Stigmatized identity motivating right-wing populism

Abstract

Since election night 2016, pundits and scholars have offered conflicting theories regarding the victory of Donald Trump. These explanations often fall into two broad categories: class politics and cultural politics. Did Donald Trump tap into and exacerbate latent anti-immigrant/racial resentment that simmers just below the surface for many Americans? Or were Trump supporters motivated by economic dislocation in primarily rural America brought about by globalization? The chapter offers a theoretical approach to understanding many Trump supporters and the attraction of right-wing populism that blends these two approaches. Building upon Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic capital, I argue that many Trump supporters base their support on the perceived value of their symbolic capital in relation to those they perceive as liberal, political, and cultural elites. These often-rural “deplorables” view their communities as suffering from deindustrialization that has favored the coastal, urban areas containing liberal elites advocating multiculturalism. However, instead of being silenced through symbolic violence, the deplorable label becomes the foundation for the fashioning of activist political identities. This perspective provides an effective means of suturing the nativism explanations of Donald Trump supporters with explanations favoring class dislocation. I draw upon interviews with North Carolina Tea Party supporters with whom I have conferred since 2011 and who only eventually became Trump supporters. Long-term engagement with Tea Partyists illustrates a similar outlook which shifted with the rise of Donald Trump. I argue that the similarities and shifts in Tea Partyists’ outlooks offer insight into the mobilization of right-wing populist movements.