent populations. That does not really capture what is happening. Countries such as China, Russia, and the United States are, in many respects, becoming more centrally powerful through access to the products and services developed by tech companies. At the same time, however, they are becoming increasingly dependent on those same companies.

This is why the balance of what we call “symbiosis” is so precarious and requires careful attention. It can easily tip into parasitism if the relationship becomes too unbalanced. Conversely, private firms may defect if they feel excessively pressured by their state clients.

We have seen examples of this dynamic even in recent months. The Department of Defense and Pete Hegseth’s staff suddenly declared Anthropic to be a supply-chain risk and sought to remove its software from government systems. Initially, this looked like an assertion of state authority over the private sector. But almost immediately, two things happened: courts ruled against the decision, and other tech firms rallied behind Anthropic, effectively saying, “We do not want to be subjected to arbitrary state decision-making, and we also want collective influence over how our products are used.”

So, what we are seeing is a partnership, an alliance, a fusion—however one chooses to describe it. But it is no longer the libertarian fantasy historically associated with Silicon Valley: escaping the state, building private cities, or founding sovereign communities on decommissioned oil rigs in Honduras. That may have been a plausible understanding of Silicon Valley in 2000, or perhaps even in 2009. But by 2026, the dynamic is much more about becoming part of the state than escaping it.

Tech CEOs Are Not Sovereigns

In your discussion of “sovereignty as a service,” firms such as SpaceX, Palantir, and Starlink appear not simply as contractors but as infrastructural sovereigns. Does this imply a transformation of the Weberian state itself—from a monopoly of legitimate violence to a dependency network mediated by corporate platforms?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: I think we are deliberately stopping short of that argument because we are not saying that Musk, Zuckerberg, and Bezos are sovereigns. They are not.

What is interesting about the DOGE moment we discuss in the final chapter of the book is that it serves as a revealing test case of how far a tech CEO can govern directly in practice. How far can that line actually be pushed? Can the tech lord effectively become the formal national government? What we saw was that Musk was actually quite bad at it. He not only failed to achieve the goals he had set for himself in terms of reducing state costs, but he also failed to secure legitimacy from the American public at a very basic level. His popularity plummeted during his time in Washington, and he did not emerge as a sovereign figure, as it were.

So, to us, the division of labor between traditional governments and tech firms remains essential. Governments still perform the old-fashioned functions of securing consent and legitimacy, and that remains a necessary condition for the expansion of tech leaders’ power. They do not need to govern directly, nor do they need to seize sovereignty for themselves. Contracting out sovereignty—what we describe as selling “subscription sovereignty,” as it were—is not the same thing as actually being sovereign. Those are distinct categories, and it is important to keep them separate.

Some of the more exaggerated alarm bells surrounding tech power too quickly jump to the conclusion that these figures have become new emperors or kings. But they have not. Nor do they necessarily want to be. What is interesting, of course, is that Musk has called himself “Technoking” at Tesla since 2021 rather than CEO. But in practical terms, these people are not especially good at governing. While governments increasingly outsource certain capacities to tech lords, the tech lords, in turn, outsource governing back to states. So far, that arrangement appears relatively stable and not easily disrupted in any fundamental way.

At the same time, what is fascinating about the present moment is that the disruptive effects of generative AI are creating such intense public attention around new technologies that figures like Dario Amodei and Sam Altman increasingly feel compelled to address populations in quasi-political or quasi-governmental terms. They now say things like, “We have a constitution for our AI,” or “Here is our vision for a public wealth fund,” or “Here is our proposal for fiscal policy.” In that sense, they are increasingly treated as though they are co-governing alongside agencies in Washington, D.C. But practically speaking, I still think there remains at least a horizontal relationship—and perhaps even a slight subordination—of these companies to the state itself.

Musk May Have Overplayed His Hand in Europe

Elon Musk. — Elon Musk—founder and CEO of SpaceX, CEO of Tesla, owner of X (formerly Twitter), and co-founder of Neuralink and OpenAI—speaks at VIVA Technology (VivaTech), June 16, 2023. Photo: Frédéric Legrand / Dreamstime.

Much contemporary scholarship frames democratic backsliding as a crisis driven by populist leaders and illiberal parties. Your analysis suggests that technological infrastructures and billionaire networks may be equally central. Should we rethink democratic erosion less as a purely political phenomenon and more as a reconfiguration of political economy?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: The relationship between Silicon Valley and the far right in Europe is a particularly fascinating one. It also provides another revealing example of the delicate balance between Silicon Valley and existing political parties over the question of who actually governs. In late 2024, when Musk was investing his money and political capital in Trump’s election campaign, he seemed to believe that he could replicate that success almost universally. For a moment, at least, he appeared to think he had acquired a kind of political superpower—the ability to make virtually anyone electorally viable in any political environment. For several months, he attempted to use this supposed superpower to transform even relatively fringe candidates across Europe into credible political figures.

What we have seen since then, however, is that it does not work like a superpower at all. In many cases, it is actually counterproductive. A number of these right-wing parties have built their legitimacy around the language of sovereignty, and they are often damaged when they become too closely associated with an American tech billionaire. Interestingly, some of the transnational support figures like Musk have extended to right-wing populist parties in Europe has actually undermined rather than strengthened their credibility.

The positive side of this development is that it shifts public debate away from purely symbolic issues—or highly distorted narratives about immigration and demographics—and toward questions of political economy, exactly as you suggest.

Europe’s dependence on American-produced technologies is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. This creates a genuine opening for center-left and centrist parties in Europe. If they can demonstrate that they are capable of securing genuine digital sovereignty and data sovereignty vis-à-vis Silicon Valley, that could significantly strengthen their credibility among voters as forces capable of delivering national autonomy, strategic capacity, and political strength. In that sense, the past year has revealed that the Silicon Valley leadership class may, in some respects, have overplayed its hand and unintentionally produced a kind of boomerang effect. As people become more aware of the disruptive consequences of new technologies and of the dependencies created by a small number of tech firms, they are beginning to ask whether alternative arrangements might be possible. Increasingly, it appears that creating substitutes or alternatives to things like Starlink, SpaceX, or X.com is ultimately a matter of political will. None of these systems are inevitable.

We are already beginning to see this shift. France has started moving away from Microsoft products, Denmark is pursuing similar policies, and there is growing interest in Eutelsat as a European low-Earth-orbit alternative to Musk’s satellite infrastructure. These are genuinely praiseworthy developments. They may also provide a more material foundation for thinking about European identity and strategic autonomy in ways that could ultimately weaken some of the messaging power of right-wing populist parties.

Optimization Replaces Individual Freedom in Muskism

To what extent is Muskism compatible with liberalism at all? Is it best understood as an illiberal variant of neoliberalism, or does it represent a more radical break with liberal constitutional traditions altogether?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: Muskism has very little to do with the liberal tradition. In fact, it represents a much more radical break with the broader trajectory of Western political thought stretching from John Locke to the present. Because it is fundamentally a technologically determinist philosophy. It takes the functioning of network technologies—especially computers—as a kind of model for how society itself should be organized and managed. In doing so, central liberal categories such as the dignity of the individual, or the value of human agency and individuality, cease to function as foundational principles. They are displaced by concerns with optimization and efficiency.

In some respects, the closest intellectual tradition it resembles is utilitarianism, insofar as it evaluates social interventions primarily according to outcomes, regardless of their effects on individual freedoms or other normative principles. But because this worldview is fundamentally mediated through the logic of the computer, it also dehumanizes politics. Belief systems become reducible to systems of replicable memes—or, as Musk himself calls them, “mind viruses.” This framework assumes that people do not possess genuine convictions or socially rooted beliefs but instead function as programmable and reprogrammable units of information. Those informational units can either be modified arbitrarily by someone with sufficient coding power or removed from the system altogether, as we saw in Musk’s projects at Twitter and DOGE.

So, in that sense, I do think Muskism represents a radical departure from the liberal tradition. And that is precisely what makes it—while still very much a system that produces inequality and concentrates private power—operate according to fundamentally different premises from the neoliberalism of the last several decades to which we have otherwise become accustomed.

The Far Right Is the Bastard Offspring of Neoliberalism

In your recent writings, you argue that many contemporary far right-populist formations are not anti-neoliberal but “the bastard offspring of neoliberalism itself.” How does this insight complicate dominant narratives that treat populism simply as a backlash against globalization?

Professor Quinn Slobodian: This line of inquiry emerged for me during the period from roughly 2008 to 2018, when the rise of right-wing backlash parties—especially the Alternative for Germany (AfD), but also the Tea Party in the United States and eventually the MAGA movement—was frequently described as a rejection of neoliberalism. What fascinated me was that many of the people deeply involved in these movements actually came out of the libertarian tradition and, in some cases, directly from the think tanks most closely associated with neoliberal policy formation—the Heritage Foundation in the United States, the Institute of Economic Affairs in Britain, and similar institutions.

What I discovered was the rather surprising fact that, after the end of the Cold War, many neoliberals did not believe they had definitively won. Instead, they identified new enemies and new forms of opposition, particularly environmentalism, feminism, and anti-racism. As a result, they began forming alliances with people for whom those issues were primary concerns. Suddenly, individuals primarily committed to economic freedom found themselves working closely with people primarily motivated by racial purity or national chauvinism.

In the United States, this coalition became known as the Paleo Alliance. These were actors who rejected the post-Cold War consensus around democracy promotion and strongly opposed the compromises that had emerged between civil rights movements and the American legal order—affirmative action, workplace harassment laws, and similar reforms. Many neoliberals came to view these developments as a new “road to serfdom,” and therefore believed they needed to push back and seek allies wherever they could find them.

The AfD is, in many ways, a particularly clear example of this dynamic because it effectively united neoliberal economists with Islamophobic right-wing German nationalists. They were bound together by a shared hostility toward the European Union—both because they believed it undermined German monetary sovereignty and because they felt it weakened sovereign control over borders.

What emerged, then, were these unusual alliances between actors motivated primarily by economic concerns and others driven by cultural or even racial anxieties. If you examine many of the parties associated with Europe’s right-wing backlash, you find that a significant number emerged from precisely this fusion moment of the 1990s and early 2000s.

The same pattern was visible in the United States. If you look at Trump’s economic advisers during his first term, figures such as Arthur Laffer stand out. Laffer had literally advised Reagan on tax cuts in the early 1980s and then returned decades later to help design Trump’s tax cuts.

So, the mainstream narrative—which often portrayed a sharp rupture between an earlier era of market-friendly globalism and a new era of nationalist anti-neoliberalism—missed something important. The political actors themselves often remained the same. What changed was not their entire political worldview, but rather their preferred mode of organizing capitalism.

Part IV — Rethinking the Nexus of Racialization and Populism: Lessons from the Study

May 11, 2026

by ECPS_admin ECPS Youth Editor’s Choice Home Voice of Youth

In the concluding installment of her series, Lianne Nota offers a theoretically and empirically grounded reassessment of the relationship between populism and racialization. Moving beyond conventional assumptions, she demonstrates that while racialization is central to certain forms of right-wing populism, it is not an inherent feature of populism itself but contingent upon broader ideological configurations. By foregrounding the role of “new racism” and the discursive linking of categories such as migration, religion, and security, Nota reveals how exclusionary boundaries can be constructed without explicit reference to race. At the same time, the analysis highlights the possibility of de-racializing political discourse through more inclusive articulations of “the people.” The article thus advances a nuanced framework for understanding how language shapes political belonging and exclusion.

By Lianne Nota*

This series set out to explore a question that is often overlooked in populism research: how and under what conditions does racialization shape the construction of the populist ‘people’? By analyzing parliamentary debates in the Netherlands, the findings point to a clear but nuanced conclusion. While racialization plays a significant role in right-wing populism, it is not an inherent feature of populism as such.

Is Racialization Inherent to Populism?

A key takeaway from this study is that populist actors do not automatically produce racialized understandings of ‘the people.’ Both Dutch populist parties under examination relied on a populist logic separating ‘the people’ from ‘the elite,’ yet only one consistently constructed these categories in racialized terms.

This suggests that the presence of racialization depends less on populism itself, and more on the ideological context in which populism is articulated. In the case examined here, right-wing populist discourse constructed ‘the people’ through exclusionary boundaries that essentialized cultural and religious differences, while left-wing populist discourse emphasized inclusivity and resisted such essentialization.

At the same time, this finding should not be taken to mean that left-wing populism is inherently immune to racialization. Rather, it highlights the importance of examining these dynamics empirically, rather than relying on a priori assumptions regarding the presence (or absence) of racialization in populism.

New Racism

Another important insight is that racialization often operates indirectly. Throughout this study, explicit references to race were absent. Instead, references to culture, religion, and civilization performed a similar function. By presenting religious and cultural differences as fixed and immutable, the discourse created boundaries that closely resemble racial hierarchies, without ever using the language of race itself.

This reflects what scholars have called ‘new racism,’ where cultural differences replace biological difference as the basis for exclusion. Another word to describe this type of racism is cultural racism. Cultural or new racism is not necessarily less innocent than ‘traditional’ biological racism, for the cultural boundaries that separate people from each other are presupposed to be absolute, meaning no ‘outsider’ can ever be assimilated into ‘the people (MacMaster, 2001: 194-195). In other words, “cultural racism as a discourse performs the same task as biological racism, as culture functions in the same way as nature, creating closed and bounded cultural groups,” (Wren, 2001: 144).

Understanding racialization in this broader sense is especially important in contexts like the Netherlands. As mentioned in the first article, discussions of racism are often avoided by a majority of academics and policymakers in the Netherlands (Grosfoguel & Mielants, 2006). However, this does not mean that racism is absent from the Netherlands. In fact, as Weiner (2014) argues, racism takes a peculiar form in the Netherlands, rooted in the denial of race as significant and the particular Dutch history of colonization. Building on this, this study shows us how exclusionary logics can persist even in the absence of explicit references to race or racism.

The Importance of Discursive Linkages

The analysis also shows how racialization does not occur only through how ‘the people’ are described, but also through how different categories are linked together.

In right-wing discourse, groups such as Muslims, migrants, and terrorists were frequently connected, forming a broader threatening ‘Other.’ This process can be understood as kind of a discursive chain, where distinct categories are treated as equivalent.

This finding builds on existing scholarship on populism. While scholars have used the idea of a ‘chain of equivalence’ to explain how demands are linked together (Laclau, 2005), this study suggests that a similar logic can operate in the construction of perceived threats. By linking different groups into a single category, the boundaries of ‘the people’ become sharper and can exclude large portions of society from ‘the people’.

Looking Forward

Taken together, these findings draw attention to how processes of (de-)racialization are implied in the construction of the populist ‘people.’ In doing so, this study suggests that race, racism, and racialization are concepts that should be considered more systematically in relation to populism. Societally, this study demonstrates (again) that discourse has real consequences for real people. How something or someone is talked about has real-world implications that can affect the inclusion or exclusion of particular groups from society. In particular, this study warrants us to pay attention to how exclusion is naturalized through language and how groups of people are systemically excluded even in absence of terms like ‘race.’

At the same time, this article series also suggests that such exclusionary discriminatory framings are not inevitable. By emphasizing inclusivity, the protection of human rights, and the rule of law, more pluralistic understandings of ‘the people’ can be advanced.

However, like any study, this analysis has its limitations. It has focused on a single country, a specific time period, and a limited number of political actors. As such, the findings cannot be generalized to all cases of populism across the world.

This opens up avenues for future research. Comparative research across different countries could help determine whether similar patterns emerge elsewhere. It would also be interesting to analyze less traditional platforms like social media networks in order to examine whether racialization plays out differently depending on the platform of choice. Finally, future research could link the discursive dimension of racialization more to the material or institutional dimensions of racialization, for example, by examining how racializing or de-racializing discourse translates into policy decisions and institutional practices.

Ultimately, this article series highlights a broader point: how we talk about ‘the people’ matters. The boundaries drawn through language shape who is included and who is excluded. Paying attention to these boundaries is therefore not only an academic exercise, but also a necessary step in understanding and potentially challenging the dynamics of exclusion in contemporary politics.

(*) Lianne Nota is an ECPS intern and Research Master’s student in International Relations at the University of Groningen, with a focus on identity, populism, ontological security, and the ethics of global affairs. These article series is based on her paper “Constructing ‘The People’: The Role of Racialization in Dutch Populist Discourse” that she wrote for her specialization phase at RUG.

References

Grosfoguel, R., & Mielants, E. (2006). “Introduction: Minorities, Racism and Cultures of Scholarship.” International Journal of Comparative Sociology, 47(3–4), 179–189. https://doi.org/10.1177/0020715206065780

Laclau, E. (2005). On Populist Reason (1st edn). Verso.

MacMaster, N. (2001). Racism in Europe, 1870-2000. Palgrave. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-4033-9

Weiner, M. F. (2014). “The Ideologically Colonized Metropole: Dutch Racism and Racist Denial.” Sociology Compass, 8(6), 731–744. https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12163

Wren, K. (2001). “Cultural racism: Something rotten in the state of Denmark?” Social & Cultural Geography, 2(2), 141–162. https://doi.org/10.1080/14649360120047788

See other parts of the series

Part 1 — Constructing ‘The People’: The Role of Racialization in Dutch Populist Discourse

Part 2 — Studying “the People”: A Discourse-Analytical Approach to Populism

Part 3 — (De-)racializing ‘the People’: Who Is the Dutch Populist ‘People’?

Part III — (De-)racializing ‘the People’: Who Is the Dutch Populist ‘People’?

May 11, 2026

by ECPS_admin ECPS Youth Editor’s Choice Home Voice of Youth

In the third installment of her series, author Lianne Nota presents a nuanced comparative analysis of how “the people” are constructed within Dutch populist discourse. Drawing on parliamentary debates, she demonstrates that right- and left-wing populist actors do not merely differ in tone but articulate fundamentally distinct logics of political belonging. While the Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV) constructs a homogeneous and exclusionary “people” through the racialization of a Muslim “other,” the Socialistische Partij (SP) advances a more inclusive, civic conception that actively resists such boundary-making. By juxtaposing processes of racialization and de-racialization, Nota offers a compelling empirical contribution that challenges prevailing assumptions about populism’s relationship to exclusion, highlighting instead the contingent and discursive nature of political community formation.

By Lianne Nota*

In the previous parts, we outlined the project in terms of literature, method, and data. In this part, the findings of the analysis will be shared. To reiterate, this study analyzed parliamentary debates about migration, Islam, terrorism, and radicalization in the Netherlands during the 2015 refugee crisis. Through a comparison of how a right- and left-wing populist party spoke about ‘the people’ and various Others, the role of racialization in the construction of ‘the people’ was analyzed. What emerged is not just a difference in tone or emphasis, but a fundamentally different understanding of who belongs and who doesn’t.

PVV: The Homogenous Judeo-Christian People, the Tacialized Muslim Other and the Culpable Elite

The Construction of ‘the People’

PVV consistently presented itself as the party for the ordinary, hardworking, overlooked people. For example, in the debate on the terrorist attacks in Paris at the beginning of January 2015, frontman Geert Wilders stated that “I am [emphasis added] one of the victims, and not just me, but the entirety of the Netherlands and lots of others” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). As part of the common Dutch people, the PVV thus insisted on representing their voice.

For the PVV, ‘the people’ consisted of an innocent Judeo-Christian community that is being threatened by ‘Islamization.’ For example, one speaker expressed that “Islam is alien [‘wezensvreemd’] to the Judeo-Christian and humanist norms, values and traditions on which the Dutch society is based” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015b). In the context of the terrorist attacks in Paris, Wilders stated that he was “furious that, because of Islam, innocent victims fell again: jews, Islam critics and innocent people” and that “Islam simply does not belong to the Netherlands and is a danger to it,”(Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a).

Islam was portrayed as slowly taking over and threatening ‘our’ culture, for example, through an expression like “we are having to put our [emphasis added] Christian culture with the garbage” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015c).Wilders even explicitly mentions that he does not see the encounter with Islam as a clash of civilizations, but rather as “a clash, a confrontation, between civilization and barbarism” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). Entire population groups (primarily Muslims) are thus systematically excluded from ‘the people’ along civilizational lines.

The Construction of ‘the Other’ and ‘the Elite’

The construction of ‘the people’ by PVV happened also through constructing a foreign Other. In this regard, PVV speakers positioned themselves as warriors for freedom fighting against Islam, and simultaneously as experts in Islam. For example, Wilders declared that “I am standing here to fight the root of all evil. That root of all evil is called Islam. I-s-l-a-m. Islam,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015d). At the same time, one of the PVV speakers portrayed an SP opponent as ignorant in claiming that “it takes a lot of work to know exactly what Islam represents and how you can recognize it. I’m not going to give a lecture about it. To Ms. Karabulut of the SP, I say: bury yourself in the books, in the Quran, in hadith, and in the sira. Then you have enough to read and maybe you’ll find out,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015b). This signaled the PVV’s anti-Islam and anti-Muslim position in the debates, while at the same time bolstering their claims as authoritative speakers.

For PVV, the boundaries between Muslims, immigrants, and terrorists were fundamentally blurred. This becomes most clear in the debate about the terrorist attacks in Paris, where Wilders claimed that “of course not all Muslims are terrorists, but almost all terrorists nowadays are Muslims,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). He continued, “For decades, mass immigration has brought hundreds of thousands of people with an alien culture into Europe, into our country. Why do we import all this misery? Islam brings hate and violence everywhere it goes,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a).

In passages like these, it is assumed that terrorism stems from Islam, and through mass immigration, we are inviting Islamist terrorists to our country. Importantly, PVV speakers also linked these categories discursively through attributing physical features. Immigrants were portrayed as “masses of young men of around 20 years with beards” singing “allahu akbar-like songs” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015c). This obviously refers to young Muslim men. But in the data, terrorists were described by Wilders as “people who scream allahu akbar” as well, linking terrorists to immigrants and Muslims (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015d).

As for the elite, PVV speakers depicted political opponents and ruling parties not only as failing to address issues like terrorism and migration, but also as actively enabling them. For example, in the context of the Paris terrorist attacks, Wilders starts by saying that “of course the government is not responsible for every attack.” Still, he continues that “if someone who could have been stopped from returning to the Netherlands, if someone who the government has stopped from returning to Syria, if someone from another Schengen country comes to the Netherlands and commits a terrorist attack, then this government has blood on its hands,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). Statements like these elevate responsibility into moral blame.

These kinds of accusations were blended with portrayals of political opponents as “the political elite who look away,”(Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a), “incompetent” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a) and “scandalously neglecting its duty” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a).

PVV speakers also frequently used a kind of rhetoric that was meant to ridicule political opponents, for example declaring that “I was scared for a moment that clown Bassie [a famous clown in a children’s tv programme] was standing in front of me, but it was mister Kuzu” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015b). As opposed to these political opponents, PVV was depicted as telling the uncomfortable but necessary truth. For example, Wilders mentions that “it’s an awkward truth, but one that must be told: we are talking today about an invasion, an Islamic invasion of Europe, of the Netherlands,”(Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015c). The mixing of these strategies creates a sharp moral divide between ‘the people’ as represented by the PVV and the elite who are portrayed as detached from or indifferent to concerns of ‘ordinary’ Dutch people.

Presence of Racialization in the Discourse

The framing of ‘the people’ by the PVV can be seen as an instance of racialization. There is a boundary that is drawn very clearly between ‘us,’ ‘the people,’ and ‘them,’ Islam or Muslims. In addition, Islam is constructed not merely as a set of beliefs, but as an essentialized and homogeneous category that is incompatible with ‘our’ Dutch identity. In this regard, ‘we’ are clearly presumed superior vis-à-vis ‘them.’

Furthermore, the PVV construction of ‘the elite’ did not directly racialize ‘the people’ but could indirectly reinforce how racialization happens. The strong moral opposition between ‘the elite’ and ‘the people’ heightens the sense of urgency and crisis, which indirectly strengthens the exclusionary boundaries drawn between ‘people’ and ‘other.’ Overall, the PVV thus constructed a threatening racialized ‘other’ which, in turn, sharpened the boundaries of ‘the people’ as a homogeneous collective.

SP: The Inclusive People, the De-racialized Other and the Irresponsible Elite

The Construction of ‘the People’

In contrast to the PVV, the SP tried to portray itself as the protector of the rule of law and individual freedoms by emphasizing “the freedom to think, believe, draw, and write whatever you want” as a central part of ‘our’ democracy (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). SP speakers also stressed that they represented the ‘ordinary’ people in terms of wealth. For example, a speaker assertively stated that “nothing is shared fairly. Everything is for the rich, and those who are poor are screwed” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015e).

SP members also emphasized that the Netherlands is generally a rich country, such as claiming that “in a rich country like the Netherlands, nobody sleeps under a bridge and we don’t eat from trash bins” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015f). SP thus positioned itself as defenders of the law and the less wealthy.

The ‘people’ constructed by SP was also a far more inclusive category compared to PVV. For example, regarding the terrorist attacks in Paris, the frontman of SP at the time, Emile Roemer, stated that “I am also here to protect the freedom of all [emphasis added] Dutch people. That means I have a lot of trouble with Mr. Wilders describing 1 million Dutch people with an Islamic background as potential terrorists,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a).

In the other debates as well, it becomes clear that, for the SP, Muslims are explicitly included in their understanding of ‘the people.’ For example, in one debate, a SP member stated that “I want to clarify that we should all stand firm for the freedoms and fundamental rights of all people, whether it concerns Islamic people, non-religious people, or people of a different religion,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015b). In this way, ‘the people’ is constructed not as a homogeneous entity but as a diverse collective united by the law.

The Construction of ‘the Other’ and ‘the Elite’

As for the construction of a foreign Other, the SP presented itself as a protector of vulnerable communities and their human rights, often explicitly opposing the PVV. For example, Roemer expressed that “people fear attacks in the Netherlands and wonder how they can defend themselves when terror comes so close. But people also fear that divisions between population groups are growing, between Muslims and non-Muslims, and that people of good will are being pitted against each other,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a).

SP also expressed their involvement in these communities by positioning itself as an eyewitness to the experiences of these minorities, especially migrants. For example, Roemer stated that “my party members have seen with their own eyes how vulnerable children are who are in the region of Syria, Libanon or Turkey,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015g). SP thus saw itself as defender of the human rights and safety of vulnerable people, especially migrants.

For the SP, the boundaries between Islam, migrants, and terrorists were very clearly maintained. While SP speakers also addressed issues such as terrorism, they did so mostly from a legal point of view, describing terrorism as “a horrible form of criminality” or terrorists as “people who try to overthrow or harm the legal order here or in other parts of the world,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015h). SP speakers were adamant that terrorists should be seen as “extremists that attack our freedoms under the flag of Islam,” instead of ordinary Muslims (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015a). As such, rather than Islam or Muslims being framed as ‘other,’ terrorists are the clear ‘other’ of a ‘people’ that expressly includes Muslims.

As implied before, migrants and refugees were frequently constructed as vulnerable individuals rather than a potential threat. This was done, for example, by explicitly including children in descriptions of migrants. In this regard, Roemer talked about “children of 3, 4, 5 years old selling flowers in those camps to be able to buy something like a slice of bread,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015g).Thus, just like ‘the people’ are seen as victims of terrorism, refugees and migrants are seen as victims of war and conflict, similarly in need of protection by the government.

As for their attitude towards the elite, the SP was markedly less aggressive and condemning towards the ruling parties and the government than the PVV. The SP did frame political elites as naïve and detached, such as in statements like “the prime minister is bailing again” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015g) or calling on a minister to “do his job better” and asking whether “he still has all his ducks in a row” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015h). However, in general, SP discourse was fairly institutional and targeted towards policy effectiveness. Rather than accusing the government of betraying the people, it was (constructively) criticized for not doing enough or not taking the right actions.

Presence of De-racialization in the Discourse

As a result, the framing of ‘the people’ as including multiple diverse population groups could be seen as an act of de-racialization that can be summed up by the following contribution: “Whether it concerns people who are black or white, whether they are being persecuted because of their race or their religion; people are people, European or not, and they remain people,” (Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal, 2015e). Here, race and religion are both explicitly invoked to argue that they should not be used as discriminatory bases. Therefore, the SP’s discourse constructs ‘the people’ largely in a more inclusive and civic way, rather than drawing divisions between groups of people in society.

Two Logics?

Taken together, the analysis demonstrates that the constructions of ‘the people,’ ‘the other,’ and ‘the elite’ are combined in different ways with different effects by PVV and SP. While PVV consistently constructed a homogeneous ‘people’ through racializing a threatening ‘other’ reinforced by a strongly antagonistic ‘elite,’ SP constructed a more inclusive understanding of ‘the people’ by resisting the racialization of out-groups. These findings highlight not only important differences between right- and left-wing populist actors but also raise important questions about the relationship between populism and racialization in general. In the following and final part, we will therefore reflect on what these findings mean for how we understand the relationship between populism and racialization more broadly.

References

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015a). “De aanslag in Parijs.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/41#40d004c2.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015b). “Komst moskee in Gouda.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/95#b73a0f77.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015c). “Gemeenschappelijk asielbeleid in Europa.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/111#07cd76b4.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015d). “Aanslagen in Parijs.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2015-2016/27#d0f39abf.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015e). “Instroom asielzoekers.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/68#e3e2931c.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015f). “Uitkomsten onderhandelingen inzake bed, bad en brood.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/83#ae18d915.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015g). “Gemeenschappelijk asielbeleid in Europa.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/111#d573540e.

Tweede Kamer der Staten-Generaal. (2015h). “Ontnemen van het Nederlanderschap bij terroristische misdrijven.” https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/plenaire_verslagen/detail/2014-2015/60#9ad08f9e.

See other parts of the series

Part 1 — Constructing ‘The People’: The Role of Racialization in Dutch Populist Discourse

Part 2 — Studying “the People”: A Discourse-Analytical Approach to Populism

Part 4: Rethinking the Nexus of Racialization and Populism: Lessons from the Study

Part II — Studying ‘the People’: A Discourse-Analytical Approach to Populism

May 11, 2026

by ECPS_admin ECPS Youth Editor’s Choice Home Voice of Youth

In the second installment of her series, the author Lianne Nota advances the analysis by developing a rigorous methodological framework for studying the construction of “the people” in populist discourse. Moving beyond abstract theorization, she introduces a discourse-analytical approach grounded in Critical Discourse Analysis and the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA), emphasizing the interplay between language, power, and historical context. By operationalizing racialization through boundary-making, essentialization, and moral differentiation, Nota provides a precise analytical toolkit for identifying how political actors construct inclusion and exclusion—even in the absence of explicit racial references. Focusing on Dutch parliamentary debates during the 2015 refugee crisis, this contribution bridges conceptual and empirical inquiry, offering a nuanced pathway for examining how populist narratives produce and legitimize social hierarchies.

By Lianne Nota*

To analyze how and if Dutch populist actors have constructed ‘the people’ in racialized terms, we are in need of an empirical approach to actually study these processes in practice. This approach needs to be attentive to how ‘the people’ is not a concept determined a priori, but how they are actively constructed by populist parties in particular contexts. This is where a discourse-analytical perspective comes in.

Adopting a Discursive Approach

While discourse is a notoriously hard concept to define, for this article series, it is enough to understand that discourse refers to how language use in speech and writing functions as a form of ‘social practice.’ This means that a discourse constitutes situations, people, and objects of knowledge, but is also socially conditioned by them (Fairclough & Wodak, 1997: 258). In other words, discourse treats language not as a neutral medium, but as a form of social practice. Language does not merely reflect social and political reality but also constitutes it.

To capture these dynamics, this series draws on Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), and more specifically on the Discourse Historical Approach (DHA) in order to analyze racialization in populist discourse.

The Discourse-Historical Approach

The DHA is particularly well-suited for studying questions of racialization because the original purpose of the DHA was to examine racism and discrimination in the context of antisemitism (Reisigl, 2017: 44-45). What distinguishes DHA from other types of CDA is that it links linguistic analysis to broader political and historical contexts (Wodak & Reisigl, 2016: 583).

In practice, this means that DHA combines three levels of analysis: (1) identifying key topics within a discourse, (2) examining discursive strategies through which different groups are constructed, and (3) analyzing the linguistic means through which these strategies are realized (Reisigl & Wodak, 2016). This means paying close attention to how political actors name certain groups, what characteristics they attribute to them, how they justify these attributions, and how they position themselves in relation to them.

The Data

Empirically, the analysis focuses on parliamentary debates in the Netherlands that have as their main topic migration, Islam, terrorism, or radicalization, because these debates are most salient in terms of racialized constructions of ‘the people’ (de Koning, 2020; Silverstein, 2005; Selod & Embrick, 2013; Woodbridge et al., 2025). In terms of periodization, I look at the year 2015 when debates surrounding these topics were highly relevant due to the 2015 refugee crisis.

The analysis will be organized around two distinct but interrelated categories: ‘the people’ and “the Other.” These ‘Others’ can be further divided into two categories: the elite and the foreign Other. While the foreign Other typically only plays a role in right-wing populism (which is assumed to be exclusionary), it is included here as a separate category to allow for a systematic comparison between PVV and SP. This structure allows for a distinction between how ‘the people’ themselves are directly constructed, how ‘the people’ are (or are not) constructed in contrast to a foreign Other, and how ‘the people’ are constructed in opposition to ‘the elite’.

Identifying Racialization in Practice

Building on the earlier discussion of racialization (see the first article in this series), this study operationalizes it through three criteria.

Boundary-making: a distinction is drawn between ‘the people’ and others;
Essentialization: groups are portrayed as homogenous and defined by fixed characteristics;
Moral differentiation: these groups are evaluated in normative terms (e.g. as good, dangerous, inferior etc.)

By analyzing how these elements appear in populist discourse, it becomes possible to identify whether and how racialization happens, even without explicit mentions of race.

Looking Ahead

What happens when we apply this approach in practice?

In the next article, we turn to the empirical analysis and examine how Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV), a Dutch right-wing populist party, and Socialistische Partij (SP), a Dutch left-wing populist party, constructed ‘the people’ in parliamentary debates. By looking closely at how groups are named, described, and contrasted with others, we begin to see how different versions of ‘the people’ take shape. As we will see, while both parties drew on a populist logic separating ‘the people’ from ‘the elite,’ they constructed these boundaries in fundamentally different ways, raising important questions about how and when racialization enters populist discourse.

References

de Koning, M. (2020). “The racialization of danger: Patterns and ambiguities in the relation between Islam, security and secularism in the Netherlands. “Patterns of Prejudice, 54(1–2), 123–135. https://doi.org/10.1080/0031322X.2019.1705011

Fairclough, N., & Wodak, R. (1997). “Critical discourse analysis.” In: Discourse as Social Interaction (pp. 258–284). SAGE.

Reisigl, M. (2017). “The Discourse-Historical Approach.” In: J. Flowerdew & J. Richardson (Eds), The Routledge Handbook of Critical Discourse Studies (pp. 44–59). Routledge. https://www-taylorfrancis-com.proxy-ub.rug.nl/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781315739342-4/discourse-historical-approach-martin-reisigl?context=ubx&refId=5b29f8d0-009b-41bb-863b-946150a3bfc4

Reisigl, M., & Wodak, R. (2016). “The discourse-historical approach (DHA).” In: R. Wodak & M. Meyer (Eds), Methods of Critical Discourse Studies (3rd edn, pp. 23–61). SAGE.

Selod, S., & Embrick, D. G. (2013). “Racialization and Muslims: Situating the Muslim Experience in Race Scholarship.” Sociology Compass, 7(8), 644–655. https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12057

Silverstein, P. A. (2005). “Immigrant Racialization and the New Savage Slot: Race, Migration, and Immigration in the New Europe.” Annual Review of Anthropology, 34(Volume 34, 2005), 363–384. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.34.081804.120338

Wodak, R., & Reisigl, M. (2015). “Discourse and Racism.” In: D. Tannen, H. E. Hamilton, & D. Schiffrin (Eds), The Handbook of Discourse Analysis (pp. 576–596). John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118584194.ch27

Woodbridge, E., Vanhouche, A.-S., & Lechkar, I. (2025). “The racialization of radicalization and terrorism: Belgian political language on Muslims and Islam.” Ethnicities, 25(5), 701–723. https://doi.org/10.1177/14687968251329926

See other parts of the series

Part 1 — Constructing ‘The People’: The Role of Racialization in Dutch Populist Discourse

Part 3 — (De-)racializing ‘the People’: Who Is the Dutch Populist ‘People’?

Part 4: Rethinking the Nexus of Racialization and Populism: Lessons from the Study

People skating on the frozen canals at the crossing of Leidsegracht and Keizersgracht in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Amsterdam’s canals rarely freeze, allowing residents and visitors to walk and skate on the ice. Photo: Wessel Cirkel.

Part I — Constructing ‘The People’: The Role of Racialization in Dutch Populist Discourse

May 11, 2026

by ECPS_admin ECPS Youth Editor’s Choice Home Voice of Youth

In this incisive opening to a multi-part series, ECPS intern Lianne Nota interrogates one of the most taken-for-granted concepts in populism studies: “the people.” Moving beyond conventional definitions that treat the category as self-evident, she foregrounds racialization as a critical—yet often neglected—dimension in its construction. By shifting the analytical lens from race as a fixed attribute to racialization as a dynamic process of boundary-making, the study offers a conceptually rigorous and empirically grounded intervention. Focusing on the Dutch case, Nota situates populist discourse within broader debates on “new racism,” identity, and political representation. The series promises to advance the field by systematically examining how both right- and left-wing populist actors construct “the people” through implicit and explicit forms of differentiation.

By Lianne Nota*

Populism is everywhere in contemporary politics, from Europe to the Americas. At its core lies a simple but powerful idea: ‘the people’ should be at the center of politics (Canovan 1999). But who exactly are ‘the people’ and how are they constructed?

This question is more complicated than it seems. In much of academic literature, populism is understood as a ‘thin ideology’ that divides society into two camps: the ‘pure’ people and the ‘corrupt’ elite (Mudde & Kaltwasser, 2017). While this understanding captures something important, it often takes ‘the people’ for granted, overlooking the essentially contested and flexible nature of that category.

This four-part article series explores a crucial but often overlooked dimension of the construction of ‘the people’: racialization.

Beyond Race: Why Racialization Matters

While much has already been written on the people-centeredness of populism, this article series aims to focus the discussion on the construction of the populist ‘people’ through racialization. Using racialization as a concept instead of race, this series aims to avoid reifying race and emphasizes the inherent social constructedness of race (Small, 1994).

As such, racialization refers above all to a process through which differences between groups are constructed, whether cultural or biological. This understanding of racialization draws on the understanding that, nowadays, ‘new racism’ often uses culture and religion as proxies for race to create orders that resemble racial hierarchies, even in the absence of any explicit biological references (MacMaster, 2001). In addition, racialization often serves to subordinate a specific group (Woodbrige et al., 2025). This article series therefore uses racialization to refer to the discursive process of boundary-making by which (political) subjects are constituted and morally differentiated through the attribution of racial meanings, whether those are explicitly biological or not.

What Has Already Been Said?

Existing research on race and populism reflects the assumption that right-wing populism is inherently exclusionary while left-wing populism is inherently inclusionary (Mudde & Kaltwasser, 2013). As such, the relationship between race and right-wing populism has been addressed by numerous scholars (Krzyżanowski, 2018; Krzyżanowski, 2020; Thorleifsson, 2021; Mondon & Winteri, 2020), while the relationship between race and left-wing populism has been largely overlooked.

Following existing literature, this series does not make any assumptions about the conduciveness of either right- or left-wing populism to racialization. Instead, it asks the open-ended question: how do different populist actors construct ‘the people’ and to what extent does racialization play a role in that process?

Case Study: The Netherlands

To explore this question, we turn to the Netherlands, a country with a long history of both left- and right-wing populism. Interestingly, Dutch political discourse often avoids explicit references to race, favoring terms like ‘ethnicity’ or ‘culture’ (Essed & Trienekens, 2008). This makes the Netherlands a particularly interesting case study for studying how racialization can operate indirectly through seemingly neutral language.

What This Series Will Show

In the upcoming articles, we will work towards answering the puzzle of how Dutch populist actors construct ‘the people’ and, if so, how racialization plays a part in that process. Drawing on a series of Dutch parliamentary debates held in 2015 during the height of the refugee crisis, this series compares how/if Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV), a right-wing populist party, and Socialistische Partij (SP), a left-wing populist party, constructed ‘the people’ in racialized terms. The findings suggest that, while both parties mobilized a populist divide between ‘the people’ and ‘the elite,’ they differed significantly in how they constructed ‘the people,’ and only one party constructed the ‘people’ in racialized terms.

Let’s dive into existing literature on the role of race in populist politics first.

Where Is Race in Populism Studies?

We have already asked a deceptively simple question: who are ‘the people’ in populist politics? Surprisingly, within mainstream populist research, this question is not often framed in terms of race or racialization. To illustrate, let us take a look at the major handbooks on populism in scholarly literature. For example, the Oxford Handbook of Populism, contains no chapter on race, racism, or racialization, despite dedicating large parts of the book to ‘issue-centred’ discussions surrounding populism (Kaltwasser et al., 2017). Similarly, the Research Handbook on Populism and the Palgrave Handbook of Populism also do not systematically address race as a core issue in populist politics (Oswald, 2022). This relative silence suggests that race, racism, and racialization have not been regarded as central elements of populism within mainstream (theoretical) debates.

When research on the relationship between race and populism does exist, it mostly focuses on right-wing populist parties and movements.For example, Krzyżanowski (2018, 2020) argues that racist and xenophobic ideas have become normalized in Poland as a result of anti-refugee and anti-immigration rhetoric introduced by the Polish PiS party, a right-wing populist and nationalist party. This kind of research shows that culture and religion are often used as proxies for race to create orders that resemble racial hierarchies, even in the absence of any explicit biological references. This kind of cultural racism is sometimes called ‘new racism,’ to distinguish it from the biological racism that characterized the pre-1945 era (MacMaster, 2001). While this body of work has been crucial in drawing more attention to the role of race and racialization in populist ideology, it has also contributed to a relative neglect of how similar processes might (or might not) unfold beyond right-wing populist parties.

Two notable exceptions in this regard are worth mentioning. A study by Chazel and Dain (2021) found that left-wing populist movements may also draw on notions like ‘the homeland,’ albeit in more inclusive ways than their right-wing counterparts do. Drawing on narratives about belonging and national identity always engages in some exercise of boundary-making, introducing the possibility for racialization. In their study of Hugo Chávez’s political rhetoric, this leads Barreto and Maldonado (2025) to conclude that left-wing populism can also include racial rhetoric.

Therefore, rather than assuming a priori that left-wing populism is immune to racialization, this article series critically examines the role racialization plays in left-wing populism and whether this role differs from how racialization operates in right-wing populism. The next article turns to how we can study racialization empirically by outlining a discourse-analytical approach to this process.

References

Barreto, A. A., & Maldonado, D. (2025). Race and populism on the left: Political rhetoric in Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela. Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies, 20(3), 387–402. https://doi.org/10.1080/17442222.2024.2393506

Chazel, L., & Dain, V. (2021). “Left-Wing Populism and Nationalism: A Comparative Analysis of the Patriotic Narratives of Podemos and France insoumise.” Journal for the Study of Radicalism, 15(2), 73–94. https://www-jstor-org.focus.lib.kth.se/stable/48642382

Canovan, M. (1999). Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy. Political Studies, 47(1), 2–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9248.00184

Essed, P., & Trienekens, S. (2008). ‘Who wants to feel white?’ Race, Dutch culture and contested identities. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 31(1), 52–72. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870701538885

Kaltwasser, C. R., Taggart, P., Espejo, P. O., & Ostiguy, P. (Eds). (2017). The Oxford Handbook of Populism. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198803560.001.0001

Krzyżanowski, M. (2018). Discursive Shifts in Ethno-Nationalist Politics: On Politicization and Mediatization of the “Refugee Crisis” in Poland. Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies, 16(1–2), 76–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/15562948.2017.1317897

Krzyżanowski, M. (2020). Discursive shifts and the normalisation of racism: Imaginaries of immigration, moral panics and the discourse of contemporary right-wing populism. Social Semiotics, 30(4), 503–527. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2020.1766199

MacMaster, N. (2001). Racism in Europe, 1870-2000. Palgrave. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-4033-9

Mondon, A., & Winter, A. (2019). Whiteness, populism and the racialisation of the working class in the United Kingdom and the United States. Identities, 26(5), 510–528. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2018.1552440

Mudde, C., & Kaltwasser, C. R. (2013). Exclusionary vs. Inclusionary Populism: Comparing Contemporary Europe and Latin America. Government and Opposition, 48(2), 147–174. https://doi.org/10.1017/gov.2012.11

Mudde, C., & Kaltwasser, C. R. (2017). Populism: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. (1378915). https://research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=0a98f106-01e2-39bf-9f0c-7ff265fff45d

Oswald, M. (Ed.). (2022). The Palgrave Handbook of Populism. Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80803-7

Small, S. (1994). Racialised Barriers: The Black Experience in the United States and England in the 1980s. Routledge.

Thorleifsson, C. (2021). In pursuit of purity: Populist nationalism and the racialization of difference. Identities, 28(2), 186–202. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2019.1635767

Woodbridge, E., Vanhouche, A.-S., & Lechkar, I. (2025). The racialization of radicalization and terrorism: Belgian political language on Muslims and Islam. Ethnicities, 25(5), 701–723. https://doi.org/10.1177/14687968251329926

See other parts of the series

Part 2 — Studying “the People”: A Discourse-Analytical Approach to Populism

Part 3 — (De-)racializing ‘the People’: Who Is the Dutch Populist ‘People’?

Part 4: Rethinking the Nexus of Racialization and Populism: Lessons from the Study