[Special Feature: How to Understand Populism] Theory and Some Prospects of Left-Wing Populism

Let us begin by looking back at recent political circumstances. First, there is the growth of "right-wing populism" with xenophobic tendencies in Europe, the US, and South America, as represented by the 2016 US presidential election, the Brexit referendum in the UK, and the Orbán administration in Hungary. Generally speaking, these movements have succeeded in garnering support by adopting authoritarian tendencies and deploying discourse that treats immigrants as enemies. On the other hand, attention has been focused on the movements of "left-wing populism" that oppose recent neoliberal austerity policies and call for fairer redistribution, including the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) in Greece and "Podemos" in Spain, as well as Corbyn of the British Labour Party, Mélenchon of La France Insoumise, Bernie Sanders in the US, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Left and right populism have jumped into the political vacuum created after neoliberalism. In such a situation, whether for better or worse, there is no doubt that "populism" is a keyword of contemporary politics.

Generally, the term "populism" may evoke images of demagoguery that incites the public by spreading rumors, or right-wing discourse that scapegoats minorities and spreads xenophobic rhetoric. However, as mentioned in the previous examples, the formula "populism = right-wing" is not necessarily accurate. As was the case with the "People's Party," the original populist party that appeared in the US in the 19th century, populism was originally supposed to be a force that sides with "the people" in weak positions and opposes elites and vested interests. In that sense, populism is deeply related to left-wing traditions and, furthermore, cannot be completely separated from democracy. The force that attempts to position and embrace populism within such a tradition is "left-wing populism."

Now, the movement of "left-wing populism" is theoretically supported by Chantal Mouffe, a political theorist from Belgium. The publication of Mouffe's "For a Left Populism" (Akashi Shoten, translated by the author [co-translation], 2019) threw a stone into the controversial situation surrounding populism. That said, left-wing populism also has a prehistory. In this article, before examining left-wing populism theory, I would like to quickly confirm "agonistic democracy" as its theoretical prehistory. This is because when left-wing populism is discussed in the current political climate, it is accompanied by considerable misunderstanding and lack of understanding, which I believe is leading to a somewhat confused situation.

Since the 1990s, Chantal Mouffe has developed a model of agonistic democracy that emphasizes conflict and antagonism over reconciliation and consensus, while criticizing the theory of deliberative democracy. To summarize that position in one word, it is not a deliberative democracy that forms consensus through discussion, but rather finds the nature and significance of democracy in the fact that such consensus formation always fails and opinions never come together. From this standpoint, Mouffe criticized deliberative democracy for excluding the possibility of dissent in advance and erasing "pluralism" in politics.

The unique part of Mouffe's theory is that it views democracy as a conflict between "adversaries." An "adversary" is distinguished from the liberal notion of a "competitor" or an "enemy" as an object of destruction. An adversary is certainly a kind of opponent, but they are an enemy who fights with legitimacy and acknowledges the basic principles of liberal democracy. Therefore, democracy is a struggle between adversaries who have accepted the basic principles of liberal democracy. There, a certain consensus may be reached after conflict, but it is only a "temporary consequence of a certain provisional hegemony," what could be called a "conflictual consensus," an extremely unstable agreement that is constantly open to new struggles.

The outline of Mouffe's agonistic democracy is as stated above. Nevertheless, in recent years, Mouffe has abandoned this position and has begun to actively develop left-wing populism. How should we think about this shift?

Perhaps it is for the following reason. As terms like post-truth and fake news have been attracting attention recently, it has become increasingly difficult for people to share information and discuss it while examining it together. In such a situation, the bottom has fallen out of the "deliberation or agonism" debate, and the "space for speaking" itself, which should be the foundation of democracy, has now been lost. In such a situation, it will first be essential to reconstruct a public space for speaking. Furthermore, under the recent neoliberal hegemony, more and more people are being forced into economically difficult situations. That is why Mouffe likely set aside the position of agonistic democracy for a moment and put forward a "left-wing populist strategy." Mouffe had long argued that criticizing middle-of-the-road political lines (for example, the "Third Way" of Tony Blair and Anthony Giddens) and reviving the axis of conflict between the left and right is essential to prevent people's affects from being mobilized by the far right and to radicalize democratic politics, but that axis of conflict has now become top versus bottom. This is how Mouffe's theoretical change can be explained.

Now, let's grasp the key points of "For a Left Populism." The basic line of Mouffe's left-wing populist strategy is this: the neoliberal austerity policies promoted by the European Union and national governments have created a new rule by the few (oligarchy). The middle class has withered, the majority of people have been politically neutralized, and liberal democracy is now in a "post-democratic" situation. In this phase, the left must appeal to a populist strategy to unite forces against the establishment and restore liberal democracy.

In addition, to list a few points, first, Mouffe positions her left-wing populism as "radical reformism." That is, unlike "pure reformism" which accepts the current neoliberalism, or "revolutionism" which seeks a radical break, "radical reformism" is said to seek a hegemonic formation to replace neoliberalism while accepting the principles of legitimacy of liberal democracy. To that extent, left-wing populism seems much more moderate than its name suggests.

The second point is the re-evaluation of the nation-state as a stage for hegemonic struggle. According to Mouffe, the nation-state is still a crucially important space for democracy and popular sovereignty, and is "the place where a collective will should be constructed to resist the effects of post-democracy." However, this is presented not as following the right-wing identification of the nation, but as "mobilizing people toward patriotic identification, which is the best and more egalitarian aspect of national traditions" (p. 97). However, it seems undeniable that this direction, which could be called "strategic nationalism," carries the risk of being absorbed into right-wing xenophobia. For this reason, it is said to be in a subtle state of tension with movements such as Yanis Varoufakis's DiEM25, which aims for international left-wing solidarity.

Thirdly, Mouffe had long emphasized the role of passions in democracy, but in this book, that is developed by relying on Spinoza. According to this, the call of left-wing populism needs to be made not only through rational explanation but in a way that provokes people's emotions and resonates with everyday feelings. As Spinoza stated, "An affect cannot be restrained or removed except by an opposing and stronger affect." This is the basic intuition of left-wing populism theory.

Fourthly, let us also note that Mouffe is critical of lottocracy (sortition-based democracy), which has been attracting attention in recent years. Mouffe criticizes lottocracy theorists for reducing representation to elections and failing to see that political parties and representative systems play an important role in making social antagonisms visible and in the "institutionalization of the agonistic dimension." Furthermore, since people form their identities through the discursive frameworks presented by political parties, representative systems are essential in politics. Therefore, "selection by lot, far from being a procedure to establish a better democracy, would promote the idea that politics is about respecting individual opinions, freeing individuals from the burden of constitutive social relations" (p. 80).

Finally, it is also important that ecological issues will become a central issue of the left-wing populist strategy. Mouffe recognizes the importance of combining ecological issues with social issues, and this direction corresponds to the trends of the left in Europe today. According to Mouffe, "an ambitious and well-planned ecological project has the potential to present an attractive vision of a future democratic society" (pp. 84-85). She also shows an optimistic outlook that if a left-wing populist strategy can be developed around this issue, it may even be possible to draw in sectors that are currently integrated into the neoliberal block.

Now, while left-wing populism seeks the restoration of democracy and fair redistribution of wealth, looking at real-world politics, it is actually facing a considerable struggle. First, the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) in Greece, which gave a premonition of the dawn of the era of left-wing populism by taking power in 2015, lost in the 2019 general election and fell to the second party. Similarly, Podemos in Spain, which made great strides in the 2015 general election, has not shown the same momentum as before, although it recently joined a coalition government. Furthermore, the British Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn had attracted attention for its ties to the Momentum movement, but it is still fresh in our memory that it suffered a crushing defeat to the Conservative Party in the election at the end of 2019.

In this way, left-wing populism has not been able to win people's support as successfully as its theory loudly proclaims. In some Western countries, far-right parties are gaining even more momentum, and left-wing populism is not showing as much presence as before. There are several possible reasons for this, but one that can be mentioned is that the vision presented by left-wing populism remains extremely "common sense." For example, in the previous UK election, while the Conservative Party developed its campaign around the clear and empty slogan "Get Brexit Done," Corbyn of the Labour Party took a "neutral" position on the withdrawal issue. In other words, the Labour Party had failed to show a sufficient alternative to the current administration.

However, while some tones mock the left-wing populist strategy following Corbyn's defeat, saying "I told you so," I would say there is another way to look at this. That is, what if the problem with the left-wing populist camp is not because it is left-wing populism, but because it "lost because it was not left-wing populist enough"? While more detailed analysis of election results in each country is required, it is a bit premature to conclude that left-wing populism has become strategically invalid.

For the time being, how much support Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and others can expand in the 2020 US presidential election is likely to be a watershed. In Japan, "Reiwa Shinsengumi," which won two seats in last year's House of Councillors election, is said to be close to the position of Western left-wing populism, and I would like to pay attention to whether it will further expand its support in the future.