The populist uprisings in the U.S. and Europe have aroused fears for the future of liberal democracy. The concerns aren’t misplaced, but the threat is well understood. One mistake is to assume that all forms of populism are alike, and dangerous in the same way.
Populism sustains President Donald Trump in the U.S. and Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Hungary; it drove Britain’s vote to quit the European Union, and put the Five Star Movement and Matteo Salvini’s far-right League in charge of Italy.
These movements are populist by definition. They stand for ordinary people against a failed establishment not just a failed government, but a discredited ruling class. All populists are fed up with politics-as-usual, expert orthodoxy, received opinion and elite purveyors of all of the above.
Thanks to globalization and open borders which hurt the many citizens they were supposed to help.
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