Donald Trump, Silvio Berlusconi, Marine Le Pen, Viktor Orbán - populists are becoming more and more successful worldwide. But what exactly is populism? What is the difference between left-wing and right-wing populism? Does populism bring governance closer to the people, or does it pose a threat to democracy? Who exactly are "the people" and who can speak for them? These questions are particularly pressing today.
According to Jan-Werner Müller, professor of political science at Princeton University, the essence and greatest danger of populism is that it rejects pluralism, i.e. the competing diversity of values ​​and views. Populists believe that only they represent the real interests of the people. And when they gain power, they build an authoritarian state from which they exclude everyone who is not considered to belong to "the people". The comprehensible and provocative writing presents the phenomenon of populism through historical examples, reveals the deeper reasons for its success, and also offers a practical strategy for what supporters of democracy should do with populists.