Toward an Inclusive Populism? On the Role of Race and Difference in Laclau’s Politics

McKean, Benjamin L.

doi:10.1177/0090591716647771

Cited by 38 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 2 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…But Laclau's own populism is also deeply flawed, in another way that is equally revealing. Here I am not concerned with normative objections, for instance that his view ends up subordinating pluralism to unity in the final instance, despite his professed aim to the contrary, or that it eliminates critical standards of legitimacy (see McKean, 2016). This may be so, but I want to take an opposite tack.…”

Section: Constructivism And/or Realismmentioning

confidence: 95%

Populism, Cosmopolitanism, or Democratic Realism?

Meckstroth¹

2020

GJN

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article argues that populism, cosmopolitanism, and calls for global justice should be understood not as theoretical positions but as appeals to different segments of democratic electorates with the aim of assembling winning political coalitions. This view is called democratic realism: it considers political competition in democracies from a perspective that is realist in the sense that it focuses not first on the content of competing political claims but on the relationships among different components of the coalitions they work to mobilise in the pursuit of power. It is argued that Laclau’s populist theory offers a sort of realist critique of other populists, but that his view neglects the crucial dynamics of political coalition-building. When the relation of populism to global justice is rethought from this democratic realist angle, one can better understand the sorts of challenges each faces, and also where and how they come into conflict.

show abstract

Section: Constructivism And/or Realismmentioning

confidence: 95%

Populism, Cosmopolitanism, or Democratic Realism?

Meckstroth¹

2020

GJN

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Although often claiming to represent the people, by contrast, nonpopulists concede “that representation is temporary and fallible, that contrary opinions are legitimate, that society cannot be represented without remainder, and that it is impossible for one party or politician permanently to represent an authentic people apart from democratic procedures and forms” (40). Other recent accounts have stressed a similar exclusionary, moralistic logic as central to populism, linking it both theoretically and empirically to the erosion of democratic norms and institutions (Galston 2018; Levitsky and Ziblatt 2018; McKean 2016).…”

Section: Toward a Pluralist Approach To The Ethics Of Campaigns And Ementioning

confidence: 96%

An Adversarial Ethics for Campaigns and Elections

Bagg¹,

Tranvik²

2019

Perspect. polit.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Existing approaches to campaign ethics fail to adequately account for the “arms races” incited by competitive incentives in the absence of effective sanctions for destructive behaviors. By recommending scrupulous devotion to unenforceable norms of honesty, these approaches require ethical candidates either to quit or lose. To better understand the complex dilemmas faced by candidates, therefore, we turn first to the tradition of “adversarial ethics,” which aims to enable ethical participants to compete while preventing the most destructive excesses of competition. As we demonstrate, however, elections present even more difficult challenges than other adversarial contexts, because no centralized regulation is available to halt potential arms races. Turning next to recent scholarship on populism and partisanship, we articulate an alternative framework for campaign ethics, which allows candidates greater room to maneuver in their appeals to democratic populations while nevertheless requiring adherence to norms of social and political pluralism.

show abstract

“…For instance, as Benjamin McKean explains, Laclau's 'populist reason' is unable to accommodate the non-contingent role of 'racial resentment' in determining the modes of identification in which we invest. 73 In other words, Laclau's discursive field is far more 'socially uneven' and less open than he or his acolytes appear to recognise. If Laclau's vision of populism is premised on an attenuated conception of power, it also withholds from us any conceptual tools to make sense of how and why we build relations of solidarity.…”

Section: Populism As a Logic: The Abstraction And De-radicalisation Omentioning

confidence: 99%

Resisting the ‘populist hype’: a feminist critique of a globalising concept

Maiguashca

2019

Rev. Int. Stud.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The purpose of this article is to offer a feminist critique of populism, not as a distinct mode of politics, but as an analytical and political concept. As such, it seeks to redirect our attention away from populism, understood as a politics ‘out there’, towards the academic theoretical debates that have given this analytical term a new lease of life and propelled it beyond academic circles into the wider public discourse. In this context, the article develops two broad arguments. The first is that the two prevailing conceptions of populism are marred by anaemic conceptions of power, collective agency and subjectivity and, as such, are unable to present us with a convincing account of why this form of radical politics emerges in the first place, who its protagonists are, and how they come together in collective struggle. The second is that our current frenetic deployment of the term as a blanket descriptor for radical politics of all persuasions does not bode well for feminism politically. For both reasons, I conclude that feminists need to resist the current ‘populist hype’.

show abstract

Toward an Inclusive Populism? On the Role of Race and Difference in Laclau’s Politics

Cited by 38 publications

References 2 publications

Populism, Cosmopolitanism, or Democratic Realism?

Populism, Cosmopolitanism, or Democratic Realism?

An Adversarial Ethics for Campaigns and Elections

Resisting the ‘populist hype’: a feminist critique of a globalising concept

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About