Right-wing Populist Discourse Research Articles

Europe versus Islam?: Right-Wing Populist Discourse and the Construction of a Civilizational Identity

:This article reveals the ways in which five populist parties in Europe (AfD in Germany, FN in France, PVV in the Netherlands, M5S in Italy, and Golden Dawn in Greece) employ the fear of Islam as a political instrument to mobilize their supporters and to mainstream themselves. The study is conducted through a discourse analysis of the speeches and manifestos of the aforementioned parties. Following the depiction of each political party, the article displays some of quotations from the fieldwork conducted in the Spring of 2017 to be able to explicate their common tropes about their Islamophobic, migrant-phobic, and diversity-phobic discourses of the supporters of populist parties. The main premise of the work is to claim that these parties have recently generated a civilizational discourse in order to expand their electorate.

Religion, Cleavages, and Right-Wing Populist Parties: The Italian Case

:The political science literature analyzing the genetic profile of European political parties has mainly focused on the salience, for the identity of today’s parties, of four social cleavages rooted in European history: among them, a religious/secular cleavage created by the birth of the modern national state. However, in the past two decades, some contributions about new party types developed after the end of the Cold War have hypothesized the existence of new cleavages, based on materialist/post materialist sets of values and on the acceptance or rejection of globalization and Europeanization processes. This article will work on this latter hypothesis, by highlighting how some European parties, previously secular or focused on the “traditional” religious cleavage, are increasingly using religion-related arguments in the context of a civilizational stance focused on anti-globalization and anti-EU discourses, but most of all on the idea of migrants and Muslims as a threatening other. The second section of the paper will focus on the Italian case and on the development of a right-wing populist discourse on religion by the Lega Nord party.

”De står som en besætning i et fremmed land.” - Racekrig, besættelse og højrepopulistisk historiepolitik

The article discusses one of the ways in which the politics of history is performed by contemporary Western European right-wing populism. This discussion is conducted with reference to Michel Foucault’s analysis of the historical discourse on ’racial war’ of the 17th and 18th centuries. It is argued that, in its most basic features, this discourse is not simply a historically delimited discourse, but a specific form of critique which survives in modified forms within modernity and one of whose contemporary versions is the anti-establishment discourse of right-wing populism. Specifically, the article discusses how the theme of ’occupation’ so central to the discourse on racial war is re-articulated in two instances (Danish and French) of current right-wing populist discourse, not simply with reference to current ’mass immigration’, but also with reference to experiences of occupation during World War II. The article concludes that the age-old theme of occupation is here integrated into a new politics of history which basically concerns the questions of the responsibility for and the heritage from totalitarianism.

Chapter 5: Fake News and Alternative Facts – A Constructivist Critique of the Current Right-Wing Populist Will to Truth

This chapter focuses on rhetorical strategies employed in right-wing populist discourses like the talk about “fake news” and “alternative facts” most prominently used in the Trump campaign and in the first year of his presidency. We discuss what is at stake in current politics regarding the relation between power and truth and propose some perspectives for critical reflection. First, we explore the concept of truth from a pragmatist and constructivist perspective. We argue that there is a fundamental and necessary distinction between relativism and arbitrariness. Second, we consider the role of facts and scientific results in culture and society and the role that markets play in the distribution and dissemination of information and beliefs in a consumer society. We refer to Foucault’s critical concept of the “will to truth” in order to argue that there are standards and procedures regarding facts and beliefs in modern society – e.g., practices that have shown their relative success in the hard and soft sciences – that must be defended against arbitrary assults by right-wing propaganda. We conclude by considering the necessary connection between a plurastic concept of truth and democratic politics in the face of the current right-wing attempts to establish a regime of truth that is fundamentally detrimental to democracy.

Don’t Look Now

Don’t Look Now

A Critical Review of Recent Literature on Populism

This is a review article of the following five recent studies on populism: 1) Ruth Wodak’s <em>The Politics of Fear: What Right-Wing Populist Discourses Mean</em> (Sage, 2015); 2) Benjamin Moffitt’s <em>The Global Rise of Populism: Performance, Political Style and Representation</em> (Stanford University Press, 2016); 3) Cas Mudde and Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser’s <em>Populism: A Very Short Introduction</em> (Oxford University Press, 2017); 4) Jan-Werner Müller’s <em>What is Populism?</em> (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016); and 5) John B. Judis’ <em>The Populist Explosion: How the Great Recession Transformed American and European Politics</em> (Columbia Global Reports, 2016). The review argues for a return to early Frankfurt School Critical Theory to address some of the shortcomings of these studies.

The Border as a Resource in Right-wing Populist Discourse: Viktor Orbán and the Diasporas in a Multi-scalar Europe

ABSTRACT Europe and now the United States are characterized by the growing presence of populist parties and leaders able to attract a significant share of the electorate. The successful strategy of right-wing populist politicians consists in proposing a series of discourses based on a differentiation between an endangered “Us” and a threatening “Them.” The protection of the “Us” community from the evil “Them” is often expressed through the necessity of closing the national border. This measure is a key discursive resource incorporated in their speeches. However, is the border only presented by right-wing populist leaders as a boundary which has to be controlled, securitized, and sealed? Based on the analysis of discourses produced by Viktor Orbán, the only long-standing European populist leader in power, the research shows that right-wing populist discourses can be based on opposed and complementary conceptions of the state border to entrench the opposition between “Us” and “Them.”

Wodak, Ruth (2015). The Politics of Fear: What Right-Wing Populist Discourses Mean

Wodak, Ruth (2015). <i>The Politics of Fear: What Right-Wing Populist Discourses Mean</i>

Book review: Ruth Wodak, The Politics of Fear: What Right-Wing Populist Discourses Mean

Book review: Ruth Wodak, <i>The Politics of Fear: What Right-Wing Populist Discourses Mean</i>

Book review: Ruth Wodak, The Politics of Fear: What Right-wing Populist Discourses Mean

Book review: Ruth Wodak, <i>The Politics of Fear: What Right-wing Populist Discourses Mean</i>

Populist discourses in the Hungarian public sphere

AbstractExtendingLaclau’s (2005)claim to the importance of ‘populism’ for a democratic politics, I argue that the ‘we’, when issued from a left-wing position around ‘empty signifiers’, must be informed by an inclusionary logic. In my critical study of the Hungarian Government’s right-wing populist discourses, I show that their billboard campaign in 2016 against the European Union’s migrant quota articulates the ‘we are not like them’ exclusionary distinction of ‘against and over’. Through Judith Butler’s category of vulnerability and Mary Matsuda’s relative distinction between immediate and indirect targets of exclusion, I explore the inclusionary logic of the campaign by the Two-Tailed Dog Party. I demonstrate that a non-identitarian collective subject "from below" in their alternative left-wing populism is made possible by the power of irony that may sidestep the mobilising force of fear that should legitimise the Government’s agenda.

The “Tweet Politics” of President Trump

Abstract This study explores how U.S. President Donald Trump employs Twitter as a strategic instrument of power politics to disseminate his right-wing populist discourse. Applying the discourse-historical approach to critical discourse analysis, this article analyzes the meaning and function of Trump’s discursive strategies on Twitter. The data consists of over 200 tweets collected from his personal account between his inauguration on January 20, 2017 and his first address to Congress on February 28, 2017. The findings show how Trump uses an informal, direct, and provoking communication style to construct and reinforce the concept of a homogeneous people and a homeland threatened by the dangerous other. Moreover, Trump employs positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation to further his agenda via social media. This study demonstrates how his top-down use of Twitter may lead to the normalization of right-wing populist discourses, and thus aims to contribute to the understanding of right-wing populist discourse online.

Wodak, Ruth (2015). The Politics of Fear. What Right-wing Populist Discourses Mean

Wodak, Ruth (2015). The Politics of Fear. What Right-wing Populist Discourses Mean

Different Types of Right-Wing Populist Discourse in Government and Opposition: The Case of Italy

Does right-wing populist discourse change when parties move from opposition to government? How do different ideological types of right-wing populist parties express this discourse? Through an analysis of the Lega Nord and Forza Italia/Popolo della Libertà between 2006 and 2013, we find that while the switch to office does bring some changes, the main elements of their populist discourse remain largely the same. We also show how their respective emphases on ‘elites’ and ‘others’ distinguish the parties: FI/PDL focuses overwhelmingly on ‘elites’ while the LN places similar emphasis on both ‘elites’ and ‘others’.

Intersections and Inconsistencies. Framing Gender in Right-Wing Populist Discourses in Austria

The paper contributes to the discussion on (re)framing processes of gender equality focusing in particular on right-wing populist discourses in Austria. Our frame analysis of 50 texts published by four right-wing (extremist) parties and movements reveals that traditional (family) values, women's “free choice”, and LGBT rights play important roles in right-wing populist (re)framing processes of gender equality. Our data also show notable inconsistencies with regard to the meanings attached to gender and gender equality within the discourses studied. For instance, right-wing populists are, on the one hand, concerned with the protection of “the traditional family”—which means being against e.g. same-sex marriage and emphasizing women's wish to stay at home. On the other hand, these same actors argue against immigration by using gender arguments in a different and even contradictory manner, claiming that e.g. Muslim men are bound by their “culture” to discriminate women and LGBT people. Our intersectional approach, analytically focusing on different meanings that gender equality acquires at the intersections with ethnicity, nationality, religion/culture, and sexuality, shows that within right-wing populist discourses inconsistencies in the framing of gender and gender equality arise in relation to the shifting meanings attributed to the essential dichotomy of “us” versus “them”. While the discursive construction of antagonistic positions is essential for right-wing populism, the groups/people designated to fill these “slots” might differ according to topic. We argue that “intersectionality from above” is one of populists' instruments to gloss over inconsistencies and to (re)frame gender equality in an on-going process of (re)negotiations of meanings.

The Tea Party and the Crisis of Neoliberalism: Mainstreaming New Right Populism in the Corporate News Media

Within months of Barack Obama's election, a putatively grass-roots conservative uprising emerged to challenge the Democratic Party's agenda. In this article, we analyze the role of cable news in the rise of the Tea Party during the current “crisis of neoliberalism”—a moment of political-economic volatility brought about by the Great Recession. We argue that the Tea Party's political purpose is to hold together the New Right coalition of business elites and white working- and middle-class Americans that undergirds the neoliberal political project. In the context of a deregulated corporate mass media, we show that both “right-wing” and “moderate” cable networks mainstreamed the Tea Party by framing it as a legitimate social movement, enabling the widespread projection of right-wing populist discourse in support of neoliberalism. In light of our study, we suggest that democratizing the mass media is crucial for a sustained progressive political response in the United States.