What Is Populism?

'This lucid guide is essential reading' Guardian 
 
From Donald Trump to Recep Erdogan, populists are on the rise across the globe. But what exactly is populism? 
 
Should everyone who criticizes Wall Street or Washington be called a populist? What precisely is the difference between right-wing and left-wing populism? Does populism bring government closer to the people or is it a threat to democracy? Who are "the people" anyway and who can speak in their name? These questions have never been more pressing. 
 
In this provocative book, Jan-Werner Müller argues that at populism's core is a rejection of pluralism. Populists will always claim that they and they alone represent the people and their true interests. Contrary to conventional wisdom, populists can govern on the basis of their claim to exclusive moral representation of the people: if populists have enough power, they will end up creating an authoritarian state that excludes all those not considered part of the proper "people". Proposing a number of concrete strategies for how liberal democrats should best deal with populists, Müller shows how to counter their claims to speak exclusively for "the silent majority". 
 
*Updated with a new afterword*

This lucid guide is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand leaders such as Trump and Chávez

In this essential book, Müller defines populism's most salient characteristics --antielitism, antipluralism, exclusivity -- and explains Trump and other populists through that framework. It is a quick read, and worth every page

Populism is not just antiliberal, it is antidemocratic -- the permanent shadow of representative politics. That's Jan-Werner Müller's argument in this brilliant book. There is no better guide to the populist passions of the present

No one has written more insightfully and knowledgeably about Europe's recent democratic decay than Jan-Werner Müller. His depiction of populism as democracy's antipluralist, moralistic shadow is masterful

An exceptionally intelligent book about a notoriously slippery, yet essential, political concept. Jan-Werner Müller's sweeping critique of populism will both instruct and challenge anyone who seeks to understand the roots and nature of the political conflicts that are roiling Europe and the United States

Michael Kazin, author of The Populist Persuasion: An American History

Jan-Werner Müller is Professor of Politics at Princeton University and the author of several books, most recently Contesting Democracy: Political Ideas in Twentieth Century Europe. He contributes regularly to London Review of Books, the Guardian, and the New York Review of Books.

Jan-Werner Müller

Books by Jan-Werner Müller

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter