The literature on populism in the 21st century often assumes that far-right leaders draw their support from voters who have lost out to globalisation. This is the case among low-skilled, white workers in Global North democracies, including the United States. But, there are also meaningful occurrences of backlash against the political establishment and liberal values in parts of the Global South that have clearly benefited from the post-Cold War trade openness. For instance, two of the largest democracies in the developing world have been shaken by right-wing movements that came to power with the support of the winners of economic liberalisation. In Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, a former army captain, won the presidency in 2018 with the support of agribusiness exporters …

I have had a laminated image pinned, stuck, or otherwise attached to various office walls for many years, since 2003 indeed, as I’ve moved between roles and institutions this has been one constant. The image is from the cover of Mute Magazine, Issue 26. It is a line drawing depicting a desk, on it a Macintosh PowerBook G4, Apple’s then state of the art portable computer – around it are drawn scenes from the global anti-capitalist struggles of the period. There is a picture of Sub-Commandant Marcos of the Mexican Zapatistas, in iconic balaclava, smoking a pipe and looking away into the mid-distance. There is another picture of workers in a field of GM crops, and one of a high-tech …

YouTube is a prime space for the communication of the hundreds, if not thousands, protests that have taken place around the world since mandatory measures were introduced by governments to contain the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. From New York to Tokyo and from London to Sydney, protesting social distancing, face coverings, lockdowns and vaccines is caught up in hours of video footage by protesters themselves, passersby, and reporters, featuring as content for the YouTube channels of major international news agencies. According to a recent publication in Harvard’s Misinformation Review, such videos often serve as a backdrop for commentary out which emerge “participatory cultures of conspiracy theory knowledge production and circulation”. Here, I would like to shed light on a …

The latest mass uprisings in Thailand have driven a wedge between people who remained complacent towards the status quo and people who sought to upend what they saw as conservative authoritarianism by resorting to rally politics. The latter wished to take matters into their own hands and steer the country in a more democratic direction as faith in mainstream political actors dwindled. Should marginalized civil-society actors not take drastic measures, future political trajectories will remain shrouded in conservative mist. A military coup in 2014 had enabled the conservative establishment to tighten its grip on the country’s politics. This is not a one-off incident but a recurring pattern in Thailand’s modern history. Via military coups, conservative forces have always found a …

For the last two decades, observers and scholars of Latin American politics have wondered about the electoral fate of the left. Some analysts in particular have highlighted how the end of the ‘Pink-tide’ precipitated the comeback of right-of-centre governments across the region. But in this regard, Mexico has been running in dissonance to its regional counterparts. The right-of-centre parties Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) and then the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) occupied the executive office from 2000 to 2018 while most Latin American countries turned to either a radical or a reformist left.  Now, however, left-of-centre Andres Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) and his National Regeneration Movement (MORENA) hold the Mexican presidency. To delineate what the future might hold for AMLO, we can look to the previous experience of the …

Italy’s post-war political system is not new to dramatic government changes and sudden reversals of fortunes. The experience of the first populist experiment in government thus far is no exception. The elections of March 4th, 2018, were nothing short of a political earthquake. The most dramatic result was the success of the Five Star Movement (M5S). The political formation, created by comedian-turned-guru Beppe Grillo and led by his former lieutenant Luigi Di Maio, became the strongest party in Parliament with 32.7% of votes, wooing voters away from Matteo Renzi’s PD. On the right, the League took over Berlusconi’s Forza Italia as the main political party, winning over 17% of votes. This ‘sorpasso’ emboldened Salvini to break with the electoral pact …

Even though Hungarians vote this Sunday, April 8th, this piece is not on the Hungarian parliamentary elections per se. Whilst the initial idea was to write a short summary of the state of the opposition to prime minister Viktor Orbán, I had to quickly realize that the average Western news consumer hardly knew anything about Hungary. Hence presupposing very little knowledge about the ins and outs of Hungarian politics, I will try to challenge some of the assumptions and myths extolled in recent news articles on the Hungarian elections by giving you some additional, contextual information. Myth #1: Hungary is an outright illiberal state Despite their thoroughly liberal roots, Fidesz – the larger party in the current government coalition in …

The Five Star Movement is one of the most interesting political ‘experiments’ on political landscape of Western democracies. Once again Italy, which with Berlusconi has experienced Trumpism before Donald Trump, is a political laboratory for novel political phenomena that the world looks at, with a mixture of concern and excitement, to learn something about the future of our democratic systems. Only five years ago Beppe Grillo, a stand-up comedian and the founder of the Five Star Movement (M5S), launched his parole guerriere (warlike words) and M5S obtained a remarkable 25% of the national vote in its first electoral showing. Italian voters again expressed loudly and clearly their preference for the Five Star Movement in last weekend’s general election. The M5S not …