It's one way of looking at it.
Palestine Action activists guilty of criminal damage
A drop in the ocean in the great schemes of things....but replicated by how many more
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Explanation for the rise in populism
(77 Posts)I have just been listening to TRIP USA. And they had a good article explaining the rise in populism in the USA which has been mirrored in the U.K. and other countries in Europe.
Put very simply.
Beginning with Bretton Woods, where many renowned economists met - including a Keynes - aiming to reconstruct the world economy and trade - the zeitgeist of the time argued after two devastating world wars, that countries who traded together did not go to war. The USA at the time had 2% of the total worlds population but 50% of the worlds trade, so of course Bretton Woods was certainly constructed to advantage the USA, but it also enabled other countries through trade relatively free from tariffs etc to develop and expand their own trade.
This was when many of the rules enabling free-ish trade were constructed. The USA dollar was pinned to gold during the initial period. So the 50s in the USA and Europe was a period of manufacturing, high employment and growing living standards, particularly in the USA where the working classes achieved a level of income and living standard un imagined during the 1930s.
There were notable exceptions to this - China being one country, constrained by a full communist economy, however when Xi took the chairmanship, he was ready to open up the Chinese economy to world capitalism, and Nixon decided that a lot of manufactured goods produced in the USA could be made far cheaper in China. “What about our jobs”? Said the w/c. Don’t worry they were told, you will be re-trained in the new technology etc
Nixon then allowed China to tie its currency to the us$. The global market took off with China becoming the workshop of the world, the city elite in the west becoming ever more wealthy but the result was devastation in many areas of the USA and U.K. This was the Reagan and Thatcher period, where wealth inequality grew like Topsy. Unions were hollowed out and whole towns were boarded up and emptied of working class jobs.
The promised re+training never happened, and people’s living standards stalled.
Things began to pick up for the w/c during the 2000s, and in the U.K. public services supported by the government - schools the NHS and other services thrived better than they had done for years.
Then came 2008 and the world economy came crashing down. People lost their homes and jobs and were back to square 1.
Governments seem to flounder with little answer to the unemployed and ill-housed.
Enter Trump -stage right. He “got” the grievances of the working class, who saw the elite getting wealthier and wealthier each year that passed, and immigrants willing to do the w/c jobs at a much cheaper rate than the indigenous w(c were either willing or able to afford.
“Make America Great Again” harks back to the period of the 50s and 60s when the w/c had good manufacturing jobs in all sorts of industries and the wealth inequality was at a reasonable standard.
This TRIP USA argues is why populists like Trump (and I think in the U.K. and wider Europe) has won the vote with the siren call of more jobs, crushing the elite snd stopping immigration.
Of course we know that in the end it will all come crashing down, but I think it is a pretty convincing argument as to why populism has taken such a hold on the (particularly) w/c population.
Sorry this is rushed and simplistic, but hopefully you get the drift of their argument.
I read your posts Maizie but I read other people's as well, and my comment was in response to one made by WWM2
MaizieD
^Voters with low integrity will have no qualms about voting for a politician with low integrity. Look at the success of Boris Johnson.^
Which is exactly what I said a few posts ago, MOnica. I suspect you don’t read my posts…
Is it because I insist on arguing about economics (which is at the very heart of the rise of populism though I’ve tried to steer clear of such an obvious point)
The article on which this thread is based said exactly that.
“It is the economy - stupid”
Allsorts
How can anyone compare Boris Johnson with Trump, ridiculous. Trump is dumping Europe, he thinks like Putin. We should be very worried.
Did you not notice that Johnson dumped Europe, too?
(and please don’t try that specious Leavers’ argument about the ‘EU not being all of Europe)
Voters with low integrity will have no qualms about voting for a politician with low integrity. Look at the success of Boris Johnson.
Which is exactly what I said a few posts ago, MOnica. I suspect you don’t read my posts…
Is it because I insist on arguing about economics (which is at the very heart of the rise of populism though I’ve tried to steer clear of such an obvious point)
reosted related
On another thread I linked to a video which discussed our obsession with growth and reosted it to cargo-cultism - something I had never heard of before. I feel it could equally be a description of populism - with some caveats.
A cargo cult creates the illusion of progress by copying symbols of success rather than addressing underlying mechanisms. While not identical to populism, cargo-cult dynamics appear within populist movements when they rely on symbolic, ritualistic actions or promises disconnected from practical reality. You can summerise Cargo-cultism as:
1. People or institutions copying visible practices, strategic plans, corporate structures, political slogans, without grasping the underlying logic.
2. Success is believed to come from performing certain rituals or using certain symbols rather than doing the hard structural or analytical work.
3. It relies on belief rather than evidence.
4. It can create strong collective identities.
I was thinking of Johnson’s complete lack of integrity when I gave him as an example.
We know he is a compulsive liar, but there are a lot of other questions hanging over his head, that have yet to be answered, including his questionable friendship with a KGB general, - just like Trump and Farage - Russia is always in the background.
Allsorts
How can anyone compare Boris Johnson with Trump, ridiculous. Trump is dumping Europe, he thinks like Putin. We should be very worried.
Trump doesn't think - at least in a coherent way. Next week Europe will be his bestie, the week after.....
Putin doesn't just run rings around Trump, he strolls round casually and Trump's thinking is coonfused.
Whatever else pne may say about Boris, he is a very clever man, but misuses his talents.
The BBC website has an article about how prepared the U.K. is for war😬
How can anyone compare Boris Johnson with Trump, ridiculous. Trump is dumping Europe, he thinks like Putin. We should be very worried.
MaizieD
M0nica
Whitewavemark2
But my point was that why on earth would you vote for someone whose moral integrity is so very low - regardless of their politics?
Who says low moral ingrity is limited to politicans. i would say it is evenlyspread throughout the population.
I don’t see the relevance of your comment, MOnica.
All sorts of undesirable traits are evenly spread throughout the population but I don’t see why we should tolerate them in our politicians.
Voters with low integrity will have no qualms about voting for a politician with low integrity. Look at the success of Boris Johnson.
nanna8
I don’t know,really. Slating ‘populism’ sounds rather snobbish to me.
Populism= populat= majority. Perhaps we should rethink ‘democracy’ if we castigate populism. It is interesting that it tends to be associated with the right wing just now. I actually now associate it with left wing people who go on pro Palestinian marches .
It isn’t meant in a “snobbish” way - it is just a word used by say academics like sociologists or political scientists to describe what happens when a charismatic but very divisive figure and usually from the extreme ends of politics say the far right or left who get voted in. They are characterised as promising to deal with the “others” (like Trump and “clear the swamp”) but never really achieve any promise that make the people’s lives better who voted for them.
I don’t know,really. Slating ‘populism’ sounds rather snobbish to me.
Populism= populat= majority. Perhaps we should rethink ‘democracy’ if we castigate populism. It is interesting that it tends to be associated with the right wing just now. I actually now associate it with left wing people who go on pro Palestinian marches .
M0nica
Whitewavemark2
But my point was that why on earth would you vote for someone whose moral integrity is so very low - regardless of their politics?
Who says low moral ingrity is limited to politicans. i would say it is evenlyspread throughout the population.
I don’t see the relevance of your comment, MOnica.
All sorts of undesirable traits are evenly spread throughout the population but I don’t see why we should tolerate them in our politicians.
Yes but pretty important in a country’s leader I would have thought. Or at least it is something that would go towards my decision on how to vote.
Whitewavemark2
But my point was that why on earth would you vote for someone whose moral integrity is so very low - regardless of their politics?
Who says low moral ingrity is limited to politicans. i would say it is evenlyspread throughout the population.
Perhaps some of the answer lies in what they see and read about various politicians. If media mega moguls are all promoting the same name, with constant coverage, on all of their platforms, much of that will sink in, to the minds of the voting public.
But but, we all hold different ideas of integrity, etc. I honestly can't believe that anyone would fall for Polanski, every red flag waving in my view, but other people think differently.
When you’ve lost your job/ home/ health insurance because your country has out sourced your job and there’s no indication that those jobs arnt coming back any time soon the integrity of the person who is promising you a better life doesn’t enter your head.
As I said in a previous post, I listened to these people ( the poor and jobless) Some were asked what they thought of Trumps principles, their answers, i couldn’t care less
These people can’t afford principals.
But my point was that why on earth would you vote for someone whose moral integrity is so very low - regardless of their politics?
Whitewavemark2
But, but , but they don’t - get things done. Trump is busy making things worse for the W/C
But when you vote for someone you cannot see into the future to see how they will govern. Now manypeople who voted for Trump are turning against him and his support is shrinking fast - just as happened to Boris Johnson
It will be interesting to see how the Reform party vote holds up inthe next election when so many people will have had the experience of local councils who have not reduced local government expenditure because there was no waste and most of the spending is statutory
But, but , but they don’t - get things done. Trump is busy making things worse for the W/C
What I don’t understand is why they are willing to vote for someone like Trump and Farage with such moral vacumns. I felt exactly the same about Johnson - why on Earth vote for such a poor examples of a human being?
There is a section of the population who set very little store by rules and morality and are delighted to cheer on politicians who they feel they can relate to because the politicians break the rules, too.
They admire leaders who can ‘get things done’ and aren’t fussy about how they ‘get things done’ as long as ‘things get done’ quickly.
M0nica yes I think you are correct.
There are many sections of the electorate who are dissatisfied with politics and the current cohort of politicians.
Along comes a charismatic figure, promises them the world, they vote, and more chaos ensues…
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