The Latin-American discussion about populism has a long a rich tradition. Since the election of the so called progressive governments in the region there have been numerous contributions to the debate, especially with regard to Ernesto Laclau´s concept of populism. However, one of the earliest critics to his approach was already formulated by Portantiero and de Ìpola in 1981, in which they observe a kind of organicist hegemony that characterizes existing populist governments.
The paper investigates this aspect of populism in the case of the kirchnerist government in Argentine. Using Antonio Gramsci´s concept of common sense it explores the representations of kirchnerist militants and sympathizers about the government through 18 problem-centered interviews. The paper argues that their representations contain a very specific idea of the state, which structures their vision about politics.
