The Nine Ps of Digital Populism as a Chameleonic Political Marketing Strategy

In this commentary, Dr. Ana Filipa Joaquim develops a political-marketing framework for understanding the adaptive power of digital populism. Drawing on her book “The Age of Digital Populism,” she argues that populism’s “chameleonic” character lies in its ability to alter themes, leadership images, and audience appeals while preserving a recognizable antagonism between “the people” and their opponents. At the center of the analysis is a nine-P model—People, Polarization, Propaganda, Personification, Performance, Propagation, Precision, Permanence, and Participation—which connects symbolic positioning with the circulation and reproduction of political narratives. The framework highlights how adaptability, repetition, audience segmentation, leadership, and participation interact across digital environments, while distinguishing communicative visibility from persuasion, electoral success, and governing competence.

By Ana Filipa Joaquim

Introduction

The conceptual diversity of populism research raises a question about how a politically recognizable phenomenon accommodates different ideological commitments and communicative environments. Drawing on The Age of Digital Populism – How Disinformation and Propaganda Are Transforming Politics, this article examines populism through an interdisciplinary political marketing perspective. Its argument is that populism’s chameleonic capacity allows themes, leadership images and audience appeals to change while sustaining a recognizable antagonistic relationship between the people and their opponents. 

The nine Ps model identifies the interconnected practices through which this adaptability becomes strategically meaningful: People, Polarization, Propaganda, Personification, Performance, Propagation, Precision, Permanence and Participation. The framework connects symbolic positioning with the circulation and reproduction of political narratives. It offers an interpretative contribution, with European illustrations, while distinguishing communicative visibility from persuasion, electoral success and governing competence.

Conceptual Disagreement and An Interdisciplinary Perspective

Populism occupies a central place in political debate without having acquired a single, universally accepted academic definition. Its frequent use as a term of political criticism compounds the problem: a label employed to discredit opponents can become detached from analytical criteria. In A era do populismo digital, this conceptual difficulty provides the starting point for examining the connections between political meaning, strategic communication and mobilization (Joaquim, 2026: 23–27).

The disagreement concerns the analytical status of populism as well as its defining features. Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser (2017) conceptualize it as a thin-centered ideology organized around a moral opposition between the people and the elite. Laclau (2007) approaches it through the discursive construction of a collective political subject and the articulation of demands. Moffitt (2016) foregrounds political style, embodiment and performance. Weyland’s (2017) political-strategic approach emphasizes personalistic leadership and its relationship with followers. These perspectives locate populism in different, sometimes competing, dimensions of political life.

Conceptual plurality does not mean that scholarship has failed to identify meaningful patterns. It indicates that ideological content, discourse, leadership and mediated performance cannot simply be treated as interchangeable objects. The question is how to examine their relationships without assuming that one perspective exhausts the phenomenon. Sorensen’s (2021) integration of ideology, performance and mediation supports the relevance of this broader communicative enquiry.

An exclusively classificatory debate can therefore be complemented by a question about strategic practice: how are social grievances translated into recognizable political offers, directed towards particular audiences and sustained through repeated interaction? Moving beyond a narrowly disciplinary reading of populism makes political marketing useful here. This broadens political analysis through attention to audience relationships, symbolic value and communication. It does not require abandoning ideological differences or treating citizens as equivalent to commercial consumers.

There is also an established basis for this connection. Winder and Tenscher (2012) examine populism as a political marketing technique concerned with communicative relationships, organization and mobilization. Lees-Marshment (2011) situates political marketing within strategic engagement with public expectations. The present argument draws these concerns together through the nine Ps model developed in Joaquim (2026). Conceptual disagreement alone does not establish that populism is marketing; the analytical justification lies in the strategic construction, differentiation and circulation of its political offer.

Chameleonic Adaptability as a Strategic Resource

The book explicitly identifies populism’s chameleonic nature as a source of political strength (Joaquim, 2026: 55). The metaphor describes adaptation with continuity. Populist actors can change the themes they priorities, the identities they invoke and the opponents they designate while retaining an antagonistic account of legitimate representation. Its flexibility concerns how the political division is expressed and made relevant within particular circumstances.

This interpretation is compatible with the thin-centered ideological approach. A limited ideological core can attach itself to different political projects, helping explain why populism is not confined to a single ideological family (Mudde & Rovira Kaltwasser, 2017). It is also consistent with the book’s distinction between cultural, socioeconomic and anti-establishment configurations. These overlap in practice, allowing identity, material insecurity and institutional distrust to be combined in different proportions (Joaquim, 2026: 67–77).

The European illustrations clarify this flexibility without establishing a uniform strategy. The book discusses national identity in France’s Rassemblement National, or National Rally, and the combination of anti-corruption, cultural and socioeconomic appeals in Portugal’s Chega. The themes differ in emphasis, but both can be organized through a morally charged distinction between a deserving community and those represented as responsible for its predicament (Joaquim, 2026: 76–77, 111–113). These examples illustrate how national specificity shapes political communication.

From a marketing perspective, this adaptability involves the construction of perceived relevance. A political offer acquires value when it gives recognizable expression to grievances, offers belonging and identifies an apparently intelligible response. Positioning distinguishes that offer from established alternatives, while leadership and recurring symbols help maintain recognition. Changing an emphasis from insecurity to corruption need not dissolve the broader narrative if both are presented as consequences of an unresponsive or illegitimate establishment.

Adaptability does not imply the absence of ideology or unlimited freedom to change. As the book stresses, emotion reconfigures the experience of ideology rather than simply replacing it (Joaquim, 2026: 31–36). Historical conditions, institutional arrangements and existing political commitments shape the available appeals. The marketing perspective explains how these materials are organized in relationships with audiences; it cannot, by itself, explain every source of political dissatisfaction.

Chameleonic strength thus rests on a tension between variation and recognizability. Messages must respond to changing concerns while preserving enough continuity to sustain identification. The nine Ps make this relationship analytically accessible by connecting the definition of a political community with the practices through which its narrative is embodied, distributed and repeatedly renewed.

The Nine Ps as an Integrated Marketing Strategy

The model comprises People, Polarization, Propaganda, Personification, Performance, Propagation, Precision, Permanence and Participation. Developed in Chapter 15 of the book, these dimensions constitute an interpretative framework rather than a linear campaign sequence (Joaquim, 2026: 129–150). Their relevance derives from their interdependence. The preceding discussion of political marketing supplies the connection to segmentation, positioning, branding and the construction of symbolic value (Joaquim, 2026: 105–114). The nine Ps reorganize these concerns around the distinctive communicative practices of digital populism.

People identifies the collective subject in whose name the political project speaks. This is a discursively constructed community, endowed with moral legitimacy and boundaries of belonging. Its strategic importance lies in offering citizens a position within the narrative: their experiences become evidence of what has happened to the community. The political offer consequently combines proposed action with recognition. As different grievances gain prominence, the representation of the people can adjust without abandoning the claim to speak for a legitimate collective subject (Joaquim, 2026: 130–132).

Polarization gives that community an antagonistic relationship with its opponents. Differences become moralized, allowing political choices to be experienced as affirmations of identity. Within the model, this concerns a communicative practice of constructing conflict, not an independently measured level of polarization across society. Its strategic function is to distinguish the political offer through an intelligible attribution of responsibility. The relevant analytical question is how disagreement is transformed into a distinction between legitimate representatives and actors presented as undeserving of recognition (Joaquim, 2026: 132–134).

Propaganda organizes the problems through which antagonism acquires urgency. Selection, emphasis and dramatization can turn complex circumstances into emotionally charged interpretations. Entman’s (1993) account of framing clarifies the importance of defining problems and attributing responsibility. The book treats corruption, insecurity and immigration as recurrent themes through which this process operates. Propaganda may involve real grievances interpreted selectively; fabrication is not a necessary condition. Its place within the model is to connect attention with a politically consequential understanding of what is wrong and who should answer for it (Joaquim, 2026: 134–135).

Personification concentrates the political offer in a recognizable leader. Image, biography and public conduct become resources through which a complex organization acquires an accessible identity. The book discusses André Ventura’s centrality to Chega as an illustration. The leader can provide continuity across changing themes because audiences recognize the person through whom the project is represented. Yet this concentration also creates dependency: damage to individual credibility can destabilize the wider narrative. Personification therefore combines an opportunity for identification with organizational vulnerability (Joaquim, 2026: 136–138).

Performance concerns how the narrative is enacted through gesture, tone, confrontation and staged proximity. Moffitt’s (2016) analysis of political style helps explain why the form of a political intervention matters to its reception. Informality or an emotionally intense appearance may support a perception of authenticity, even when carefully constructed. In this model, performance means communicative enactment, distinct from electoral results or governing effectiveness. Personification identifies the figure who embodies the offer; performance concerns the experience through which audiences encounter that figure and attach meaning to the message (Joaquim, 2026: 138–140).

Propagation concerns the circulation of messages across platforms, social networks and mediated encounters. Supporters, journalists and other intermediaries can extend the visibility of material beyond its original audience. Sharing also allows messages to be reinterpreted, so strategic circulation is not reducible to organizational control. The book relates propagation to the interaction between emotional engagement and platform visibility, while recognizing the role of informal networks. The dimension identifies how a political offer acquires communicative reach. That reach remains distinct from persuasion or evidence of electoral support (Joaquim, 2026: 140–142).

Precision describes the adjustment of content, tone and framing to particular audiences through segmentation and data use. This provides a direct connection between chameleonic adaptability and marketing practice: different concerns can be addressed through differentiated appeals within a recognizable narrative. Precision concerns the intended fit between a message and an audience; it does not certify targeting accuracy or imply that every campaign has equivalent technical capabilities. Its democratic significance lies partly in visibility, since citizens may encounter different political promises without being able to scrutinize the complete range of appeals (Joaquim, 2026: 142–144).

Permanence refers to sustained narrative presence through repeated themes, symbols and interpretations. The repetition need not be literal. Wording and format may change while preserving a familiar account of political responsibility. Research on illusory truth demonstrates that repetition can influence perceived truthfulness (Fazio et al., 2015), although this does not establish the effects of any particular campaign. Permanence gives the model a temporal dimension: recurring interpretations can become the frame through which subsequent events are understood. Its effectiveness remains conditional, since repetition can also generate saturation and fatigue (Joaquim, 2026: 144–146, 186).

Participation incorporates audiences into the reproduction of political meaning. Reactions, comments, shares and user-generated content can express belonging, extend circulation and supply visible signals of approval. It overlaps with propagation but identifies a distinct relationship: citizens contribute to the visibility and perceived legitimacy of the narrative. Their activity can also provide feedback that informs subsequent communication. Participation may broaden access to political expression while reinforcing homogeneous communities. Interaction counts therefore cannot be treated as measures of informed deliberation or representative public endorsement (Joaquim, 2026: 146–148).

Adaptation and Reinforcement Across the Nine Ps

The model’s interpretative value lies in the relationships among its dimensions. The construction of the people supplies a political identity, and polarization establishes the conflict within which that identity acquires significance. Propaganda selects problems that connect the conflict with recognizable experiences. Personification and performance give the offer an identifiable presence, while precision and propagation concern its adjustment and circulation. Permanence sustains recognition over time, and participation supplies further opportunities for amplification and renewal.

The connection between precision and permanence is particularly important to the chameleonic argument. Differentiated messages need not repeat identical language to sustain the same interpretation of political life. Appeals organized around corruption, economic insecurity or cultural threat can reproduce a common distinction between the community and those held responsible for its difficulties. Adaptation concerns the immediate appeal; continuity can reside in the underlying attribution of legitimacy and blame (Joaquim, 2026: 76–77, 142–146).

Participation helps connect this variation with visible social validation. When supporters share or reinterpret messages, they contribute to their persistence and can make them appear socially endorsed. Further interaction may then encourage additional circulation. This relationship explains why analyzing a single post, leader or engagement total captures only part of the communicative process. The framework directs attention to recurring connections among meaning, audience activity and visibility (Joaquim, 2026: 121–127, 146–148).

Such integration does not require a centrally controlled apparatus. Political organizations make strategic choices, but users and intermediaries can reproduce or modify messages autonomously. The book’s account of decentralized circulation prevents the marketing interpretation from becoming a claim that every manifestation results from deliberate planning. Strategy operates within an environment that political actors can influence without fully controlling.

Disinformation and the Limits of Communicative Success

Disinformation can reinforce several dimensions of this strategy, connecting distorted claims with established grievances, recognizable leaders and repeated circulation. It is therefore examined across the relationships among the Ps. The distinction between deliberate deception and unintentional error remains necessary (Wardle & Derakhshan, 2017). Neither emotional intensity nor the use of marketing techniques is sufficient to classify a message as disinformation. Propaganda, deception and strategic distribution have related but analytically distinguishable functions (Joaquim, 2026: 95–118).

The explanatory limits are equally important. The framework synthesizes the book’s conceptual argument and illustrative European discussions; it does not present a new dataset or a comparative test of the nine dimensions. The available material does not establish the independent contribution of each P to persuasion or electoral outcomes. The analysis concerns strategic organization and plausible relationships among practices, with attention to their contextual conditions.

The book also identifies vulnerabilities associated with communicative success. Leadership dependence can turn personal credibility into organizational fragility; repetition can produce exhaustion; simplified promises can become difficult to sustain when confronted with governing responsibilities (Joaquim, 2026: 185–187). Chameleonic adaptability does not remove these tensions. A capacity to revise a message cannot be assumed to supply the institutional competence required to address the problem it describes.

Democratic assessment consequently extends beyond whether a strategy attracts attention. It concerns whose grievances acquire recognition, whose membership is denied, how differentiated appeals can be scrutinized and whether visible participation supports informed judgement. The book’s discussion of media literacy, platform transparency and political accountability addresses these connected concerns (Joaquim, 2026: 201–207). The analytical task is to understand how communication organizes influence while retaining criteria for evaluating its consequences.

Conclusion

The absence of a single academic conceptualization of populism creates a case for analytical dialogue across disciplines. Its chameleonic capacity makes political marketing particularly useful for examining how varied political contents are organized into recognizable offers of belonging and representation. The nine Ps specify the practices through which this organization acquires communicative form. Their contribution lies in connecting adaptation with continuity, and strategic intention with audience participation. Approached in this way, digital populism can be analyzed as a marketing strategy whose strength depends on sustaining identification across changing circumstances, while its effects remain contingent and its democratic consequences require scrutiny.

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References

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