Populist Söylem, Yapısal Dönüşümler ve Temsiliyet Krizi

Öz

Popülizm ideoloji, söylem ya da bir siyaset tarzı olarak ele alınmaktadır. Bu makalede popülizm, popülizmin eklemlendiği unsurlar ve popülist hareketlerin ortaya çıkmasına neden olan yapısal dönüşümler, Ernesto Laclau'nun popülizm teorisi ve söylem analizi aracılığıyla ele alınmaktadır. Bu yaklaşım, popülizm çalışmalarına üç farklı açıdan katkı sağlamaktadır. İlki, popülizmi bir ideoloji olarak kabul etmek yerine bir siyaset etme biçimi ve stratejisi olarak benimsemesidir. İkincisi, tek ve nesnel bir halk kavramı olmadığını ve halkın söylem yoluyla farklı anlamlarda kurgulanabileceğini ortaya koymasıdır. Dolayısıyla popülist hareketlere atfedilen homojen halk tahayyülü, yalnızca sağ popülistlerin harekete geçirdiği bir mit olarak görülmelidir. Halk kavramını çoğulcu ve demokratik bir özne olarak inşa etmek de mümkündür. Söylem analizinin üçüncü katkısı, popülizme zemin hazırlayan yapısal dönüşümler ile popülist hareketlerin bu dönüşümlere ve krizlere yükledikleri anlamları irdelemesi ve popülistlerin bunları stratejilerine nasıl uyarladıklarını sorunsallaştırmasıdır. Dolayısıyla bu çalışma popülizmi söylem olarak değerlendiren yaklaşımdan hareketle, popülizmi bir yandan siyasi bir strateji olarak anlamaya çalışırken öte yandan da popülizmin ortaya çıkmasına, güçlenmesine ve Avrupa'da yayılmasına neden olan yapısal nedenleri incelemeyi amaçlamaktadır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Popülizm
• Ernesto Laclau
• Temsiliyet krizi
• Söylem

Populism, Structural Transformations, and Crisis of Representation

Abstract

Populism can be conceptualized as an ideology, discourse, or style of politics. Employing Ernesto Laclau's theory of populism and discourse analysis, this study deconstructs the meanings and articulations of key political concepts within populist discourse and reflects on the structural transformations that precipitate the emergence of populist movements. The discursive approach contributes to populism studies in three distinct aspects. First, it conceptualizes populism as a form of politics and strategy rather than an ideology. Second, it demonstrates that there is no single, objective concept of the people, but rather that this notion can be constructed with various meanings through discourse. Consequently, the homogeneous imagination of the people attributed to populist movements should be viewed as a myth mobilized primarily by right-wing populists. It is equally possible to construct the concept of the people as a pluralistic and democratic subject. Third, discourse analysis examines the structural transformations that pave the way for populism and the meanings that populist movements attribute to these transformations and crises, while problematizing how populists adapt these interpretations to their strategies. This article, drawing on the discursive approach, aims to understand populism as a political strategy while examining the structural causes that lead to its emergence, strengthening, and proliferation in Europe.

Keywords

• Populism
• Erneston Laclau
• Crisis of Representation
• Discourse

References

1. Akkerman, T. (2015). Immigration policy and electoral competition in Western Europe: A fine- grained analysis of party positions over the past two decades. Party Politics, 21(1), 54–67.
2. Art, D. (2011). Inside the radical right: The development of anti-immigrant parties in Western Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
3. Aslanidis, P. (2016). Populist social movements of the Great Recession. Mobilization: An International Quarterly, 21(3), 301–321.
4. Berman, S. (2021). The causes of populism in the West. Annual Review of Political Science, 24(1), 71–88.
5. Berman, S., & Snegovaya, M. (2019). Populism and the decline of social democracy. Journal of Democracy, 30(3), 5–19.
6. Betz, H.-G. (1994). Radical right-wing populism in Western Europe. London: Macmillan.
7. Betz, H.-G. (2003). Xenophobia, identity politics and exclusionary populism in Western Europe. Socialist Register, 39, 193–210.
8. Bonikowski, B., & Gidron, N. (2016). The populist style in American politics: Presidential campaign discourse, 1952–1996. Social Forces, 94(4), 1593–1621.

9. Brubaker, R. (2017). Why populism? Theory and Society, 46, 357–385.
10. Brubaker, R. (2020). Populism and nationalism. Nations and Nationalism, 26(1), 44–66.
11. Bugaric, B. (2019). The two faces of populism: Between authoritarian and democratic populism. German Law Journal, 20(3), 390–400.
12. Canovan, M. (2005). The people. Cambridge: Polity.
13. De Cleen, B. (2017). Populism and nationalism. In C. R. Kaltwasser, P. A. Taggart, P. Ochoa Espejo, & P. Ostiguy (Eds.), Handbook of populism (pp. 342–362). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
14. De Cleen, B. (2019). The populist political logic and the analysis of the discursive construction of “the people” and “the elite.” In J. Zienkowski & R. Breeze (Eds.), Imagining the peoples of Europe: Populist discourses across the political spectrum (pp. 19–42). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
15. De Cleen, B., & Stavrakakis, Y. (2017). Distinctions and articulations: A discourse theoretical framework for the study of populism and nationalism. Javnost - The Public, 24(4), 301–319.
16. Eatwell, R., & Goodwin, M. (2018). National populism: The revolt against liberal democracy. Milton Keynes: Pelican Books.
17. Fennema, M., & Van der Brug, W. (2007). What causes people to vote for a radical right party? A review of recent work. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 19(4), 474–487.
18. Fraser, N. (2019). The old is dying and the new cannot be born: From progressive neoliberalism to Trump—and beyond. New York: Verso.
19. Giddens, A. (1991). Modernity and self-identity: Self and society in the late modern age. Cambridge: Blackwell Publishing.
20. Gidron, N., & Bonikowski, B. (2013). Varieties of populism: Literature review and research agenda. Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, Working Paper No. 0004.
21. Glynos, J., & Howarth, D. (2007). Logics of critical explanation in social and political theory. London: Routledge.
22. Habermas, J. (1996). Between facts and norms. Cambridge: MIT Press.
23. Halikiopoulou, D., Mock, S., & Vasilopoulou, S. (2013). The civic zeitgeist: Nationalism and liberal values in the European radical right. Nations and Nationalism, 19(1), 107–127.
24. Heinisch, R. (2003). Success in opposition–failure in government: Explaining the performance of right-wing populist parties in public office. West European Politics, 26(3), 91–130.
25. Hobolt, S. B. (2016). The Brexit vote: A divided nation, a divided continent. Journal of European Public Policy, 23(9), 1259–1277.
26. Ignazi, P. (2003). Extreme right parties in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
27. Inglehart, R. (1977). The silent revolution: Changing values and political styles among Western publics. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
28. Inglehart, R. F., & Norris, P. (2016). Trump, Brexit, and the rise of populism: Economic have- nots and cultural backlash. HKS Working Paper No. RWP16-026. Retrieved from https://papers.ssrn. com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2818659 (Accessed: July 10, 2024).
29. Jones, K. (2021). Populism and trade: The challenge to the global trading system. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
30. Judis, J. B. (2016). The populist explosion: How the great recession transformed American and European politics. New York: Columbia Global Reports.
31. Katsambekis, G. (2020). The populist surge in post-democratic times: Theoretical and political challenges. The Political Quarterly, 88(2), 202–210.
32. Katsambekis, G. (2022). Constructing ‘the people’ of populism: A critique of the ideational approach from a discursive perspective. Journal of Political Ideologies, 27(1), 53–74.
33. Kioupkiolis, A. (2016). Podemos: The ambiguous promises of left-wing populism in contemporary Spain. Journal of Political Ideologies, 21(2), 99–120.
34. Kriesi, H. (2014). The populist challenge. West European Politics, 37(2), 361–378. Laclau, E. (2005). On populist reason. New York: Verso.
35. Laclau, E. (1990). New reflections on the revolution of our time. London: Verso. Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (1985). Hegemony and socialist strategy. New York: Verso.
36. Lefort, C. (1988). Democracy and political theory. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
37. Mazzoleni, G., & Schulz, W. (1999). “Mediatization” of politics: A challenge for democracy? Political Communication, 16(3), 247–261.
38. Machiavelli, N. (1996). Discourses on Livy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (Trans. N. Tarcov & H. Mansfield).
39. McCormick, J. P. (2011). Machiavellian democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.
40. Mendes, M. S., & Dennison, J. (2021). Explaining the emergence of the radical right in Spain and Portugal: Salience, stigma and supply. West European Politics, 44(4), 752–775.
41. Milanovic, B. (2016). Global inequality: A new approach for the age of globalization. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
42. Milanovic, B. (2019). Capitalism, alone: The future of the system that rules the world. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
43. Minkenberg, M. (2000). The renewal of the radical right: Between modernity and anti- modernity. Government and Opposition, 35(2), 170–188.
44. Moffitt, B. (2016). The global rise of populism: Performance, political style and representation. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
45. Moffitt, B. (2015). How to perform crisis: A model for understanding the key role of crisis in contemporary populism. Government and Opposition, 50(2), 189–217.
46. Moffitt, B., & Tormey, S. (2014). Rethinking populism: Politics, mediatisation and political style. Political Studies, 62(2), 381–397.
47. Mondon, A. (2014). The Front National in the twenty-first century: From pariah to republican democratic contender? Modern & Contemporary France, 22(3), 301–320.
48. Moran, M., & Littler, J. (2020). Cultural populism in new populist times. European Journal of Cultural Studies, 23(6), 857–873.
49. Mouffe, C. (2018). For a left populism. New York: Verso Books.
50. Mudde, C. (2004). The populist zeitgeist. Government and Opposition, 39(4), 541–563.
51. Mudde, C. (2007). Populist radical right parties in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
52. Mudde, C. (2019). The far right today. Cambridge: Polity Press.
53. Mudde, C., & Kaltwasser, C. R. (2012). Populism and (liberal) democracy: A framework for analysis. In C. Mudde & C. R. Kaltwasser (Eds.), Populism in Europe and the Americas (pp. 1–27). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
54. Mudde, C., & Kaltwasser, C. R. (2017). Populism: A very short introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
55. Müller, J.-W. (2016). What is populism? Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press.
56. Norris, P., & Inglehart, R. F. (2019). Cultural backlash: Trump, Brexit and authoritarian populism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
57. Ostiguy, P. (2009). The high-low political divide: Rethinking populism and anti-populism. Committee on Concepts and Methods Working Paper Series, 35(4).
58. Panizza, F. (2005). Introduction: Populism and the mirror of democracy. In F. Panizza (Ed.), Populism and the mirror of democracy (pp. 1–31). New York: Verso.
59. Piketty, T. (2017). Capital in the twenty-first century. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
60. Pirro, A. L. P. (2014). Populist radical right parties in Central and Eastern Europe: The different context and issues of the prophets of the patria. Government and Opposition, 49(4), 600–629.
61. Plattner, M. F. (2010). Democracy’s past and future: Populism, pluralism, and liberal democracy. Journal of Democracy, 21(1), 81–92.
62. Rooduijn, M. (2014). The mesmerising message: The diffusion of populism in public debates in Western European media. Political Studies, 62(4), 726–744.
63. Rydgren, J. (2007). The sociology of the radical right. Annual Review of Sociology, 33, 241– 262.
64. Saward, M. (2006). The representative claim. Contemporary Political Theory, 5, 297–318.
65. Stavrakakis, Y. (2004). Antinomies of formalism: Laclau’s theory of populism and the lessons from religious populism in Greece. Journal of Political Ideologies, 9(3), 253–267.
66. Stavrakakis, Y., & Katsambekis, G. (2014). Left-wing populism in the European periphery: The case of SYRIZA. Journal of Political Ideologies, 19(2), 119–142.
67. Streeck, W. (2015). Why the euro divides Europe. New Left Review, 95, 5–26. Streeck, W. (2017). The return of the repressed. New Left Review, 104, 5–18. Taggart, P. (2000). Populism. Buckingham: Open University Press.
68. Urbinati, N. (2019). Me the people: How populism transforms democracy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
69. Usherwood, S., & Startin, N. (2013). Euroscepticism as a persistent phenomenon. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 51(1), 1–16.
70. Vatter, M. (2012). The quarrel between populism and republicanism: Machiavelli and the antinomies of plebeian politics. Contemporary Political Theory, 11, 242–263.
71. Verbeek, B., & Zaslove, A. (2015). The impact of populist radical right parties on foreign policy: The Northern League as a junior coalition partner in the Berlusconi governments. European Political Science Review, 7(4), 525–546.
72. Weyland, K. (2001). Clarifying a contested concept: Populism in the study of Latin American politics. Comparative Politics, 34(1), 1–22.
73. Wodak, R. (2015). The politics of fear: What right-wing populists mean. London: Sage.