Populism has gotten a bad rap over the years. It is used in a loose fashion by those in the media. Many have gone so far as to identify it with fascism, and a fascism grossly defined. Populism is as rich as fascism is awfully misconstrued by equating that particular philosophy with the tragic figures of Hitler and Mussolini. While I don't intend to justify fascism, I think that politicians and journalists alike would do well to reevaluate their understanding of its philosophy. Same goes for Populism. It is with the latter that I am concerned here.
Populism is rather broad. One can be right-wing, centrist, or left-wing, and still be classified a populist. At its core, it is little more than a view of society in terms of rivalries. It recognizes the reality of class distinctions, unjust inequalities, and the will to power. Typically, populists (at least in America) have taken aim at the social and economic injustices being done by a small group of people over against the general populace. They see a danger in oligarchy and plutocracy. They acknowledge the threats that a powerful and wealthy elite have on a people who lack both the political tools and financial resources to defend themselves from the onslaught.
This is especially seen when discussing trade, immigration, and multiculturalism. It is here that the will of the few appear to be imposed upon the public at large. Whether it is the damaging cost of free trade upon American workers, mass immigration (both legal and illegal) changing the culture, or mandatory multicultural sensitivity training, we see the minority elite imposing their ideology upon an unwilling and resentful populace.
Whether or not one likes those most commonly identified with populism (i.e., Lou Dobbs, Pat Buchanan, Thomas Flemming, Ralph Nader, Theodore Roosevelt), they cannot deny that much of what they say has roots in political and economic realism. The ideologues may see populist economic nationalism and a rigid non-interventionism as things of the past, but the numbers, both of lost jobs to so-called free trade and lost lives to imperialist adventures around the globe, speak for themselves. Numbers never lie, and the numbers are there for all to see. We don't need Ross Perot's charts, we need look no further than our paychecks and the ever growing number of those who have lost well-paying jobs to people in China, Mexico, and India.
However the political tides turn, one this is for certain, populism is on the rise. Some may call it reactionary, and they may be right. But it isn't a blind knee-jerk reaction to political phantoms and economic illusions. The reaction is a gut feeling that what they see and feel is very real, and that what they see and feel is reflected in the language of the populists.
