Eli5 what is populism?
In: Other
As others have stated, it’s an appeal to “the population at large” rather than “elites”. But those descriptions leave a lot to be desired.
Populism is about appealing to groups that believe they best represent a country’s population, and othering groups that don’t belong to that group. The groups that are othered get painted as elites or foreign agents that have no right to an opinion on how things should work. Populism generally involves a leader suggesting they’re the only one capable of representing the will of the public, and that traditional checks and balances only serve the elite and will get in the way of delivering the things the people want, i.e. the leader will need to consolidate power in order to be effective.
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