Abstract
Among the various perspectives developed to engage with populism, the stylistic approach offers a unique set of tools to capture the repertoire of populist communication. This chapter makes the case for this critical and interdisciplinary perspective at the intersection of political science and performance studies, showcasing the specific form populism takes on the global stage. Its first section provides a general discussion of the relevance of describing populism as a style, that is an open-ended repertoire of political performances, characterised by three core clusters: (1) performances of identity, (2) transgression, and (3) crisis. Its second section focuses on populist performances of identity, examining the performative articulation of the populist triad: the people, the elite and the populist leader, and discusses how these performative constructs are used for the political communication of politicians embracing populism on the global stage. After elaborating on the form taken by each of these three dimensions from an IR perspective, this chapter concludes with a plea to go beyond state-centrism and to consider the emergence of transnational and global uses of populism, notably in the communication of green political actors defending the global people in their fight against the climate crisis.
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This chapter was written as part of a project which received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska grant agreement n°945380.
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Aiolfi, T. (2023). Performing the Populist Repertoire on the Global Stage: A Critical Approach to IR and Populist Communication. In: Lacatus, C., Meibauer, G., Löfflmann, G. (eds) Political Communication and Performative Leadership. The Palgrave Macmillan Series in International Political Communication. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41640-8_11
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