Narratives of Power: Demagogues, Politics and Morality at the Start of the 21st Century

Abstract

One way of characterising the present political conjuncture - worldwide, not just in Europe and North America - is to point to the rise to power of politicians best described as demagogues. Trump, Duterte, Putin, Modi, as well as the leaders of Europe's neo-fascist racists (Alternative für Deutschland, the ONR in Poland, Fidesz in Hungary, France's Front National) have in common not just certain policies and attitudes, but, significantly, a political style: that of the demagogue. Thinking through that term, ‘demagogue', is instructive in helping us to understand this phenomenon, no less historically than politically.