The Populist Backlash: Challenging the Elites and the Utopia of the Market?

Populist parties are on the rise and manifest themselves in both populist radical left (PRL) and radical right (PRR) variants. The literature suggests that, despite different traditions, attaching ideologies and origins, these parties share the core people-centrist, anti-elitist and popular sovereignty features. Populist actors claim to represent the people against the elites and dangerous outsiders, i.e. those who threaten ‘society’. The current populist backlash seems to constitute a facet of what Karl Polanyi (1957) once referred to as the ‘double movement’. Populism is increasingly seen as a reaction against economic globalization and the ‘dis-embedding’ of the market from society. Populist parties mobilize against this globalized ‘market utopia’, targeting free trade, large businesses, cosmopolitan elites and financial international institutions and reaching out to economically challenged voters affected by economic globalization and the process of ‘denationalisation’ (Kriesi et al. 2008). Expanding on previous research (Akkerman et al. forthcoming), this paper explores the overlap between the PRR and the PRR. Populist voters are united by a common set of people-centrist and anti-elitist attitudes. Beyond the core features of populism, however, we focus also on economic attitudes, perceptions of economic globalization and support for European integration, and how these relate to electoral support for populist actors, arguing that these are part of the ‘global market utopia’ against which populist parties mobilize. The commonalities of populism are examined cross-nationally from two voter surveys conducted in France and the Netherlands. Both countries provide suitable cases where relevant populist parties are found in both their radical left and radical right manifestations. This study aims to assess the relationships of variants and/or common similarities of populism. We expect that PRR and PRL voters will share similar people-centred and anti-elite attitudes relating to their more profound distrust of the political system. In line with previous research, we expect PRR voters to be culturally exclusionist, showing in particular a significantly stronger opposition to immigration, while PRL supporters should exhibit more economically inclusive preferences (Akkerman et al, forthcoming; Mudde Kaltwasser 2013). We, however, also expect both PRL and PRR voters to converge on fears of globalisation and opposition to European integration. These findings have important implications for our understanding of the electoral dynamics of contemporary populism: if a sort of double movement is underway (or what Kriesi refers to as the move towards a demarcation cleavage) we would see an overlap between the PRR and the PRL overlap. But we also see that how the PRR and the PRL addresses this issue is also very different. Works Cited: Akkerman, A., Spruyt, B. Zaslove, A. (forthcoming) ‘We the People’ or ‘We the Peoples’? A Comparison of Support for Populist Radical Left and Populist Radical Right Parties’ Kriesi, H., Grande, E., Lachat, R., Dolezal, M., Bornschier, S., & Frey, T. (2008). West European politics in the age of globalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Polanyi, K. (1957). The Great Transformation:(the Political and Economic Origin of Our Time). Beacon Press.