Books on Populism

For a year or two I've looked at books on populism that did not go to one or the other side, supporting populists or at least populism as beneficial or then going full anti Trump. This Moffitt book so far has been the only one, even from academia. It only goes to 2016. The tea party movement is well described, birthers and anti Obama feel bubbling under. Trump is not covered, as the book focuses mostly on Europe and Latin America and does not go past 2016. Sarah Palin makes a brief appearance.

Populism is not always active in day to day politics, but occasionally will color the entire year with shades of discontent. This happened with the banking crisis 2008. Somebody was doing terrible things. They have to be held accountable!

A paragraph will explain more on the scope of this book.

It's quite readable, and the first page of text captures quite well the views of the populist right: the elites and unelected bureaucrats are running "our" country, so they are angry. It gives good historical background. The chapter on populism and democracy catalogs the academic views on populism, positive and negative. From the negative side, it is pointed out that in elections the populist parties may be large parties, even larger than the other two or three if we are in Europe. The populist leaders and their followers always seem to subjugate the other parties and any minority groups to their rules.

One thing that got pointed out is that like everything in the world of the Internet and media, even popular movements might not be genuine, but manipulated from the very start.

Other authors seemed to be too happy with populism as a force. This book does describe what happened in recent times, but with not much criticism. The chapter titled Protest in the Age of Populism is worth reading. Covers grass roots activism, which on the right got funded by the Koch brothers.

Anne Applebaum covers Brexit and Europe well but not so much the US. Her examples are from the 1970s.