(Emerald Points) Óscar García Agustín - Left-Wing Populism - The Politics of The People-Emerald Publishing (2020)

LEFT-WING POPULISM
What is Left populism? In this book, Óscar

Garcı́a Agustı́n analyzes the Left populist
movements of the last decade, showing
how Left populism provides a distinct
language and strategy for the European
Left, distinguishing it from both right-wing
populism and from the old Left. The book
covers political topics such as migration,
nationalism, and sovereignty, and analyzes
the organizational challenges that a Left
populist movement faces. Left-Wing
Populism: The Politics of the People offers
the first systematic book-length account of
Left populism. It should be compulsory
reading for anyone interested in the future
of the Left.
Lasse Thomassen, Queen Mary University of London
and University of Copenhagen
The last few decades were marked by the

crisis of neoliberalism and the rise of
populist politics but despite the spilled ink
few have managed to explain with clarity
this conjuncture.
The author manages to do exactly that: not

only does he dispel with a lot of
misconception about populism but he also
offers a fascinating mapping of the trajectory
of left populism and an inspiring blueprint
for future politics.
Dr Marina Prentoulis, University of East Anglia, UK
LEFT-WING POPULISM
The Politics of the People
ÓSCAR GARC ÍA AGUST ÍN

Aalborg University, Denmark
United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India

Malaysia – China
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First edition 2020
© 2020 Óscar Garcı́a Agustı́n

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ISBN: 978-1-83909-206-0 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-83909-203-9 (Online)
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CONTENTS
About the Author vii
Why Left-Wing Populism? 1

1. The Left-Wing Populist Wave in Europe 13
2. The People and Popular Sovereignty 33
3. Class and Migration 47
4. Nationalism and Patriotism 65
5. Institutions and Republicanism 81
6. Sovereignism and Transnationalism 99
Five Dilemmas of Left-Wing Populism 115
References 125
Index 149
v
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Óscar Garcı́a Agustı́n is Associate Professor at the Depart-

ment of Culture and Learning at Aalborg University,
Denmark. He is head of the DEMOS (Democracy, Migration,
and Movements) research group. He works on populism,
social movements, and migration. With Christian Ydesen he
has coedited the book Post-Crisis Perspectives: The Common
and its Powers (Peter Lang, 2013), and with Martin Bak
Jørgensen he has coedited Politics of Dissent (2015, Peter
Lang) and Solidarity without Borders: Gramscian Perspec-
tives on Migration and Civil Society (Pluto Press, 2016).
Together with Marco Briziarelli he has coedited Podemos and
the New Political Cycle. Left-Wing Populism and Anti-
Establishment Politics (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). He is
author of Sociology of Discourse: From Institutions to Social
Change (John Benjamins, 2015) and coauthor together with
Martin Bak Jørgensen of Solidarity and the “Refugee Crisis”
in Europe (Palgrave Pivot, 2018).
vii
WHY LEFT-WING POPULISM?
It is becoming a kind of commonplace that every piece of

writing on populism starts by questioning the usefulness of
the term due to its vague and ambiguous meaning, both in
academia and in the public and political debate. Not only
that, its use frequently is pejorative and applied to discredit
those who are portrayed as populist. Not many politicians
define themselves as populists but rather hurry to call their
adversaries populists instead. Although the concept is rejec-
ted, due to its inability to explain the political reality, it
paradoxically continues to generate more and more articles
and books and be the object of reflection. Populism accounts
sometimes for a general and common phenomenon, being
global and affecting both the left and the right, and other
times a common but differentiated phenomenon for left and
right. The focus on the similarities between right- and left-
wing populism has not contributed to clarifying the term but
instead to increasing the negative view that some authors or
politicians, belonging to the left spectrum, have on populism
as a progressive political project. They wonder why they
should talk about left-wing populism when there is an
extended agreement that populism is something bad. All in
all, populism provokes, in general, a dual rejection: from
mainstream politics and from left politics.
1
2 Left-Wing Populism
The main controversy awoken by populism is what can be

summarized as its alleged opposition to liberal democracy.
From this perspective, there is no distinction between right
and left, given that both sides question the essence of liberal
democracy: the representative system and the constitutional
and institutional realm. For this reason, populism is accused
of being a threat to democracy while mainstream parties
react to safeguard the pillars of the democratic system. From
a left perspective, populism is regarded with skepticism since
it would imply abandoning the emancipatory project of the
left as well as the attempt to change the neoliberal system.
The liberal position leaves intact any critique of the repre-
sentative, and the crisis of the values on which it is grounded,
and makes it even difficult to imagine any other alternative to
it (Rancière, 2016). The demands for political change and
more democracy, coming from civil society and social
movements, barely have the option to resonate in the polit-
ical system. The socialist position is linked with the crisis of
the left, more specifically the radical left, to forge its own
ideological project, which has been in crisis since the fall of
the Soviet Union, and reveals its need to be reconsidered after
the crisis of the neoliberal system in 2008. The crisis has not
led to a spectacular expansion of the political space of the
radical left.
This book is no exception to the genre on populism and
starts with the acknowledgment of the ambiguity and vague-
ness intrinsic to the concept. However, I believe that it is still
useful and necessary to think about populism and its impli-
cation in current politics. Specifically, it can be fruitful to
reflect on and analyze populism from its ideological position,
in this case from the left, rather than conceptualizing populism
as an overall phenomenon across ideologies. I am not arguing
that there are no similarities, because there are, but the dif-
ferences are significant and can be explained by the parties
belonging to the left or right axis. In other words, the populist

articulation differs substantially if it is made from the left or
the right. Thus, the objective of this book is to conceptualize
and analyze left-wing populism as a political project devel-
oped from the left which embraces populism. Left-wing
populism cannot imply that we can identify “pure” forms of
populism or that populism is the only component defining the
left. Yannis Stavrakakis (2017) points out that populism
involves a series of contradictory articulations that imply a
plurality of populist hybrids where what is at stake is the
specific profile of the populism emerging within a context.
Hybridity itself is a feature shared by all forms of populism
(Zienkowski & Breeze, 2019), and this is applicable to the
varieties of the left too. It would be wrong to look at
the populist turn of radical parties as the total assumption of
the populist logic instead of as the coexistence of populist and
radical forms and traditions. The focus on (hybrid) left-wing
populism highlights the importance of taking diverse socio-
political contexts into account in order to understand how
populism is embedded within different left-wing traditions.
Therefore, addressing the specificities of left-wing populism
can contribute to understanding the recent emergence or
development of the left and the existence of multiple and
valuable debates on the alternatives to neoliberalism, the
multicultural societies, or the role of the nation in globaliza-
tion times. Left-wing populism is not a “pure” or fixed
concept, or an unproblematic one, but it is necessary to grasp
the multiple debates and crossroads faced by the left in
searching for its own identity.
The reflections on left-wing populism draw mainly on the
European situation, particularly after the crisis of 2008 with
focus on the political parties which embraced, more or less
explicitly, left-wing populism (or a form of left politics
distinguishable from the radical left and close to some
populist features), and on the political and academic debates

generated around the populist strategy. It does not mean that
we should ignore the previous experiences of the Latin
American left-wing populism given its influence both theo-
retically and politically. It would also be naı̈ve not to
mention that the main interest in populism, despite having
existed before, has been provoked by phenomena like the
Brexit and the electoral victory of Donald Trump. I will refer
to the far right and (radical) right wing indistinctly, although
I am aware of the differences and the variety of positions
around it. Focusing on left-wing populism, it is pertinent to
explain, first of all, the emergence of the “populist moment”
and later the definition of left-wing populism as a political
phenomenon.
THE POPULIST MOMENT
Before the economic crisis, the idea of the populist Zeitgeist

was used to explain the emergence of contemporary populism,
both from the left and right, in Europe. In the beginning of the
2000s, Cas Mudde (2004) referred to the causes of the
populist Zeitgeist and pointed to some perceptions, rather
than facts, on the increasing corruption of the elites and the
separation between “the people” and “the elite.” This trend
was not only attributable to the right wing but also to the left.
Luke March and Cas Mudde talked about “social populism”
to characterize parties whose “ideological stance echoes
democratic socialism’s acceptance of parliamentary democ-
racy and rejection of capitalism” (2005, p. 35). While doctrine
principles and the “correct” class politics still define these
parties as radical left, the openness to egalitarianism and
“proletarian” anti-elitism connects with populism, as well as
supplementing class analysis with other identity issues,
including those associated with the right as ethnic or national

sentiment. It is important to notice that the shift from radical
left to populist left wing is, to some extent, a tendency pre-
existing the crisis of 2008. Indeed, there is a continuity along
left-wing populism before and after the crisis, even if it is true
that the crisis of representation and the popular movements
and social protests increased after 2008 and set the agenda
and the priorities for left-wing parties. In short, even when the
radical right-wing populism was dominant, the radical left
was already embracing some populist principles. Without
pretending to offer a comprehensive description of the popu-
list moment (intensified in the aftermath of the crisis but
existing before), these elements are important to understand-
ing the left-wing turn to populism. All of them are about the
decreasing capacity of representativeness by political parties.
While the first two elements emphasize the production of
common interests between parties and other economic
actors, leaving out the demands of the people, the third one
points to a way of strengthening both participation and
representativeness.
• Party system crisis: The cartelization of political parties

(Katz & Mair, 2018) provokes the disappearance of
differences between parties. Since they are funded by the
state, they reproduce the same pattern of behavior. Pol-
iticians preserve their own interests, and that is why
parties collaborate among each other. The cartel parties
stop representing the demands of the electorate, and
the extra-parliamentary party organization loses rele-
vance (Müller, 2000). Peter Mair warns that the defini-
tion of democracy is leaving out its emphasis on popular
sovereignty and the consequence of that would be “a
kind of democracy without the demos at its centre”
(2013, p. 9).
• Corruption: Cas Mudde in his definition of populism

opposes the “pure people” against the “corrupt elite.” The
application of “pure” to “the people” is questionable, but
the characterization of “the elite” as “corrupt” requires a
more detailed definition of what corruption is. The notion
of “dependence corruption,” coined by Lawrence Lessig
(2011), can be useful to such a definition. According to him,
the main problem of the government is the dependency of
the economic interests, its funders. Corruption is not about
violating the criminal laws but about the dependency that
highlights how political parties in government rule for the
economic elites. Moreover, this reinforces the idea that the
pattern of interaction underlying such a dependency is
unbreakable and consequently avoidable. Corruption is
relational in the sense that it entails bad governance (the
government not expressing the will of the people) and lost
trust (declining participation of the people due to their lack
of faith in democratic processes).
• Political movements: It would be erroneous to consider

social revolts and protests, which increased enormously in
response to the implementation of austerity politics, as a
risk instead of a necessity, argues Jan Hoby (2013). He
claims that what distinguishes both perceptions (movements
as risk or necessity) is the way in which social revolts are
handled politically in terms of organization, leadership,
vision, and strategy. Incorporating the antiestablishment
rhetoric to articulate their discourses and experimental and
horizontal ways of organizing, some social movements have
transformed into political parties or, at least, movements
and parties are interrelated. As a consequence, some orga-
nizational innovations are introduced such as the blurred
distinction between members and non-members, alternative
funding means, direct citizen engagement (social media and
digital tools), and mobilization of citizens (Klaukka, Van

der Staak, & Valladares, 2017). The crisis of representation
leaves the question of finding satisfactory means of partic-
ipation and engagement open.
These three features show an overall picture of how the crisis

of representation is fundamental to approaching the populist
moment and the reason why left-wing parties are embracing
populism or populist strategies. However, the main issue at stake
is if populism is the main feature for the novelty responses
coming from the left and the right. In other words, is populism
the central political axis (“the people” vs “the elite,” the bottom
vs the top) of the political dispute? If so, what happens with the
traditional left-right axis? Chantal Mouffe advocates for the
“populist moment” as a conjuncture in which both the left and
the right adopt a populist strategy. Mouffe defines the “populist
moment” as “the expression of resistances against the post-
democratic condition brought by 30 years of neoliberal
hegemony” (2018, p. 79). The crisis of neoliberalism would
allow fostering a new hegemonic formation which could develop
into more democratic or authoritarian politics. The expectations
from a left-wing perspective are, obviously, to deepen democ-
racy, but the association of “populism” with authoritarianism is
frequent in the public and academic debate. It is not surprising
that the predominance of “populism” to elaborate a left project
bothers some leftist authors. They think that “populism” miti-
gates the political importance of the left and moves it to an
ambivalent and less ideological place. Éric Fassin (2018a), for
example, criticizes that left-wing populism is replacing the
ideological conflict between left and right with one between “the
people” and “the elite.” Fassin (2018b) does not see the point in
reversing the “stigma” of populism or in labeling a political
project as left-wing populism, implying it has something in
common with right-wing populism; he refuses to accept that.
I share Fassin’s concern about the political implications of

erasing the left–right axis. There is, indeed, an intentionality in
equating all types of populism regardless of their context or
ideology. The left–right conflict is replaced with the opposi-
tion between liberalism (as democracy) and populism (as
illiberalism) and produces paradoxically a political frontier
separating which options are democratic and which are not
(Agustı́n & Briziarelli, 2018a). The distinction between
liberalism and populism hides intentionally the important
differences between left- and right-wing populism and how the
“populist moment,” using Mouffe’s concept, enables the
generation of opposed political options. Judith Butler (2017)
summarizes quite straightforwardly how pointless it is to
compare both kinds of populism: Right-wing populism can
lead to fascism, while left-wing populism must lead to radical
democracy. Thus, left-wing populism must be seen, primarily,
from the perspective of the left and, complementarily, from
the way in which populism is embedded and contributes to
redefining the practices of the left. There are elements, related
to the populist tradition, such as participation or the inclusion
of excluded groups, which are valuable in themselves for the
left. A similar exercise could be done with the far-right parties
or center-right parties who incorporate populist strategies or
styles as part of their political repertoires. As mentioned
above, my intention is to deepen what is characteristic of left-
wing populism as a political phenomenon, specifically as
developed in the aftermath of the economic crisis in Europe.
DEFINING LEFT-WING POPULISM
One of the main reasons to keep the distinction between

left and right and not replace it completely with other dis-
tinctions like “the people” vs “the elite” or populism vs
cosmopolitanism is basically that the left and right axis,

despite being challenged, is still dominant, and useful to
understanding political differences, I would add. The parlia-
mentary systems in Europe are still organized by the division
between left and right blocs. The complexities experienced in
recent years to obtain majorities sufficient to form government
coalitions or the complex electoral composition with vote
transfer from left to right and vice versa have not eroded the
logics of left and right. This does not imply that the ideological
differences are significant (concretely between center-right and
center-left) but that populism (or liberalism) has not displaced
the left and right axis as the main way of organizing politics.
In the cases in which a great coalition between center-left and
center-right has occurred, like in Germany, it is due to the
de-ideologization of politics rather than creating a huge liberal
group to combat far-right populism. The case of Sweden in
which a coalition was made to keep the far right out of gov-
ernment is an exception, and the division between left and
right was determinant, as proven by the fact that the possi-
bility of a great coalition between the two major center-left
and center-right parties was not an option and ideological
differences mattered.
It would be too simplistic to reduce left-wing populism to
the alternative or the opposition to right-wing populism, since
its critique is mainly aimed at the parties of the establishment
and the neoliberal policies carried out by liberal and social
democratic parties in government. Luke March (2007) char-
acterizes the left-wing populists by assuming the centrality of
the “moral people” versus “corrupt elite” as essential.
Nonetheless, I think this definition does not capture the rele-
vant opposition between neoliberalism and democracy as a
key feature for left-wing populism. I suggest we look back to
the cycle of social protests of 2011 to account for how the
opposition between democracy and neoliberalism was forged.
In her analysis of the Spanish indignados or 15M movement,

Cristina Flesher Fominaya (2015) refers to the “democratic
turn” which connects the critique of the economic and polit-
ical elites with the demand for more democracy (the complaint
against systematic political corruption, lack of transparency,
and the need for “real” democracy). Albeit using obviously
different means than social movements, left-wing populism
shares the same concerns regarding democracy. Beyond the
deployed features such as the charismatic leader or unmedi-
ated communication, left-wing populism adds the axis
democracy vs neoliberalism to the existing one of left vs right.
Left-wing populism is defined as the combination of the
populist impetus of expanding representation (through the
appeal to “the people” against the elites) and higher partici-
pation and of the left tradition to promote equality and social
justice. This definition synthesizes the democratic claims
which could not differ more from far-right populism and
egalitarianism as the main principle characteristic of the left.
The “democratic turn” can also be applied to show how the
rejection of neoliberalism is conceived in a larger framework
than the economic (and the subsequent fight for equality as
redistribution) and takes the form of democratic claims for
changes in the political system, in opposition to the economic
and political elites. There are two aspects which call for
further clarification: Participation is as important as the
opposition between “the people” and “the elites” is. If doing
politics for and by the people is to make sense, representation
should be complemented with means of participation. Social
justice projects a wider meaning to equality than the eco-
nomic, since many struggles related to other issues such as
gender, migration, environment, or human rights have
become part of the left agenda.
This definition unfolds along three characteristics: trans-
versality, inclusiveness, and participation. If the political
demands and proposals aim to reach a social majority, they

need to be transversal, that is, framed or articulated in a broad
sense that often exceeds the traditional left vs right ideological
positions. The appellation to “the people” favors such a
transversal move but can enter into contradiction with ideo-
logical frames deployed traditionally by the left. If the intention
is to increase representativeness through the articulation of “the
people,” left-wing populism needs to be inclusive not only of
the groups that do not feel represented (or feel excluded) but
also to guarantee the plurality of those who are represented.
Although populism is presented as incompatible with
pluralism, the truth is that left-wing populism, in general,
advocates for plurality and diversity in society, as the left has
usually done. Finally, left-wing populism must be participatory
to ensure the inclusion of people in the deliberation processes,
organizational debates, and policy-making. The development
of the party form as participatory structures is a pending debt
for the left parties, and it is still uncertain that left-wing
populism is going to be the final solution to overcoming ver-
tical and centralized organizational forms.
Left-wing populism is, in this regard, not an opportunistic
or useless label to mislead the radical left from the right
socialist or anticapitalist path. It is not the reverse of right-
wing populism either. However, the definition per se does not
solve the shortcomings or concerns raised by the practices of
left-wing populist parties. Having a pejorative impression of
populism overlooks its contribution to developing a left
project in the present conjuncture; having an idealized vision
of left-wing populism without assessing some of its contra-
dictions would ignore the concerns awoken by the existing
political realities. The turn to vertical organizations and strong
leaderships and the adoption of social democratic politics as
the main proposal to change the economic system are some of
the practices that reveal the difficulties of democratizing
institutions and producing an alternative to neoliberalism. The

combination of theoretical reflection and empirical analysis is
needed to assess the potentials presented by left-wing popu-
lism, as well as its contribution to the left, and political out-
comes. Since not many parties are fond of being called
“populist,” due to its pejorative implications in the public
debate, left-wing populism is used, following Mouffe, as an
analytical tool.
While the “populist moment” can be related to the crisis of
hegemony in which people do not believe the dominant
neoliberal narratives anymore, the reaction of counter-
hegemonic forces remains still open (Fraser, 2019). There are
no reasons to dismiss left-wing populism as one option to
forge an alternative to neoliberalism. Left-wing populism
cannot be considered a risk or a problem but neither “the
solution” (Gerbaudo, 2016). It would be a mistake to reduce
populism to an ideology beyond left and right as well as it
would be wrong to embrace it as if it was the only option to
redefine the left. Actually, left-wing populism should be
combined with other ideas, reflections, phenomena, or tradi-
tions from the left and not exclusively for the left. This com-
bination would shed light on the potentials and limitations of
a left-wing populism. In the following chapters, I address some
of these issues (class, migration, cosmopolitanism, patriotism,
republicanism, transnationalism) to engage in the main
debates provoked by left-wing populism.
1
THE LEFT-WING POPULIST

WAVE IN EUROPE
Although the populist turn from left parties in Europe can be

traced back several years, the window of opportunity opened
up by the post-2008 left-wing populist moment (Jäger, 2019)
sharply strengthens that tendency. The combination of eco-
nomic and political crises made it possible for radical left-wing
parties to expand their electoral support. Those parties
assumed a populist appeal (March & Keith, 2016) combining
the popular disaffection toward political leaders with the
rejection of austerity politics. In the beginning of 2015, left-
wing populism reached its peak. Syriza won the elections in
Greece, and Podemos was leading some polls in Spain and
pursued to be the alternative to the government of the con-
servative Popular Party. The political environment was
permeated by the irruption of a new generation of politicians,
contrary to the establishment parties, and the creation of a
new political space (adding the bottom vs top approach to the
traditional left vs right wing) which traditional parties should
learn how to address. It became quite evident that populism
was not a far-right wing phenomenon in Europe anymore and
13
the option of a progressive populism shook the political stage.

Marina Prentoulis and Lasse Thomassen capture the political
vibrations of that moment and the impression that left-wing
populism could introduce an alternative path to be followed
by the European left:
Three days before the election, on 22 January, a

big Syriza rally in Athens was addressed not only
by the leader, Alexis Tsipras, but also by the
leader of the Spanish Podemos party, Pablo
Iglesias. Both represent a new discourse putting
democracy, participation and the rights of the
people at the centre of their rhetoric. They speak
neither in the name of invisible market forces nor
in the name of particular classes. They do not
claim to represent only particular groups – the
unemployed, students, workers, women, and so
on – instead they speak in the name of the people.
This is what makes them populist, and this is
what infuriates other parties, both right and left.
(Prentoulis & Thomassen, 2015)
Luke March and Daniel Keith (2016) comment that times

of crisis usually do not benefit the left because the voters opt
for the safety and stability attributed to right-wing parties and
shun any type of “radicalism.” Moreover, the left tends to
emphasize the ideological content and programs and lack the
focus on identities and people’s emotions, which is the polit-
ical terrain of the right and far-right parties. The strong
ideological identity of the radical left hinders larger identifi-
cations, despite the general disenchantment with the main-
stream political parties. The populist appellation offers a
different way of dealing with the crisis by embracing a more
pragmatic approach and by enabling the creation of a new
political space through the sharp distinction between “the
The Left-Wing Populist Wave in Europe 15
people” and “the elite,” the transversal and across-classes

project, the mitigated ideological factor, the introduction of
a less militant language, and the openness to discussing
controversial left topics such as patriotism.
Populism became then part of the left-wing parties’ stra-
tegies, values, and sometimes organizational form but did
not replace the core left principles or identity. There is not a
single party which can be characterized as purely populist.
Both the national context and the internal dynamics within
each party are important to understanding the differences
between left-wing populist parties. Furthermore, the trans-
national dimension should not be ignored. The mutual
inspiration between these parties, the contact between their
leaders, and the shared atmosphere of struggling against a
common enemy, incarnated especially until 2015 by the
Troika, have contributed to developing a common ground
for a European left-wing populism. There are, indeed, four
moments which define the left-wing populist practices in
Europe and the scope and influence achieved during the
2011–2019 period:
• The electoral victory of Syriza in January 2015 in Greece,

completing the move from a marginal radical left party to a
mass popular party;
• The spectacular irruption and growth of Podemos in Spain

in 2014 as a brand-new political party connected with the
previous anti-austerity and pro-radical democracy social
movements;
• The good electoral results obtained by France Insoumise

(Unbowed France) in 2017 after a tight competition. The
main adversaries were the extreme center by Emmanuel
Macron’s new party En Marche! and the right-wing
populism by Marine Le Pen;
• Jeremy Corbyn became the new leader of the Labour Party

in 2015, supported by the activists of Momentum and
defeating the establishment within the party.
These parties present commonalities but also their own

specificities as left-wing populist, including different degrees of
populism which have been somewhat debated in the case of
Corbyn. Other radical left parties (following here Luke
March’s term) adopted left-wing populism with more or less
success: from parties increasing their parliamentary represen-
tation, e.g., Red-Green Alliance (RGA) in Denmark, to those
who obtained low electoral support, such as Razem
(Together) and LIVRE in Portugal, highly influenced by
Podemos. However, until now mainly those four parties
(Syriza, Podemos, France Insoumise, and Corbyn’s Labour)
have steered the course for left-wing populism in Europe. The
case of DiEM25 (Democracy in Europe Movement) as
transnational left-wing populism should be added to the list as
a step toward developing populism beyond national borders.
Finally, left-wing populism exists at the municipal (like Ada
Colau in Barcelona) and regional levels (with Más Madrid,
the party established by the founder of Podemos, Iñigo
Errejón, in Madrid). I will present some of the main features
of European left-wing populism, but before it is necessary to
refer briefly to Latin American left-wing populism because it
has been very influential in Europe and represents the attempt
to develop populism in government, and not just in
opposition.
1.1 FROM LATIN AMERICA TO EUROPE
When left-wing populism in Europe gained visibility, the cycle

of the progressive governments in Latin America was in crisis
and the new right was on their way to take power. The Latin
American experience was interesting because left-wing popu-
lism was developed while Europe witnessed the emergence of
right-wing populism, and populism was only associated with
nationalism and xenophobia. Furthermore, left-wing popu-
lism went beyond protest and became parties in government,
including a wide ideological diversity from radical to prag-
matic or center-left. In this regard, populism was understood
as a progressive force to expand the demos and radicalize
democracy and aimed to govern, not resigned to be a mere
symptom of outrage or discontent without any institutional
translation.
When analyzing the causes of the emergence of left-wing
populism in Latin America, some characteristics looked quite
akin to postcrisis Europe: the economic crisis (and the role
played by international organizations), the crisis of represen-
tation, de-ideologization, electoral volatility, and the
indifference or lack of trust of people in party politics (Rob-
erts, 2012). However, the political translation from one
continent to another is quite complicated. Parties like Syriza,
Podemos, and France Insoumise mirrored the populist gov-
ernments in Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil, Venezuela, or Argentina.
The connections have been particularly close in the case of
Podemos and of Mélenchon. Besides the political contacts and
inspiration, the intellectual exchange has also been crucial.
Left-wing populism in Europe expected to learn from the
journey from opposition to government as made in Latin
America. The main aspect adopted by the European left-wing
populism is the hegemonic operation depicted by Álvaro
Garcı́a Linera, the Bolivian vice president, as the trans-
formation of the social majority into political majority
(Schavelzon & Webber, 2018). The populist appellation was
identified as an efficient way of articulating social demands
and obtaining a sufficient electoral majority.
Three differences have impeded reaching a similar electoral

success. The first is the existence of multiparty and two-party
systems (or two-party systems in transition to multiparty ones)
instead of presidential systems where the president possesses
more power. In the French case, Mélenchon’s party, despite
the good results, was still the fourth most voted force and
could not make it to the second electoral round. The second is
the stronger institutional and constitutional framework in
Europe which would make it difficult to see constituent pro-
cesses like those of Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador when new
constitutions were enacted by constituent assemblies. The
possibilities of legislative change look more modest in Europe
and limited probably to reforms of the preexisting order.
Finally, the progressive cycle in Latin America had a regional
dimension in which new regional organizations such as ALBA,
UNASUR, and CELAC were promoted to develop regional
interdependency and political autonomy and enhance an
international platform for the progressive governments. In
Europe, the international cooperation happens within the EU
and the lack of left-wing governments, with the exception of
Syriza, does not contribute at all to imagining a different kind
of regional cooperation. Nor is there a strong conflictual
relation with an external country, as it happens in Latin
America with the United States.
The Latin American roots of the European left-wing popu-
lism are relevant, despite happening in different spaces and
times, but the connection with governments from Latin
America has been used as an easy tool by the media to discredit
left-wing parties. Podemos has often been accused of working
for dictatorships and trying to import the Bolivarian model to
Spain. The current situation in Venezuela under Nicolás
Maduro’s government has frequently been used in the media to
illustrate which disastrous consequences populism would have
in Spain. The European politicians have not been capable of
projecting a more critical approach to the Latin American

experience. The focus on the hegemonic articulation to gain
political power or some measures like the negotiation of the
debt might have led to the lack of critical considerations
regarding issues such as the predominant role of the leader, the
difficulties for populism in the government to articulate and
respond to new democratic demands (Mazzolini, 2015) or the
reduction of any form of participation to the plebiscite. The
Latin American legacy has also been discussed between those
who warn against the devastating consequences of left-wing
populism in Latin America (Rovira, 2018) and those who
advocate for a more complex debate without generalizations
(Wolff, 2018). In any case, although the conditions of both
types of left-wing populism are different and they cannot
reproduce the same trajectories, it is important to notice the
relevance played by Latin American left-wing populism as a
project for social majorities with less ideological footprint.
From the experience of parties like Podemos, it is clear that they
bring to Spain some refreshing and original modes of refor-
mulating left politics but also some of the most problematic
ones, like reducing the political struggle to the hegemonic one
and the combination of the socialist and national popular.
These aspects have hindered the exploration of other paths
such as cosmopolitanism and transnationalism (Cava, 2015),
barely weighed by the European left-wing populism.
1.2 EUROPEAN LEFT-WING POPULISM:

MAIN FEATURES
Based on the experiences of the main left-wing populist parties,

there are a series of features which cannot be applied to all the
populist practices but which nonetheless point to a new polit-
ical direction. I consider these five characteristics ― although
more can be added ― to be useful to understanding the extent of

left-wing populism in Europe: the response to the crisis of social
democracy; the close relation with social movements and
activists and the experimental forms of party organization; the
positioning toward right-wing populism; the possibility of a
populism from the center-left and not exclusively from the
radical left; and the central role attributed to political
leadership.
1.2.1 Alternative to Social Democracy
Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) dominated the polit-

ical stage in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but later, say Yannis
Stavrakakis and Giorgos Katsambekis (2014), the party moved
during the 1990s “from populism to modernization.” The
demands for non-privileged and the defense of popular sover-
eignty and national independence against the establishment were
abandoned, and PASOK gradually embraced neoliberalism. It
exemplifies the overall shift in Europe from social democracy to
social liberalism whose major representative was Tony Blair and
his Third Way. The Greek party system was a polarized two-
party system where the center-left PASOK and the center-right
New Democracy (ND) rotated and ended up collaborating after
2011 (Kioupkiolis & Katsambekis, 2018). The victory of Syriza
entailed the end of years of the two-party system, and the term
“Pasokization” (Douzinas, 2017) entered the international
political lexicon to designate the collapse of the social democratic
party Pasok. Based on the crisis of social democracy in Europe,
left-wing populism developed the idea of Pasokization appli-
cable to other countries. Yanis Varoufakis (2016a) warned that
the best option for Podemos in Spain was to manage to rise from
third to second place and push the Socialist Party to a similar
situation to the one of PASOK or the Socialist Party in France.
The possibility of social democratic parties ending as an

irrelevant electoral force would provide the opportunity to
shape a left-wing populism for the majority. Being still a
radical left party but undertaking a transversal and expansive
electoral strategy, left-wing populism aspired to occupy and
redefine the position of the social democracy. Although some
social democratic parties lost electoral support and their
centrality within the party system, like in Greece and France,
the social democracy has proven to have a consolidated
electoral basis and has returned to the government as in
Denmark and Spain. In other countries, the disastrous elec-
toral results of social democracy have not led to a left-wing
breakthrough, as it happened with the extraordinary results
by the Greens in the Netherlands and the social democratic
downturn. The failure of the hypothesis of Pasokization (left-
wing parties becoming the first or second most voted political
force) reduced the ambitions pursued by left-wing parties to be
capable of defeating the “parties of the establishment” like
left-wing populism did in Latin America.
1.2.2 Alternative to Right-wing Populism
The decline of social democratic parties in some countries invited

to explore electoral terrains beyond those, more marginalized,
expected for the radical left. However, there is an important
factor to take into account. Besides the loss of electoral support
by social democracy, the far right, embracing right-wing popu-
lism, has become, in some countries, a remarkable political force
through the combination of antimigration and xenophobic
attitudes and the reference to the lack of security suffered by the
“losers of globalization” or the working class. France Insoumise
has dealt with the complicated panorama of distinguishing itself
from the declining social democracy and right-wing populism
and, at the same time, appealing to their voters or former voters.

Moreover, Macron reacted quite quickly to the crisis of the
center-left and center-right and settled his own personalized
party (Rahat & Kenig, 2018) and competed electorally with a
more flexible, participatory, and vertical platform in contrast to
the traditional parties. The situation of France thus illustrates the
increasing personalization of politics.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon was member of the Socialist Party
from 1976 and was Minister of Vocational Education
(2000–2002) in the government of Lionel Jospin. He left the
party and launched the Left Party, was candidate for the Left
Front in 2012, and ran for the France Insoumise in 2017. He
is a career politician, coming from mainstream politics, and
always on the left-wing of the Socialist Party (Marlière, 2019).
Since the shift from Left Front to France Insoumise,
Mélenchon abandoned strong ideological left identities and
decided to compete within the axes bottom vs top and old vs
new politics instead of the left vs top opposition (Fernández-
Vázquez, 2019). The irony, highlighted by Philippe Marlière
(2017), is that sociologically Mélenchon’s electorate is left-
wing and their vote is a class vote against the right and
extreme right. This shows how the axis left vs right is still
sociologically relevant, although the populist discourse can
appeal to disenchanted or abstention voters. The main issue at
stake is whether left-wing populism is the alternative to right-
wing populism. The best option for Mélenchon is to reach the
two-candidate round and compete with Le Pen (Lichfield,
2018). The possibilities of defeating a moderate candidate,
like Macron, look quite remote. The opposition between left-
and right-wing populism, even in the case of the presidential
system where the options are better, fosters the opposition
extreme vs moderate and blurs the left vs right or bottom vs
top confrontation. Therefore, it would be wrong to reduce
left-wing populism to the contention of the right-wing
populism or the appropriation of their tools. Some social

democratic parties have already incorporated some of the
right-wing populism visions and values on migration (Agustı́n
& Jørgensen, 2019), and that can hardly lead to an alterna-
tive. Left-wing populism is a response to the crisis of repre-
sentation and an attempt to expand the demos (and obviously
the electoral basis), whose project is anchored in the left when
appealing, at the same time, to larger constituencies that do
not necessarily identify themselves with the left.
1.2.3 Center-left Wing Populism
Left-wing populism is usually applied to parties placed on the

radical left, but the question of whether it can be expanded to
the center-left and how is relevant to address. The immediate
reaction would be positive since populism is present in varying
degrees in all kinds of politics (Hansen, 2017), and center-left
parties are not an exception. The issue is rather how populist
center-left parties are and can become; which features they
integrate; and how they relate to other left-wing populisms.
The use of populism can be quite temporarily limited to
certain political conjunctures. The example of Pedro Sánchez
(Agustı́n & Briziarelli, 2018b) from the Spanish social dem-
ocratic party illustrates not only how the populist strategy was
deployed to defeat the internal establishment within the
Socialist Party and winning the general secretary seat but also
how he later returned to more traditional discourses and
strategies characteristic of the social democratic party.
Sánchez was inspired by Jeremy Corbyn who has provoked
the discussion about a center-left populism. On the one hand,
Corbyn was supported by Momentum, self-defined as “a people-
powered, grassroots movement working to transform Britain in
the interests of the many, not the few” (n.d.). Momentum
connects with the idea of movement party promoting participa-

tion and doing politics from below. On the other hand, Corbyn
has targeted austerity politics as responsible for the crisis and
divided the political conflict between the few and the many.
Doreen Massey made a populist reading of Corbyn, in line with
Laclau, as signifier for a “whole range of pent-up demands”
(2015, p. 10). Corbyn’s first speech of the 2017 General Election
reflected the division between “the people” and “the establish-
ment” and the fixation of a chain of equivalences:
But of course, they [the media and the establishment]

do not want us to win. Because when we win it is the
people, not the powerful, who win. The nurse, the
teacher, the small trader, the builder, the office
worker, the student, the carer win. We all win.
(Corbyn, 2017)
However, Luke March (2017) recalls that Labour is not a

populist or antiestablishment party and the majority of the
party’s MPs would not support such a position. Furthermore,
Corbyn tends to project the image of a pragmatic candidate
who aspires to rule the government, especially on his TV
appearances. Therefore, it is limited how populist the center-
left can be due to the party structure, their history, and
tradition, while the pragmatic position to keep the center-
oriented voters prevails. That said, left-wing populist aspects
can be identified within some social democratic parties like the
Labour Party.
1.2.4 Charismatic Leadership
Leadership is a controversial matter for left-wing populism.

The Latin American legacy has already showed the problems
derived from the accumulation of power around the leader.
Leadership went beyond the party and affected the government
depending on the figure of the president. Latin American

populism provokes legitimate concerns about the concentration
of power and the displacement of institutional checks and
balances. Nonetheless, the government of Syriza does not
match that description at all, and the function of the leader is
limited to internal party dynamics. Actually, the pragmatic turn
undertaken by Tsipras showed the intention to adapt the pre-
existing institutional and economic order instead of undoing it.
It is true that it is not a necessary condition for left-wing
populism to rely on a strong leader, and more horizontal
versions of left-wing populism have been developed dimin-
ishing the dependency on the leader and emphasizing party
inclusion, deliberation, and participation. Pablo Gerbaudo
proposes “citizenism” as a type of anarcho-populism, “a
populism for an individualized and digital era” (2017, p. 17);
and Alberto Moreiras (2018) claims a transversal and post-
hegemonic version, contrary to verticalism and the antidem-
ocratic implications derived from the notion of hegemony.
Despite the horizontalist approaches, the conceptualization of
Laclau has been dominant, and nowadays politics, regardless
of the ideological position, reinforces the role of the leader.
The leader is considered an empty signifier to articulate the
chain of equivalences, and the equation between charismatic
leadership and authoritarianism is refused (Mouffe, 2018).
The unsatisfied demands are articulated and visualized
through party leaders, but there is no guarantee that the leader
can fulfill them. Looking at the strongest cases of left-wing
populism, Alexis Tsipras and Pablo Iglesias have imperson-
ated their own respective parties, although they were not
originally personalized parties. Even Podemos, quite attached
to Iglesias, tried a collective multilevel (national and muni-
cipal) leadership before becoming strongly centralized around
Iglesias. France Insoumise is even more dependent on
Mélenchon’s leadership since the platform was created to
promote his candidacy, and the populist turn by Labour is

mainly based on the figure of Corbyn as new party leader. All
in all, charismatic leaders have been a main feature of the left-
wing practices. They have been capable of competing with
other parties and enabling identification with new sectors of
the population. However, the increasing verticality, the loss of
internal plurality, and the difficulties to imagine the future of
the parties with a new leader cast doubt on the convenience
for the left-wing parties of relying on the charismatic leader.
1.2.5 Movement Par ties
The social mobilizations of the square movements in 2011

found a political path in the left-wing parties. It is clear in the
case of Podemos and the 15M movement as well as Initiative
for Democratic Socialism and the Maribor protests in
Slovenia. Syriza engaged with the “Aganaktismenoi” and
participated in the protests in the streets. These parties arti-
culated social indignation politically and incorporated a self-
identification of the party as a “democratic” organization that
emanates from the cycle of protests (Agustı́n & Jørgensen,
2016a). The claim for democratization, opening to people’s
participation and the rejection of the functioning of traditional
(cartel) parties, created the expectation of a new type of party
organization and of channeling the linkages with civil society.
The notion of movement parties is, indeed, associated with
left-wing populist parties, and others less leftist like Five Star
Movement, as a combination of horizontal (stemming from
social movements) and vertical (characteristic of political
parties) structures. Marina Prentoulis and Lasse Thomassen
(forthcoming) suggest that movement parties claim to repre-
sent citizens through more horizontalist and participatory
structures, given that they are parties of civil society (not of
the state) and of the people (opposed to the elites). For that
reason, they react against cartelization and connect with the
innovative party forms pursued by left-wing populism.
Podemos was emblematic in its foundation through the
creation of cı́rculos (circles), reminiscing spontaneous assem-
blies, and the introduction of amateur forms of doing politics.
This situation changed soon, and the structure of the party
turned out to be compatible with a strong vertical leadership.
The loss of engagement and participation within the party has
kept the hierarchical structure intact. France Insoumise is
quite similar. It describes itself as a decentralized network
instead of being a party, and it aimed to create participatory
online platforms and develop a horizontalist structure
(Hamburger, 2018). However, the combination of horizon-
tality at the local level and lack of national structure favors the
vertical control by the leadership. Left-wing populism has
swung from being a mass party to a catch-all one without
showing a determined way of building up a new type of party.
The call for participation and mobilization, although without
a strong sense of class belonging, links them with mass parties,
but the attempt to expand the electoral basis and appeal to a
transversal constituency echoes the logic of catch-all parties.
This tension is far from being resolved yet, although the
organizational form of movement parties, revealing already
some contradictions, offers an interesting path to explore.
1.3 BETWEEN SOCIALISM AND POPULISM
Populism is not the only dimension of left-wing populist

parties and sometimes not even the dominant one. Populism is
one element of the multifaceted identities (March, 2017). The
antiestablishment discourse, the appellation to larger groups
of the population (not belonging to a certain class and without
referring to strong ideological terms), and the search for new

means of participation have been assumed by the parties
considered left-wing populist. Syriza, Podemos, and France
Insoumise have embraced populism and elaborated it from a
left-wing perspective but not as the only element and not
always to the same degree and intensity, depending on the
strategy and the political conjuncture. In other words, some
parties have opened up to moving beyond the traditional
space assigned to the radical left, while others have main-
tained the predominance of the socialist identity. Even so, the
former ones are still anchored in the left spectrum and the
latter have adopted populist aspects. Left-wing populism, as
mentioned earlier, is an analytical tool rather than a label for
parties’ self-identification.
In their typology of radical left parties, Luke March and
Daniel Keith (2016) distinguish between democratic socialist
parties and populist socialist parties. Although sharing similar
ideologies, the populist socialist parties deploy the populist
division between “the people” and “the elite” in an antago-
nistic relationship. Among these parties, one finds the Socialist
Party (the Netherlands), the Scottish Socialist Party, the Left
(Germany), and Sinn Féin (Ireland). The intensification of the
populist strategy blurs partly this distinction, and some of the
preexisting and recent parties belonging to the first category
move to the second or, at least, to a space in-between. The Left
in Slovenia and the RGA in Denmark are some of these parties
that can be labeled left-wing populist but combine a strong
socialist identity with a populist discourse and horizontal
participation.
The origins of the Left in Slovenia are quite similar to the
ones of Podemos. The 2012–2013 protests began in Maribor,
the second largest city in the country, which led to the mayor
stepping down in December 2012. The protests had an anti-
establishment orientation against the political and economic
elites and challenged the dominant narrative of the elite-led

transition from the authoritarian regime to representative
democracy (Toplisek & Thomassen, 2017). As a consequence,
Initiative for Democratic Socialism (IDS) was established in
2014 with a decentralized and open organizational form
aimed to complement the struggle in the streets with the one in
official institutions (Kirn, 2014). The vocation to be a move-
ment party entails the recognition of the dimension top vs
bottom, characteristic of social movements, but the left vs
right axis is preponderant. The crisis cannot be reduced to the
economic crisis because it is, in reality, a crisis of democracy.
Institutions, policies, and economy must be democratized, and
direct democracy is claimed as the main strategy. The spirit of
IDS is captured in the hybrid form of parties acting within the
institutional arena and movements not aiming to seize power:
We believe that the struggle for democratic socialism

must necessarily make use of both types of strategies:
those that work from below and are abolishing the
existing social relations, and those that are changing
the policies from above inside the institutionalised
sphere of the political system. (Initiative for
Democratic Socialism, 2013)
IDS decided to enter a coalition with the Democratic

Labour Party and the Party for the Sustainable Development
of Slovenia as United Left, dissolved in 2017 with the estab-
lishment of the Left (Levica) by IDS and the Party for the
Sustainable Development of Slovenia as United Left. Alen
Toplisek (2019) singles out that the Left can evolve in two
different trajectories: maintaining ideological clarity close to
their original principles or embracing a more determined
populist appeal. The Left’s programs point to reformist
pragmatism, rather than revolutionary idealism, but the
Marxist language and analysis are still dominant. It is
interesting to see if the combination of strong socialism and

light populism will endure or if populism will gain a more
determined position.
The RGA is, on the contrary, neither a recent party (it was
established in 1989) nor springing from social mobilizations,
although it has always been a grassroots party involving social
and political activism. The party grew from 2.2% in 2007 to
7.8% in 2015 and was the biggest party left of the Social
Democrats. The RGA initiated a left-wing turn, captured in
the program of principles in 2013–2014, as a result of a col-
lective leadership and the incorporation of a new generation
of politicians. In the program, the RGA subscribes to socialist
principles but adopts, at the same time, a more pragmatic line
(abandoning some anticapitalist values) and a clear anti-elite
stance (Agustı́n, 2019a). The social democratic party has
been, and still is, the largest party from the “red bloc,” but the
RGA contemplated the possibility, before the 2019 elections,
of surpassing the Social Democrats by gathering the votes
from the parties to the left of the latter (The Alternative,
Socialist People’s Party, and the RGA). The hypothesis proved
to be wrong, and the RGA was not even the most voted party
left of the Social Democrats. Despite that, the turning point
was that the RGA moved away from being a mere protest
party or a left appendix of social democracy. The attempt to
develop a political identity, independent of the relation with
social democracy, was already expressed in the program of
principles through the cooperation with popular movements
and the shaping of a majority.
The political campaign “Community works” (Fælleskab
fungerer), launched in 2016, illustrates how the RGA shapes a
collective identity (“community”), developed historically from
social struggles and their achievements for society (parental
leave, women’s right to vote, eight-hour workday, pension,
etc.). Community (rather than “the people”) is a conflictual
subject in which “the many” have obtained their rights against

the interests of the few. Thus, collectivity cannot be mistaken
with a cultural or essentialist identity (Agustı́n, 2019b). Pelle
Dragsted (Thorup, 2014) from RGA reveals that the left wing
has focused too much on portraying an image of the “enemy”
and less on elaborating narratives opposing “We” to “They.”
In this regard, populism is productively used to narrate the
antagonism between “We” and “They” by embracing a less
ideologized discourse. The reformulation of the “We” is
complemented with the critique of the elites, including poli-
ticians. The leader of the RGA, Pernille Skipper, as well as
other left-wing populists, highlights that the RGA politicians
act for the people’s interests in opposition to the politicians
who belong to and support the elite: “We can create a society
where the struggle with the elite and increasing inequality does
not mean hatred. We can create change. Especially if we don’t
leave politics to those who hold the soft seats at Christians-
borg [the Danish Parliament]” (Skipper, 2016).
The Left in Slovenia and the RGA in Denmark show how
in different contexts both parties combine the defense of
socialist principles with the assumption of a populist strategy.
As grassroots parties, the mechanisms of participation and
internal democracy coexist with a tendency toward stronger
or centralized leadership. In any case, it becomes evident that
in the left-wing parties where a socialist identity remains
strong, populism usually indicates a more moderate or prag-
matic approach than the one from traditional radical left
parties. In other words, the search for representing the social
majority provokes a less ideological standpoint as well as
programs and parliamentarian attitudes orientated to support
left governments or pass progressive politics.
2
THE PEOPLE AND POPULAR

SOVEREIGNTY
“The people” as political subject is without any doubt the core

of populism, as well as the most controversial aspect due to
the difficulty in finding a precise and shared understanding of
who “the people” are. It does not help so much that “the
people” is opposed to “the establishment” or “the elite”
because those concepts are broad too and changeable
according to the context. Despite differences in their way of
defining “the people” and of doing politics, populism as the
politics of the people is the central feature used to equate right-
and left-wing populism as part of the same populist wave; as a
sort of common phenomenon against liberal democracy. Even
assuming that there is one way of defining “the people” as the
key component of left-wing populism, there are several
intertwined issues that cause self-reflection and critique about
who “the people” are and which type of political project can
be grounded in that understanding of “the people.” Probably,
the most controversial aspect is that “the people” displaces the
concept of “class,” the distinguishing mark of the left. It
would empty the emancipatory project of the left and move it
33
to a kind of “identity politics” where class struggle is missing.

This concern is not the only one. The definition of “the peo-
ple” tends to collide with other concepts like the nation or
migration when delimiting who is part of the people or not. I
will address these issues later. In the following, I focus on the
category of “the people,” and probably the core-defining
element of left-wing populism: Popular sovereignty which
operates within the logics of the nation-state and of the
transnational spaces. Popular sovereignty contributes to
establishing a legitimacy which makes left-wing populism
distinguishable from mainstream parties and the far right.
2.1 THE PEOPLE AND THE ELITE
Peter Bloom, in a piece on populism, concludes that modern

politics is not about a struggle between left- and right-wing
populism but a “race to define and expand who the ‘people’
are and what they can achieve together” (2018). I consider
this reflection a good starting point given that conceptualiza-
tions such as “pure people” obscure that the appellation to
“the people” is rather an attempt to expand political
engagement and give voice and recognition to underrepre-
sented and marginalized groups. “The people” and “the elite”
are named through different signifiers depending on the
context: the Labour Party’s vision for “a country that works
for the many, not just the privileged few”; Podemos in its
origins shaking the political divisions by depicting the conflict
between “the people” and “the caste”; or before that, the
famous “we are the 99 percent” claimed by the Occupy Wall
Street movement in opposition to the “richest 1 percent.” In
all these cases, “the people” takes different forms (signifiers)
adapted to the actors and contexts and, most importantly, it
gives form to the political and social conflict.
The People and Popular Sovereignty 35
John Judis (2016) emphasizes that what defines populism

is, indeed, the conflictual relation between “the people” and
“the elite” rather than their exact referents. The process of
naming (saying who “the enemy” is and consequently who
“the people” are) establishes the relation between the form
(the people as signifier) and the content (the people as signi-
fied) (Panizza, 2005). Therefore, the discursive approach
developed by Ernesto Laclau and the Essex School has insisted
on the fact that “the people” is an antagonistic construction.
“The people” reflects different political conjunctures and
strategies, and it would be naı̈ve to expect that “the people” is
not changeable, and refers continually to the same groups and
claims, and that “the people” is the only signifier used to refer
to those groups. As mentioned above, “the 99 percent,” “the
many” are other signifiers, but also references to “citizens” or
“nationals” can work as signifiers for “the people” in certain
contexts. As Benjamin De Cleen and Yannis Stavrakakis
present, the relation between two opposed groups is formu-
lated in terms of legitimacy:
Populism is a dichotomic discourse in which “the

people” are juxtaposed to “the elite” along the lines
of a down/up antagonism in which “the people” is
discursively constructed as a large powerless group
through opposition to “the elite” conceived as a
small and illegitimately powerful group. Populist
politics thus claim to represent “the people” against
an “elite” that frustrates their legitimate demands,
and presents these demands as expressions of the will
of “the people.” (De Cleen & Stavrakakis, 2017)
According to Judis, left-wing populism is dyadic (the bot-

tom and middle against the top), while right-wing populism is
triadic and adds a third group (it could be migrants, Islamists,
etc.) so it “looks upward, but also down upon an out group”
(2016, p. 15). Actually, populism works as a two-dimensional

discourse (Brubaker, 2017, 2019) which combines a vertical
dimension (power relations, the top vs down dimension) and
the horizontal one (the inside-outside). This can be applied to
both left- and right-wing populism, but very differently. One
can say that the top/down antagonism is the main divide
which characterizes populism. However, the vertical dimen-
sion intersects with the horizontal one since, for instance, the
elite actors are perceived as outsiders too, e.g., how
Mélenchon portrays Germany as enemy of the French people’s
interests. Following Rogers Brubaker (2017), in the vertical
dimension, “the people” are defined in opposition to eco-
nomic, political, and cultural elites; in the horizontal dimen-
sion, “the people” are bounded collectivity, based on the
contrast between “inside” and “outside.” Left-wing populism
opposes vertically to the economic and political elites vs the
ordinary people and horizontally to the supranational and
global elites (the outsiders) whose interests oppose those of
“the people,” frequently understood as a national community.
It can be the EU institutions, the Troika, or transnational
companies such as Amazon or Google. It is important to
notice that right-wing populism uses a vertical dimension to
present their conflicts against the cultural elites and prolong
the vertical line when they oppose those at the bottom
(immigrants, Muslims, refugees). There is not only an insider/
outsider dimension (nationals vs aliens) but also a vertical one
vis-à-vis those who have or are perceived to have a lower
status.
Panizza (2005) points out that the act of naming entails the
relation between “the people” as signifier and signified. It
means that there is no sociological referent for “the people”
because it is a discursive construction. In this regard,
particularly for left-wing populism, Laclau’s (2005) concep-
tualization of populism as a series of chains of equivalences
has been very influential. “The people,” “the majority,” the

figure of the leader can work as an empty signifier, meaning
a signifier whose content is empty so several groups,
from different positions, could identify themselves with it
(Thomassen, 2016). When diverse demands made by parti-
cular groups (the logic of difference) become unsatisfied, it is
possible to ally all these demands: firstly, against the institu-
tions, the government, or the entities which are provoking that
those demands are disregarded and secondly, one of the
signifiers can take up the position of empty signifier and
represent the chain as a whole. Thus, sectorial particularism is
transformed into general demands, inscribed in the chain of
equivalence and creating a link between them (Keucheyan,
2015). Lasse Thomassen remarks that it is a synecdochal
operation which is performative: There is no preexisting
reality or subject, but rather it “is the creation of a chain of
equivalence and the representation of the collective identity
through the empty signifier that together constitute that
identity” (Thomassen, 2016, p. 167). Populism, or the con-
struction of “the people,” is the articulation of heterogeneous
demands through the logic of equivalence, the consequence of
which is the fixation of the populist frontier dividing the social
between “the people” and “the elite.”
Laclau and Mouffe consider necessary the figure of the
leader, as signifier, to represent the unity of the heterogeneous
demands. This thought has been very influential in the way
left-wing populism has used the leaders as empty signifiers to
articulate the people’s demands. I mentioned before how that
is problematic: The leader cannot fulfill the satisfied demands,
and the leader is still a leader, a politician with power within
and outside the political organization. The leader tends to act
within a different logic (the logic of power), which is not the
same as the logic of the people and can end up implementing
vertical structures without any kind of checks and balances;
maybe only the plebiscite. As happens with the function of the

leader, the idea of “the people” is quite controversial. “The
people,” sound the critiques, would be homogeneous as a
result of the unifying operation through the logic of equiva-
lence. Mouffe has already highlighted the misunderstanding
between equivalence and identity. It is wrong to conceive that
all the particular identities are erased and the result is a sole
homogeneous identity. The equivalence is applied to the hetero-
geneity of social demands without affecting the particular
and differentiated internal identities of the group. If the goal is
to expand who “the people” are, it would not make sense that
“the people” preexisted (before being named) or that plurality
would be reduced to unity. Rather the contrary, it is about
increasing plurality. The designation of the adversary is what
determines the configuration of the collective will. There are a
couple of interesting consequences to consider: Changing the
adversary would imply changing who “the people” are; and
achieving some of the demands could alter the chain of
equivalence through a different empty signifier or articulation.
There is, in principle, nothing that points automatically
to authoritarianism, to an essentialist notion of “the peo-
ple,” or to the imposition of the will of a homogeneous
group. “The people” as a group preserve their differences,
and the convergence of social demands does not have to be
confused with the unity into one single identity. Plurality is
not denied then. However, there are a couple of aspects
which are important to notice about the populist logic.
Laclau succeeds, in my opinion, in expanding who “the
people” are; he suggests indeed that the construction of the
people is the essential condition for the existence of
democracy. What is missed, as a consequence of his
conceptualization based on discursive articulation, is what
“the people” can achieve together: What kind of solidarity
relations and social and political practices emerge? How do
social claims, from feminism to environmentalism or from

pensioners’ rights to students demanding free and better
education, shape a populist project? It can be expected that
the claims (and the heterogeneity of actors behind them) push
toward a progressive agenda, but is it always like that? My
second concern is about the attention paid to “the people.”
Populists are accused of appropriating democracy through
naming themselves “the real people,” while the others would
be antidemocratic. However, less attention is dedicated to the
construction of “the elite.” The division and simplification by
the populist frontier obscure how the polarized groups (“the
people” and “the elite”) are porous and how “the elite” can
appropriate or satisfy, at least partly, some of the social
claims. Furthermore, the elites are also heterogeneous, and
although reduced to a common category by being named as
adversary, they retain their capacity to act at different levels
and upon different actors. The power of mediation, reor-
ientation, or manipulation by the elites must not be under-
estimated (Antón Morón, 2015)—nor that populists in
government or in parliament come closer to the interaction of
the elites if they are not directly becoming part of those elites.
2.2 POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY
The claim for popular sovereignty is one of the main features

of left-wing populism. The vivid emphasis on popular sover-
eignty has two reasons: a general reflection on democracy and
the need for offering an alternative to the existing order
(economic, political, institutional). Chantal Mouffe (2019)
makes a similar distinction when she claims that two levels
must be distinguished: The regime, the liberal democratic
institutions, consisting of the articulation between political
liberalism and the democratic values of equality and popular
sovereignty and hegemony, which is the level of interpretation

and institutionalization of that regime. Nowadays, a notion of
democracy is becoming dominant where the popular compo-
nent (the demos) is missing. Peter Mair refers to the distinction
between “constitutional democracy” and “popular democ-
racy.” The former highlights “the need for checks and
balances across institutions and entails government for the
people,” and the latter “emphasizes the role of the ordinary
citizen and mass participation, and entails government by the
people” (2013, p. 10, my italics). The recovery of popular
sovereignty reestablishes the link between constitutional and
popular democracy and places popular sovereignty as con-
stituent for democracy rather than a marginalized component
or even a threat to democracy. On the other hand, popular
hegemony is used as response to the professionalization of
politics and neoliberal globalization. In both cases, the rule by
the people is displaced by politicians and experts or by
transnational economic enterprises and institutions.
The reclamation for popular sovereignty, as formulated by
left-wing populism, does not aim to replace constitutional
power with popular power but instead a wider definition of
democracy which includes constitutional and popular
democracy. In this sense, the main value of popular sover-
eignty is that it enables the questioning of the constituted
order and opens up the possibility of creating constituent
spaces (Retamozo, 2017). In praxis, the scope of those con-
stituent spaces can vary substantially. While the Latin
American left-wing populism showed examples of constituent
processes leading to a new constitution, in Europe the situa-
tion is quite different. Despite the claims for a constituent
process made by Podemos, assuming the demands by the 15M
movement, they evolved toward a more modest goal and
aspire to constitutional reforms. Mélenchon advocates for the
Sixth Republic and a new constitution, but he does not count
on a majority to undertake such a project. However, the

movement for the Sixth Republic is experiencing relative
success in mobilizing people.
The impetus for recovering popular sovereignty in Europe
denotes that it does not represent a disruptive movement
against the existing constitutional and institutional order.
What is important here is that sovereignty is not conceived as
a coercive power but as constituent power capable of consti-
tuting something different and being attached to an emanci-
patory project. As Andreas Kalyvas (2005) says, the sovereign
act takes place outside the existing constitutional order in
order to redefine it. If the constituent power stemmed from the
preexisting constitution, it would be constituted power and
not constituent power. The principles of participation and
inclusion are immanent to the constituent act of the political
community. The constituent moments are exceptional, and
they depend on the degree of inclusion of the different actors
and the success of the constituent act, that is, their efficiency to
create a new constitutional document (Kalyvas, 2005). The
ruled, and not the rulers, must participate in the constituent
act. If not, it would be an imposition rather than a constituent
act in which a part decides illegitimately for the whole.
The social division introduced by populism through popular
sovereignty is posed as a tension between populism and
democracy instead of between popular and constitutional
democracy. “The people” as plebs (the subaltern and margin-
alized groups) are a part of the political community which
assumes the position of the whole community when they claim
to be sovereign and capable of reshaping the instituted order.
The synecdochal operation constituting a new political order,
Francisco Panizza (2008) points out, entails then the trans-
formation of the plebs into demos. There is a transition process
from being nobody, excluded from the social order, to repre-
senting the whole community. The key is how to define who the
legitimate members of the demos are, how sovereignty is

exerted, and what the constitutive outside is (Panizza, 2008).
Therefore, popular sovereignty implies also an exclusion; this
time not of the marginalized or subaltern but of the elites. Here
it is important to pay attention to the articulation of liberal
institutions and democratic values (or between constitutional
and popular democracy) and whether the operation of
becoming “the people” is expansive and increases inclusiveness.
Moreover, it must be assessed how such an articulation relates
to the preexisting institutional and democratic order (whether
equality, plurality, and sovereignty are reinforced or not).
As mentioned above, the particular interpretation of institu-
tionalization does not derive, at least so far, from cases of
constituent processes; contrary to what happened in some
countries in Latin America.
A better reading than the one confronting populism against
democracy acknowledges the political and social spaces
opened by the invocation of popular sovereignty and its
questioning of the instituted order. This is inconvenient for
liberalism (Retamozo, 2017) and republicanism which, from a
defense of existing institutions, warn against the risk of
authoritarian paths, but refuse any possible democratization
process originated by the questioning of those institutions.
Gianpaolo Baiocchi (2018) sees the risk of sovereignty being
the “general will” attributed by a part instead of the “will of
all.” Sovereignty can easily be used to cement a partial view of
the world. He suggests that sovereignty must be a process,
more than an end state, where both the “We” and sovereignty
are open to reinvention. It would be a mistake to emphasize
only one side (the “We” or the sovereign). The rule (being
sovereign) and the demos (“the people”) must work together:
“the We placing a check on Sovereignty, while Sovereignty
gives the We more meaning” (2018, p. 20). This notion of
popular sovereignty as an ongoing process, recognizing the
tensions between the demos and the sovereign, “the people”

and the institutions, is useful to politicize the issues ignored by
liberal democracy because it “radicalizes the meaning of
democracy, insisting on the idea of the people as an egalitarian
collective and the people’s rule as a broad mandate to bring
about social transformation” (Baiocchi, 2018, p. 23). Baiocchi
refers mainly to a historical bloc, where social movements are
a leading force, so the situation is more complex in the case of
populist parties. However, similar dynamics can be applied.
Not all the left-wing parties connect with mass mobilizations
or stem from social protests, but all of them develop a
discursive articulation and mechanism of participation to
foster the identification between “the people” and the party. It
would be quite difficult to imagine sovereignty as process if
political parties were disconnected from social movements and
mobilizations. The reality shows, in any case, that such a
connection is complicated and adds different levels of tensions
between movements and parties.
2.3 NEOLIBERAL GLOBALIZATION
When reclaiming popular sovereignty, left-wing populism

faces a kind of paradox. On one side, sovereignty is in crisis
and has been gradually transferred to transnational forces; on
the other, the traditional terrain of sovereignty is still the
nation-state. Thus, left-wing populism contests neoliberal
globalization and claims for a form of popular sovereignty
which is exchangeable with national or state sovereignty.
Popular sovereignty assumes the value of the defense of the
capacity of self-decision by nation-states. This position gen-
erates confusion comparing with other claims, particularly
from the far right, which apparently pursue the same goal.
Recovering the horizontal dimension of populism, the far
right triumphs electorally due to the xenophobic and anti-

immigrant discourse where there is an ethnic and class frontier
between the insider and outsider. Left-wing populism, on the
contrary, identifies the economic elites and the European
Union as the main responsible party for the impoverishing
situation of the people. These conceptions of who are not
part of “the people” could not differ more. The uneven
geographical development of the EU, materialized in the
Center and North with stronger economy and the South
suffering from austerity politics (Gros, 2016), depicts the
existence of two totally different types of populism. However,
the defense of sovereignty continues to generate confusion and
contributes to making both types of populisms comparable.
Referring to the “losers of globalization” has not been very
helpful either since it includes a vast range of people from
xenophobic groups who perceive immigrants as a threat to
activists against austerity politics and global capitalism.
The claim for popular sovereignty must be observed in the
light of the articulation of “the people” and of “the elite.” Jon
Azkune Torres (2016) stresses that sovereignty articulates the
relationship between political community and the state. His
point is similar to the one expressed above on the constituent
and the constituted, but he draws on the work of Enrique
Dussel (2008). Power contains the primary power of the
political community (potential) which gives rise to the
delegation of the exercise of power through institutions and
representatives (potestas). The separation between the two
types of power, says Azkune, is possible due to sovereignty
which articulates the community and the government. At the
level of articulation (of hegemony, in Mouffe’s terms), the
differences with the far right, but also with the center-left and
right, become obvious. Popular sovereignty is not culturally or
historically grounded (i.e., not related to national identity
then) but a political claim for a government for and by the
people. Bringing back the power of decision to the people

must not necessarily imply (although often it does) the return
to the nation-state, but a reaction against the privatization of
sovereignty by transnational economic elites and against the
professionalization of politics, not interested in transforming
the common will into common good (Taylor, 2019).
Regina Queiroz (2017) singles out that neoliberalism, and
“There Is No Alternative” (TINA) as the maxim it relies on,
promotes a publicity (openness and transparency) without
public, neither a populus or demos. Thus, neoliberalism
precludes the possibility of “the people” as sovereign legis-
lator. This can be applied to the EU. Besides the problems
attributed to its lack of legitimacy or democratic deficit, it is
important to expose the lack of accountability or trans-
parency from the perspective of the “sovereign people” and
not exclusively from the nation-states’ perspective. Placing
the discussion on left-wing populism and popular sover-
eignty at this level could scale-up the discussion from the
national to the transnational level. That is what Yanis Var-
oufakis does with his proposal for democratizing Europe,
including transparency in decision-making as one of the first
measures. I will retake the discussion between the trans-
national and international levels in a later chapter. I am now
interested in underlining that regaining popular sovereignty
does not need to be restricted to the nation-state and can
introduce a transnational or international agenda, which
questions the instituted order, global neoliberalism and,
specifically, the EU. This articulation of sovereignty (the
relation between the ruled and the rulers) does not have
anything in common with that of the far right. Pernille
Skipper, leader of the Danish Red-Green Alliance, adopts the
populist logic by opposing “ordinary people” with “EU
elites,” in her case to justify the need for leaving the EU. She
illustrates how the need for popular sovereignty is due to the
existing conflict between “the elite” and “the people” at the

global level, instead of conceiving globalization as only a
conflict between the transnational forces and the national
state: “Globalization does not work for ordinary people. It
works for the elite” (Skipper, 2017).
There are, however, stances from the left that still look at
national sovereignty as the only solution to neoliberal politics.
Takis Fotopoulos (2015), for example, criticizes the way in
which Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain address the EU
framework. According to him, both parties do not question the
EU and are incapable of leading a project for the victims of
globalization. The recovery of national sovereignty would be
the right option by merging social and national liberation. The
main problem of this kind of position is that the only solution is
placed at the national level, and the articulation of sovereignty,
the political community, and the governors, is limited to the
national levels. This is a consequence of the traditional asso-
ciation between popular sovereignty and nation-state as well as
ignoring how sovereignty has been reshaped through global-
ization. It sounds quite strange that the only way to offer
solutions to the “victims of globalization” is social and national
liberalization. This suggestion barely touches the issue of
globalization and attributes an excessive emancipatory power
to the national framework and to the national identity attached
to it. In order to make the notion of popular sovereignty or
sovereign people productive, it must be associated with the
acknowledgment of different scales and how sovereignty is
exerted. I am not referring only to national and transnational
or international scales, but also to the local scale. The challenge
is how to articulate all these scales to provide a satisfactory
alternative to global neoliberalism. In this sense, popular sov-
ereignty is not reducible to national or state sovereignty, and
the political community (“the people”) is not the same as
national community, as will be discussed later.
3
CLASS AND MIGRATION
In an article answering the question if left-wing populism is

the solution, Anton Jäger and Arthur Borriello (2019)
conclude remarking that left-wing populism, in contrast to “a
moribund old left”, has taken stock of the new political and
economic situation after 30 years of neoliberalism and
“trimmed its sails to the wind”. This happens, they add,
precisely when the organized working class, the main collec-
tive actor of social change in the twentieth century, remains
extremely disorganized. This reflection draws attention to the
fact that populism so far has not been capable of reorganizing
the working class, or, at least, to offer a platform in which
such a reorganization could happen. Actually, one of the main
sticking points between left-wing populism and the socialist or
radical-left wing is about the political subject of social change,
being the working class or “the people”. The disagreement
goes beyond organization and affects the shaping of the col-
lective identity for the left project. Whilst left-wing populists
are skeptical about class-based analysis and class-struggle
discourse, radical left-wingers are wary of the absence of
labor and capital conflicts as well as class struggles when
talking about “the people”.
47
The importance of the working class is, in any case,

indisputable. Paradoxically enough, class-based interpreta-
tions of the rise of populism have been used to account for the
switch of working-class voters (normally portrayed as white
male workers) from progressive positions, especially social
democracy, to the populist-right wing. This phenomenon was
prominent after Donald Trump’s electoral victory but it was
already present in Europe in the countries where the populist-
right wing already had significant electoral support. However,
the rise of left-wing populism is framed from the perspective of
the disenchantment and the fragmentation of the middle class.
The latent questions are, on the one hand, if left-wing popu-
lism could regain the vote of the working class (now allegedly
attracted by right-wing populism), and, on the other, if left-
wing populism entails the abandonment of the working class
and class struggle as the core of the left ideology. In the first
case, the assumption is that populism is, above all, the strategy
deployed by the far right to gain the workers’ support, and
in the second, that left-wing populism is a moderate,
de-ideologized, middle-class project.
The idea of regaining the working class (in competition
with the radical right-wing populism or from a socialist or
radical-left position) should not be detached from class
composition, or in other words, which kind of working class
we are talking about. In this regard, the class dimension is
linked to migration (and other dimensions, such as gender) so
it is crucial to consider if class struggles include the migrants’
claims (as the workers they are, indeed) or if they exclude
them. Although the debate affects all of the left, the inclu-
sionary vs exclusionary conceptualization of populism can
help to assess how left-wing populism articulates class and
migration within a larger and multi-class populist project. In
principle, “working class” and “the people” should constitute
open identities whereby migrants are included when sharing
Class and Migration 49
the same economic system of exploitation or belonging to the

same group opposed to the privileged elite. Nonetheless, that
is not always the case, and some contradictions appear in the
formation of an inclusive collective subject.
3.1 WORKING CLASS AND THE PLEBS
The space created by the decreasing organizational and elec-

toral force of communist parties and the social-liberal turn
undertaken by social democrats, together with the concerns
about sovereignty in the contexts of the EU, was expanded in
the aftermath of the economic crisis. Left-wing populism made
it clear then that nowadays the conflict was between “the
people” and “the elite”, expressed through a less ideological
discourse whereby left-wing populist parties “downplay
Marxist ideological purity and present themselves as the vox
populi, not just the vanguard of the proletariat, which may
cause them to toy with non-traditional identity concerns”
(March, 2007, p. 67). Besides replacing the proletariat as
vanguard, the working class lost centrality as subject of
change due to the multiclass character of left-wing populism.
In a report on the working class in Spain, Alberto Garzón
(2019), leader of the United Left (IU), compares the strategies
of the liberal party Ciudadanos and Podemos and classifies
both as catch-all parties. He perceives similarities between the
social democracy from the beginning of the twentieth century
and the current left-wing populism which appeals to “the
people” and not to “the working class”. This strategy pro-
vokes, according to Garzón, the loss of class awareness in the
working class. Nevertheless, when the vote of the working
class is analyzed, Garzón unveils that their vote is less leftist
than the one from the sociocultural professionals who vote
Podemos. The report, and the vision of Garzón, shows the
challenge for the left: The working class does not vote
necessarily for the left (and surely not for the radical left)
whilst the absence of a “class appellation” generates
decreasing class awareness. In my opinion, left-wing popu-
lism’s difficulties in attracting the working-class vote are
insufficiently explained from a discursive perspective (the
“populist appellation”), since it has more to do with the
dissatisfaction of workers, trade unions’ role, their traditional
relation with social democratic parties, and how their
perception of their own identity and interests is in the glob-
alized world. There is no guarantee that a “class appellation”
would activate the working-class awareness and even less
regain their vote.
There are stronger critiques of left-wing populism which
pinpoint that, besides replacing the “working class” with “the
people” as political subject, the core problem to be solved and
overcome is the disregard for social struggles and class con-
flict. Massimo Modonesi (2016) refers to the correlation of
class forces in a historical moment between the dominant class
and the subaltern classes. Left-wing populism in Europe is for
him a defensive move against the dominant class, which still
maintains the initiative and is offensive. Despite their good
intentions, Modonesi interprets left-wing populism as a lesser
evil and part of the process of dismantling the left, even in the
places where class warfare comes out like Greece and Spain.
The scope of the critique is slightly different and points to the
unequal structures and the asymmetric struggle between the
dominant class and subaltern classes.
The question is not the articulation of “the people”, which
does not necessarily exclude existing class struggles or the
working class, but rather dimming the power of unequal
structures which hinder the promotion of progressive social
agendas or of economic redistribution. Left-wing populism
exposes one of its weaknesses when it is not able to fulfill its
electoral promises and must moderate its ambitions and pro-

posals due to its insufficient force in relation to the dominant
classes. In any case, I insist, it is not a matter of transforming
“the people” into the collective subject of change instead of
the working class. The problem is ignoring the power struc-
tures behind “the elites” and their capacity to constrain and
neutralize the “politics of the people”.
The claim of “the people” as political subject is neither per
se a replacement for the “working class” or abandoning the
logic of class struggles, although it implies their modification.
The fragmentation of class, due to the multiplicity of social
struggles and the vanishing conditions associated with
industrial workers, makes it quite difficult for the working
class, the proletariat, to continue as the leading emancipatory
subject. The populist logic enables a larger articulation of the
collective subject through the chain of equivalences when
preserving the verticality of the economic and social conflicts.
“The people” as plebs means “common people”, or a part
excluded from political society, in contrast to a constituted
part of society (populus) (Vatter, 2012). Ernesto Laclau
(2010) uses this distinction where populus is the totality of the
community and plebs are those at the bottom. The plebs, a
partiality within the community, aims through a hegemonic
operation to incarnate the totality of the community. The
conflict is thus vertical and characterized by the struggle of
those who are excluded from becoming the legitimate populus
(Petitjean, 2014). Class identity rather than disappearing is
embedded within other social struggles resulting in a new
hegemonic formation around “the people” vs “the elite”
dichotomy. Iñigo Errejón (2014), founder of Podemos,
considered the 15M or indignados movement, prior to
Podemos, as a plebeian irruption which altered the common
sense and enabled the establishment of a new political frontier
in which “the people” were not represented by “the elites”.
This frontier surpassed the left- vs right-wing metaphors and

required thus a different political articulation. “The people”
as plebs implies that the new political conflict cannot be
articulated through a traditional leftist discourse. The dimin-
ishing role of the working class is subsumed within the
assertion of the vertical axis established by the plebeian
mobilization.
The problem is located in the reduction of the conflict to
the communicative and discursive field. In other words, “the
people” as plebs rephrases the vertical conflict against the
elite by the articulation of the demands from the working
class together with the ones from other groups. However,
the materiality of the plebs, from the point of view
of domination and organizing resistance, remains ignored
(Sztulwark, 2019). On the other hand, the discursive con-
struction of “the elite” could be problematic. The con-
struction of “the people” is made in opposition to the
common enemy, named as “the elite”. As occurs with “the
people”, it is not expected that we would be able to identify
the sociological referents of “the elite”. The emancipation of
the working class was, according to Marx, to abolish all the
classes and should be led by the working class; this is only
possible if solidarity relations between workers are devel-
oped. The emancipation of “the people” depends on the
satisfaction of their heterogeneous social demands in their
antagonistic relation with “the elite”. Instead of solidarity
relations, what is needed is the articulation of those strug-
gles. The final goal is that plebs incarnates the totality of
“the people” as populus without abolishing the differences
between “the people” and “the elite” because such a
distinction is by the way the reason for the existence of “the
people”.
I miss also in the category of “the people” the possibility to
apply Nicos Poulantzas’ (Seymour, 2012) distinction between
“class determination” (the objective situation of class within

productive relations) and “class position” (the orientation of
members of a class within the class struggle). Although there
is space for subjective positions within the articulation of
“the people”, it is not possible to explain why members of
the working class can align with groups contrary to their
interest. In other words, how someone belonging to “the
people” can align with other groups who belong to other
discursive formations of “the people” or directly to the elite.
Coming back to the materiality of the plebs, the discursive
construction of “the people” does not always contribute to
throw light on the organization of the popular classes: How
the groups have organized themselves to elaborate their
demands and how they can organize together. The logic of
articulation favors that left-wing populism can lead a polit-
ical project from above without necessarily counting on
social groups or using the existing ways of organizing and
resisting. I am not saying that articulation is not valuable,
because it is, but that more attention should be paid to
practices and organization forms.
Talking about “the people” and not (or not only) about
working class should lead to the question of its adequacy in
building up a left project. As mentioned, it is common to read
that the working class, “the losers of globalization”, has
abandoned the left parties since they feel that the system is
rigged against them and the mainstream parties do not answer
to their concerns (Jackson, 2019). In this context, left-wing
populism offers the possibility of uniting the majority of the
working people. The main difference in relation to a class
approach is that the working class is united around common
demands such as public education, healthcare, equality, non-
discrimination, or more democracy. The articulation of the
demands and not the identity is what allows for the expansion
of the collective subject beyond the working class. “The
people” can actually contribute to envisioning a new working

class, capable of incorporating other groups. Nancy Fraser
speculates about that:
If the left hopes to revive the idea of working class as

the leading force within a new counterhegemonic
bloc, we will have to envision that class in a new
way – intersectionally, if you will ― as not restricted
to the white, straight, male, majority-ethnicity,
manufacturing and mining workers, but as
encompassing all of these other occupations ― paid
and unpaid ― and as massively encompassing
immigrants, women and people of color. (Fraser,
2019, pp. 62–63)
The idea of exploring an “intersectional populism” is quite

intriguing to connect the heterogeneity of demands and social
groups against diverse kinds of domination. “The people”
should not be used to erase differences and similarly does not
aim to replace the category of class but to expand it and
articulate it in an intersectional manner.
3.2 THE PRECARIAT AND THE

POPULIST INTERPELLATION
Besides highlighting that class is articulated, and has not

vanished, together with other struggles as part of “the peo-
ple”, it is still relevant to explore the connections between
left-wing people and the capitalist system of (re)production.
Socioeconomic and technological changes have provoked the
transformation of work: increasing flexibility, fragmentation,
and temporality of labor, as well as the predominance of
knowledge, affect, communication, and information to create
value; and relegating the waged labor time to a non-central
position (Brunet & Pizzi, 2012). The change of paradigm to

the postindustrial era or post-Fordism is changing class
composition and causing a social dualization between stable
and precarious (contingent jobs, working poor, structurally
unemployed) workers (Quintana, 2005). This duality is at the
core of the definition of the precariat, a neologism combining
“precarity” and “proletariat”, as “class-in-the-making” by
Guy Standing (2011). In his conceptualization, Standing pre-
sents from the beginning elements inviting to a populist
reading of it. Class structure, as a result of neoliberal global-
ization, consists of seven groups. At the top is the elite,
composed by a tiny number of super rich, corresponding to
the 1%. The vertical conflict and the identification of the elite
as the group at the top show that populism and Standing’s
approach have something in common. However, to Standing
the elite is not defined in relation to “the people” but from
their position in the class structure and by their own accu-
mulated privileges. The other groups are the salariat,
proficians, the old working class, the precariat, the unem-
ployed, and the lumpenproletariat. Another element, which
connects Standing with populism, is his evocation of the
global precariat, a group without any anchor of stability and
perceived as “a new dangerous class”. The risk would be that
they give their voices and money to political platforms and a
“monster” will come to life. The new class is dangerous,
“partly because its insecurities induce the bitterness, ill-health,
and anger that can be the fodder of right-wing populism. But
it is also dangerous in the progressive sense that many in it
reject old center-left and center-right politics” (Standing,
2018). The call for action by Standing is motivated to avoid
the move to right-wing populism rather than to develop a left-
wing populism. It is worth noticing that Standing’s framework
is global neoliberalism whilst left-wing populism is mainly
concerned with the nation-state.
Standing singles out three characteristics of the precariat:

They have no occupational identity or narrative to give to
their lives (provoking existential insecurity); its structure of
social income relies largely on money wages, without non-
wage benefits, rights-based state benefits or informal com-
munity benefits; and they are losing acquired rights (cultural,
civil, social, economic, and political). Insecurity, inequality,
and lack of rights thus become the common features shared by
the precariat. Furthermore, the precariat is split into three
factions: atavists, nostalgics, and progressives. I find the first
one of special relevance. Standing refers to the “atavists” as
those who have fallen from old working class and hence lack
the support of community. They “look backwards, feeling
deprived of a real or imagined past. Not having much edu-
cation, they listen to populist sirens who play on their fears
and blame ‘the other’ ― migrants, refugees, foreigners, or some
other group easily demonized” (Standing, 2016). In sum, there
are two separated groups: the precariat, divided into three
categories, on the one hand, and the working class, on the
other. The class supporting right-wing populism would not be
the working class but one faction of the precariat derived from
the working class.
At this point, it is questionable that the precariat consti-
tutes a class and it is also surprising that the precarity
processes boosted by neoliberal policies are limited to a class
rather than being a cross-class phenomenon. The precariat is
mainly defined as a negative class (Seymour, 2012), i.e. it is
what it is not: not proletariat, not working class, not salariat.
Precarity is affecting many classes and social groups from the
working class to academics or well-educated young people.
Instead of looking at the precariat as a new and separate class
(Jørgensen, 2016), it could be more productive to frame it as a
way of connecting classes and of responding to the post-
Fordist changes. The precariat comes quite close to “the
people”, albeit it emphasizes more the material conditions for

the emergence of a heterogeneity of social struggles which
share a common enemy: neoliberal or austerity policies.
Richard Seymour claims rightly that “the precariat” works as
a kind of populist interpellation through dividing society into
the “power bloc” (the elites according to Standing’s class
structure) and the rest. Seymour notes that precarity can be
part of a system of articulations unifying, through the chain of
equivalence, those affected by it and in struggle against the
power bloc. The working class would be still determinant,
since it is suffering from precarity, but in alliance with other
social groups. The precariat/populist interpellation should
contribute to forging a radical majority against neoliberalism.
Using a similar argument, Owen Jones (2016) advocates for a
left-wing populism to connect the left with the unreached and
to develop a discourse which resonates with the increasing
diversity within the working class.
The populist interpellation of the precariat opens up a
space to strengthen the class dimension of populism and
anchor it within the economic system of production. Seymour
(2017) highlights that saying “we are all precarious” does not
imply being proud of being exploited and subordinated or of
living with fear but the declared intention to fight. “The
people” as plebs should capture that spirit, and the pride of
being “the people” should express the rejection of the politics
of the elites and not the supposedly pride of belonging to a
national or cultural community (in opposition to outsiders).
The point made by Standing should not be forgotten either.
Insecurity and fear of the uncertain future is affecting all the
classes because of precarity. The left wing should address this
issue. A last but not least important aspect is that Standing is
dealing with the precariat as the global class and it demands
global solutions; some of them, like basic income, change the
left schemas of finding solutions within the traditional angle of
the welfare state. Precarity is an increasing economic and

social process. Given that left-wing populism is still mainly
attached to welfare politics and close to social democratic
socioeconomic programs, the precariat should predictably
contribute to pushing it into other directions.
3.3 INCLUSIONARY AND EXCLUSIONARY POPULISM
Against the impression that all the populisms are the same,
Cas Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser (2012) make a valuable
distinction between inclusionary and exclusionary populism.
Populism in Europe was, at that moment, exclusive, while the
Latin American one was inclusive. This divergence is
explained by the definition of the actors who belong to “the
people”, in antagonistic relation with “the elite”, and by their
ideology (left or right); albeit both are against liberal demo-
cracy. Inclusion and exclusion are characterized through three
dimensions: material (redistribution), political (political
participation and public contestation), and symbolic (the
boundaries separating the “We” and “They”). Furthermore,
Mudde and Rovira add that the inclusionary and exclusionary
distinction is also due to the stronger socioeconomic dimen-
sion (including the poor) and the predominant sociocultural
dimension (excluding the “aliens”) in Europe. The socioeco-
nomic component became more relevant in Europe in the
aftermath of the economic crisis, and the formation of an
inclusionary populism rose, although there were preexisting
left-wing populist parties like The Left in Germany and the
Socialist Party in the Netherlands. Comparing the varieties of
inclusionary populism (Syriza, Podemos, and the Five Star
Movement, FSM) in Europe, Nuria Font, Paolo Grazziano
and Myrto Tsakatika (2019) show that there are diverse types
of inclusionary populism and that Syriza and Podemos “are
clearly inclusionary along the material and political dimen-

sions, although less explicitly inclusionary along the symbolic
one” (Font, Grazziano & Tsakatika, 2019, p. 16). The FSM,
maybe not surprisingly, assumes a more ambivalent position.
The authors raise an interesting discussion about the ade-
quacy of assessing populism in terms of inclusionary and
exclusionary dimensions instead of the left- and right-wing
division which would not reflect the complexities introduced
by the new axis. Moreover, inclusionary and exclusionary
categories are gradational and not binary, since they are
opposite poles on a continuum and not different types of
populism. I think that it is still pertinent to maintain the left-
vs right-wing division but applying the gradual categories of
inclusionary and exclusionary populism into this. In other
words, before concluding that left-wing populism (or just the
left) is inclusionary and right-wing populism is exclusionary, a
more productive approach will be to assess how inclusionary
left-wing populist parties are. For instance, the material
dimension applied to exclusionary populism is explained by
their defense of welfare chauvinism: the protection of the
nationals (the insiders) and exclusion of the immigrants (the
outsiders). The reality proves to be complicated when the
defense of the working class is made in conflict with the rights
of immigrants and refugees. Left and populist left-wing parties
can be inclusionary to different degrees depending on the
extent to which they give priority to preserving working-class
rights, they avoid expressing a clear position, or they embrace
positive attitudes toward reception and integration.
Ángel Rivero (2018), who is not persuaded at all by the
“fuzzy distinction” between left- and right-wing populism, is
critical regarding the identification of Southern (i.e. left-wing
populism) as inclusionary and Northern (i.e. right-wing
populism) as exclusionary. He uses the examples of
Mélenchon as strongly favorable toward restrictions on
immigration and opposed to the arrival of refugees to France

and of Corbyn’s silence on immigration and European inte-
gration. Although the geographical division North vs South
Europe is useful to understand the uneven economic deve-
lopment in the EU, it cannot determine automatically a type
of one-sided populism (left or right). Left- and right-wing
populism coexist in Northern and Southern countries, and
exclusionary attitudes, albeit associated with the far right, can
also be found on the left. As just mentioned, the degree of
inclusiveness can vary within left-wing parties. Nonetheless, I
do not find it feasible that a left-wing populist party takes on a
fully exclusionary position. There are contradictions, as those
mentioned by Rivero, which are connected to the definition of
who “the people” are and, specifically, how the categories of
class and migration are integrated.
3.4 WORKERS AND MIGRANT (WORKERS)
In an interview, Gerrit Voerman (2015) reflects on the

inclusionary and exclusionary distinction separating the
Socialist Party from right-wing populism in the Netherlands.
He emphasizes that the key question is who belongs to “the
people” and who does not. Whilst Geert Wilders’ view is
based on ethnicity and national identity, the Socialist Party is
less defined: “the people”, “the common man”, or the “man
in the street”. This appreciation can be extended to the gen-
eral distinction between left- and right-wing populism in
Europe. “The people” in left-wing populism is, in general,
inclusive or, at least, open to including immigrants and ref-
ugees since they are also indeed “people”. Podemos and
Syriza have expressed positive attitudes to migrants and ref-
ugees. Grigoris Markou (2017) points out that Alexis Tsipras’
discourse, before and after the elections of September 2015,
presents an inclusionary articulation of “the people” by

appealing to all democratic citizens, the working class, the
unemployed, leftists, and immigrants. This happens at the
domestic level, but also at the European level. Tsipras chal-
lenged the anti-immigration logic of the EU. Nonetheless, the
degree of inclusiveness can change, depending on how explicit
the references to migrants or refugees are, or can even move
to more exclusionary positions. I mentioned above the
controversial position of Mélenchon or the ambiguity of
Corbyn but there are more worrying cases like the group Get
Up (Aufstehen), emerged from a faction of The Left in Ger-
many (see below).
In countries where the far right is gaining power and has
successfully influenced the public debate and policies on
migration and integration, the temptation of embracing the
far-right discourse is enormous. The most paradigmatic
example is Denmark. After denying their social-liberal turn,
the Social Democrats undertook a comeback to their roots.
Housing Minister Kaare Dybvad (2017) gave a populist touch
to the new social democracy whereby social democracy should
fight for real equality for “the popular Denmark” and rebel
against the tyranny of the “creative class”, using the category
of Richard Florida. Combined with this opposition between
the creative (the elite) and the working class, the Social
Democrats toughened their discourse against migration. To
regain the vote of the working and lower classes, Mattias
Tesfaye, Minister of Integration, operates under the following
premise: Class struggle is migration politics, or, in other
words, the well-being of the Danish workers can only be
ensured through tougher migration policies (Agustı́n &
Jørgensen, 2019). The result is a new social democracy,
attending to the concerns of the (national) working-class and
welfare state policies, while accepting exclusionary migration
and integration policies.
My point is that there is an increasing degree of exclu-

siveness that is affecting mainstream parties but also left-wing
populism. The risk of interpreting left-wing populism as a
response to right-wing populism, and by that overtaking their
position on migration, is quite high. The left deals with the
dilemmas of offering security and protection to the working
class and of regaining their vote. In 2018 Sahra Wagenknecht,
the parliamentary chair of The Left in Germany, launched
the non-party movement Get Up. The idea is to create a space
of convergence open to Social Democrats and the Greens.
Despite their discreet impact, the initiative represents
a populist attempt, inspired by the gilets jaunes, France
Insoumise and Momentum, to counter German right-wing
populism, Alternative für Deutschland, and aims to appeal
to the discontented voters (Beppler-Spahl, 2019), mainly the
working class. The movement’s proposal combines welfare
politics with the assertion of the national identity and the need
to regulate migration. The main focus on redistribution pol-
icies within the logic of national welfare state makes the
question of who must be the beneficiary the central question
and creates a competition between workers and immigrants.
Furthermore, Get Up takes for granted that there is a given
class instead of being constituted through social struggles
(Alabao, 2018). The same happens with the “populist inter-
pellation” of the precariat and can be applied to this case. The
division between working class and immigrants hides the
conditions of immigrants as workers who share the same
labor market and system of exploitation. The enemy of the
working class is not the immigrants then.
The problem cannot only be attributed to Get Up since it
has also affected trade unions when the defense of national
workers is understood in opposition to immigrants, accused of
worsening labor conditions. The assertion of a national
identity (and exclusive national interests) instead of a class
identity (and common class interests) hinders strengthening

social bonds and solidarity relations (Agustı́n & Jørgensen,
2016b). In populist terms, “the people” is reduced to ethnos, a
cultural community, and the plebs loses its capacity to arti-
culate vertically the struggles between the subaltern classes
and the elite. I would still maintain that left-wing populism is
inclusionary but cases are diverse and different degrees of
inclusiveness can be found. The increasing nationalism and
restrictive migration and integration policies coming from the
far right are influencing the left which feels tempted to
abandon inclusionary policies. Left-wing populism should not
imply refusing the value of class (supposedly replaced by
“the people”), but class should not be mystified as “the real
people” within the national identity framework. “The people”
as inclusionary should give place to class and migration,
exploring the intersections, and not articulating them as
antagonistic or incompatible categories.
4
NATIONALISM AND PATRIOTISM
The strong tie between nationalism and populism is quite

evident, and in the case of radical right-wing populism often
closely related. A homogeneous and exclusionary ethnic
community is presented as “the people” in right-wing
populism. On the other hand, the connections between left-
wing populism and nationalism are less obvious if the main
defining feature is the division between “the people” and
“the elite”. However, there are some elements that make it
necessary at least to consider the relation between left-wing
populism and nationalism. “The people” are, above all, a
national community, and the defense of the popular sover-
eignty takes place within the nation-state borders. The
importance of emotions and affect to constitute collective
identities contributes to overlapping appeals to “the people”
and the national community, since the nation entails a
considerable amount of symbols which reinforce the sense of
belonging. I do not consider nationalism to be characteristic
of left-wing populism, but, that said, populism as a national-
popular project, mainly developed from a nation-state,
cannot avoid the national issue and attempt to generate a
65
national framework, grounded in the demand for popular

sovereignty.
The conceptualization of populism and nationalism as
types of discourse offers a sharp distinction (Katsambekis &
Stavrakakis, 2017): They appeal to different subjects (the
people and the nation) which oppose (or align with) different
others (the establishment, other nations or ethnicities). The
relation between subjects likewise differs: top vs bottom in the
case of populism, and in vs out in the case of nationalism.
Thus, the relation between subjects refers to the inclusionary
vs exclusionary division. We can differentiate between popu-
lism and nationalism, as well as between left- and right-wing
populism where the position of right-wing populism coincides
with the nationalist position. For this reason, radical right-
wing populism is depicted as “ethno-traditional nationalism”
(Bonikowski, Halikiopoulou, Kaufmann, & Rooduijn, 2019),
aimed to protect the traditional ethnic character of the nation.
Minorities are tolerated since they are minorities and not a
“majority minority” which “threatens” the traditions and
values of the nation. The ethnic-civic distinction is applicable
to left- and right-wing populism. Since left-wing populism is
inclusive, it is however associated with the civil version of
nationalism. Right-wing populism, on the contrary, is defined
as ethnic populism due to the exclusionary conception of
who “the people” are, corresponding with the national
community.
In the following I want to examine three challenges for
left-wing populism. The first one is the crucial aspect of
sovereignty, and the almost exchangeable uses of popular
and national sovereignty. The second is the generation of a
new type of patriotism to differentiate itself from nation-
alism. The last one is separatism or, in other words, the will
of the people to self-determination and claim for an inde-
pendent state.
Nationalism and Patriotism 67
4.1 NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY
The appeal to sovereignty signals confusion about the differ-

ences between right- and left-wing populism, on the one hand,
and between national and popular sovereignty, on the other.
Later I will address in more detail the intersections between
popular and national sovereignty in the international context,
but for now I refer to the convergence of populism and
nationalism around sovereignty, albeit the meaning given
to sovereignty and the political projects must be clearly
differentiated. As mentioned above, the claim for popular
sovereignty emerges as the need to emphasize popular
democracy (government by the people), since constitutional
democracy (government for the people, checks and balances)
is the predominant, and almost exclusive, understanding of
democracy. Popular sovereignty should contribute to re-
establishing the link between constitutional and popular
democracy. This notion of sovereignty can hardly be confused
with the nationalist one. The problem is that both left-wing
populism and nationalism (as well as right-wing populism)
share the project of reclaiming sovereignty. Aristotle Kallis
makes an interesting point when identifying a political alliance
between populism and sovereignism on the basis of “re-
spatializing power”. According to Kallis, power has been
moved from the people and becomes more distant from the
community and delegated to external forces. Nation-state
would be the only way out to avoid the consequences of
neoliberal globalization, and right- and left-wing populism
would converge around nation-statism (Kallis, 2018).
The consequences of equating populism and nationalism
are, however, troubling. Firstly, the different subjects in which
political power should reside (“the people” or “the nation”, as
well as which people) are sidelined. Secondly, their references
to sovereignty are different as well. Rogers Brubaker stresses
that historically populism and nationalism have developed

different conceptualizations of sovereignty. Populism appeals
to a restorative sovereignty, because “the people as sovereign
demos seek to restore to ‘the people’ the rightful place granted
them by democratic theory”. Nationalism uses a trans-
formative appeal to the sovereignty of “the nation” to redraw
“the macro-political map and altering the boundaries of
political units” (Brubaker, 2017, 2019, pp. 7–8). The
re-shaping of sovereignty nowadays makes this distinction
between restorative and transformative blur, says Brubaker.
Nationalism aims to restore “ownership” of the polity to the
nation while populism wants to restore power to “the peo-
ple”, but the distinction between populism and nationalism
still matters. Nationalism implies a constitutive reference
within the global frame of reference, given that humanity is
divided into distinct nations. Left-wing populism’s constitutive
reference is, on the other hand, inequality and asymmetrical
distribution of power (Brubaker, 2017, 2019).
Therefore it is so relevant who the sovereign people are in the
case of populism. The radical right-wing populism limits “the
people” to natives, placing the focus on immigration and
national sovereignty. For nationalists, although references to the
people, as members of the national community, can be deployed,
the nation is the main source of sovereignty. Moreover, “the
nation” and “the people” are two types of “imagined commu-
nities”: National community is an image of community over
time, and “the people” presents an image of community over
space (Yack, 2001). While national community depicts a com-
munity preceding and surviving the current community, “the
people” address the state’s coercive authority in a specific
moment. In this regard, populism and nationalism’s appeals to
sovereignty entail re-spatializing power, but it is not only a spa-
tialized category. Nationalism and right-wing populism intro-
duce a dimension over time because the community they
“imagine” is national. The legitimacy argued to claim sover-

eignty could not be more distinct from the one used by left-wing
populism.
Kallis discusses the symbolic performance of “sovereignty
at the border”. Right- and left-wing populism would share the
borders of existing nation-states as a meeting point. They have
different reasons: borders as defense against neoliberal eco-
nomics (left-wing populism) and borders as filter to protect the
continuity of the nationally bounded community (right-wing
populism). Kallis (2018) claims that the reinvention of the
border of the nation-states becomes the marker of redeemed
sovereignty. Even when there is a return to the nation-state, I
would say that left-wing populist appeals for sovereignty are
more complicated. There is no single position within sover-
eignism, from its fierce defense to higher openness, and debate
about transnationalism is emerging, albeit timidly, as an
alternative. There is no doubt that left-wing populism targets
mainly domestic politics and lacks a developed international
framework. In any event, I would prefer to place the issues of
sovereignty and the border within the process of trans-
formation of sovereignty. Saskia Sassen (1996) highlights the
intertwined dynamics whereby economic and institutional
spaces de-nationalize and immigration politics re-nationalize.
Borders (and their control) for capital, information, services
thus differ from the borders for migrants and refugees.
The critique of left-wing populism would refer to the belief
in regaining political sovereignty when economy has been de-
nationalized by neoliberal globalization. This critique is on
point and is one of the main challenges to address in a satis-
factory manner. However, the type of borders is essential to
differentiate left- and right-wing populism. The borders
missed by left-wing populism are those which would control
financial and economic capital. The borders for right-wing
populism consist basically of controlling migration. Attending
to the relation between borders and sovereignty, the distinc-

tion between left- and right-wing populism is much clearer. It
cannot be said that both share the recovery of sovereignty as a
sort of common project. In this case, right-wing populism
shares with right governments, and some from the center-left,
the illusion of controlling borders and fixing the sovereign
territory. The “crisis of refugees” in Europe in 2015 was an
unequivocal sign of the return of the territorial borders as a
way of preserving national sovereignty. The reactions from
left-wing populism in Greece and Spain diverged from this
conception of re-nationalizing immigration politics. This is
connected with an inclusive understanding of “the people”
but also with sovereignty (or the loss hereof) perceived in
economic rather than migratory terms.
Another important discrepancy between left-wing popu-
lism and nationalism is that sovereignty is not only limited to
the nation-state. Particularly, Podemos has explored new
definitions of sovereignty beyond the unity of the nation, as
expression of the national sovereignty. Although the goal is to
regain sovereignty, the notion of sovereignty is adapted to the
complexity of the regional model. The idea of plurinationality
in Spain cannot be adopted by the Spanish nationalism and
adds a new level to the transformation of sovereignty within
nation-states. Xavier Domènech, former member of Catalonia
in Common (the Catalan branch of Podemos), talks about
multi-level sovereignties and proposes that full sovereignty can
only be achieved when these sovereignties are freely shared.
The debate on shared sovereignties should entail the accep-
tance of plurinationality and the territorial model. Although
Domènech (2017) refers to the nation-state, his argumentation
is based on the acknowledgement of several demoi at different
levels. The idea of “shared sovereignties” is applied to the
different levels of sovereignty within the state instead of
scaling-up beyond the state which could also be an option.
This debate, which cannot be expanded to all left-wing pop-

ulisms, shows more nuanced notions of sovereignty than the
one attached to the nation-state.
As it occurs with the comparison between left- and right-
wing populism based on the allusions to “the people” and
“the elite”, the appeal to sovereignty is not a sufficient element
to equate the goal of populism and nationalism. This does not
mean that left-wing populism has been capable of developing
an efficient project to deal with the transformation of sover-
eignty, but its attempt is far away from corresponding with
the claims and objectives of nationalism and radical right-
wing populism.
4.2 PATRIOTISM
In line with the claim for popular sovereignty, left-wing

populism has drawn the attention to the need for articula-
tion of a national political project. The appeal to patriotism
has been received from the left not without controversies due
to the shift from the left agenda to topics tightly attached to
the right. Patriotism is not always sharply distinguishable
from nationalism and can, in fact, lead to blurring the left vs
right division and replace it with the globalist vs nationalist
one. One good example was the elections in France in 2017.
The competition between Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel
Macron was framed as the struggle between globalism (or
cosmopolitanism) vs patriotism. It was Le Pen who in the
beginning of the campaign stated that the division is no longer
between left and right but between patriots and globalists,
concretely the financial globalization and the Islamist global-
ization helping each other (Alerta Digital, 2017). Mélenchon,
after a campaign to reinvent patriotism, was trapped in the
dilemma of expressing his intention to vote for Macron,
implying support for neoliberalism, or Le Pen, which would

be read as a new patriotic bloc. Within this lack of margins to
a left vs right conflict, he did not favor any of the candidates.
However, the “homeland” is too relevant to be left in the
hands of the radical right. At least, that was the conclusion
reached by Macron who, after winning the first round,
showed his will to join all the patriots against the “threat of
nationalism” (La Razón, 2017). Macron introduces the
distinction between patriotism and nationalism to reclaim the
civic tradition in opposition to the ethnic one and makes clear
that (civic) patriotism also belongs to the politics of the center-
oriented parties.
Patriotism is not an easy matter for liberalism due to
the emotional implications between individuals and their
homeland. Populism should be more capable of addressing
patriotism because it dismantles the reason vs emotion divide
and embraces emotions as essential to strengthening political
engagement and contributing to identity formation (Cossarini
& Vallespı́n, 2019). However, when comparing nationalism
and patriotism, republicanism objectifies loyalty as emotional
adhesion to the state or homeland and to its political institu-
tion. The nationalist loyalty is related to the people, meaning
the ethnonational group (Rosales, 1997). While liberalism
struggles to objectivise loyalty to the institutions and presents
a sort of rationalised emotion to eschew the comparison with
nationalism, populism requires building up the institutional
loyalty in order to place it in a gray area together with
nationalism. Patchen Markell (2000) refers to the distinction
between civic and ethnic nationalism as a “strategy of redi-
rection”. Civic nationalism offers to satisfy identification
through loyalty to liberal democratic principles and not to the
belonging to a pre-political community, as ethnic nationalism
does. Thus, liberals do not need to address the affective
dimension of politics, and citizens’ engagement is grounded in
the constitutional and institutional framework. The strategy

of redirection revolves around rendering “affect safe for lib-
eral democracies by redirecting our attachment and sentiment
from one subset of objects (the ‘ethnic’) to another set of
objects (the ‘civic’)” (Markell, 2000, p. 39).
I claim that left-wing populism likewise deploys a strategy
of redirection. Patriotism represents an attempt to combine
the affectual dimension of politics and loyalty to “the people”
with loyalty to democratic institutions. I would like to
emphasize that appealing to “democratic” institutions is not
casual. It aims to change the existing institutions to serve more
adequately to the people’s interests. Liberalism and republi-
canism try to solve the problem of affect by directing affect to
universal normative principles. Left-wing populism, on the
other hand, does not consider political affect a problem but it
redirects affect to improve democratic institutions through the
appeal to popular sovereignty, instead of reinforcing the
sentiment of belonging to a pre-existing community. As a
framework for the left, patriotism can work unevenly
depending on the political traditions. It was applied in Latin
America, with a progressive conception of homeland, in
France, very attached to the republican tradition, as well as in
Greece, and in Spain. Nonetheless, the language of patriotism
is not easily adopted by the left, and the political contexts can
facilitate or hinder its use. Cases like Spain, with certain
hostility toward talk about the nation or the homeland from
the left perspective, show that sometimes the context is
assessed and assumed adequately by the political actors.
The line between patriotism and nationalism can be quite
thin. The adoption of a national-popular strategy and of
patriotism does not help to clarify such a confusion. The
political practices do not do so either. Cas Mudde (2017)
remarks that Syriza continued governing with the independent
Greeks (ANEL) in the term after the Memorandum instead of
opting for other parties. He explains that choice by the fact

that Syriza, as patriotic left, is more patriotic than left.
However, it is not common that the patriotic dimension pre-
vails over the left one and would be reason enough to erase the
ideological separation between left and right. There are no
other cases like this one (the Catalan situation is much more
complex) and, as Jacopo Custodi (2017) points out, Tsipras’
patriotism did not evolve to an ethnical nationalist position
and nor has it been anti-immigrant or Eurosceptic. France
Insoumise illustrates the case of a reflective and nuanced
development of patriotism as part of the political strategy of
left-wing populism. The self-proclaimed intention of being a
political instrument to construct the Sixth Republic to reach
power requires a wide majority. France Insoumise does not
appeal to the majority from ideological left standpoints but
from a populist logic where the patriot sentiment shapes sol-
idarity relations and affect within the political community.
Raquel Garrido, national spokesperson for France Insoumise,
claims that patriotism should not be confused with nation-
alism and anchors the homeland in the Republic:
We are patriotic, not nationalist. Patriotism is love

for one’s own, while nationalism involves hatred for
others. In fact, according to the literary and political
definitions, that is the difference. The far right is
nationalist. We are patriotic. And patriotism is an
empathy, an affect towards one’s compatriots. We
really think that, insofar as our nation has been a
civic nation since the French Revolution, it is not
defined by any religion or skin color or even
language, it is universal. Our homeland [patrie] is
republican (Garrido, 2017).
France Insoumise’s patriotism connects with the republican

French tradition. In consequence, Garrido also pinpoints
universalism, inherited from the Enlightenment, and popular

sovereignty. She also adds that historically national sover-
eignty in France has been intertwined with popular
sovereignty, reflecting the people’s political power. The far
right, on the contrary, poses a narrower scope for sover-
eignty, limited only to national sovereignty. The recovery of
national symbols, as the flag or the national anthem, in
detriment of left-wing symbols, during the 2017 electoral
campaign supported this idea of constituting a popular-
national-republican project and provoked suspicion among
the left. The focus on sovereignism, especially national sov-
ereignty, increases in the international context with the
antagonism against Germany and the EU.
Podemos develops a different type of patriotism due to
the lack of a republican tradition and the existence of
peripheral nationalisms. Podemos’ attempt to articulate a
national-popular project is deliberately elaborated as an
alternative to nationalism: In relation to the Spanish
(centralized) nationalism, Podemos suggests a plurinational
state recognizing the existing diversity; and regarding
peripheral nationalism, it guarantees a high degree
of autonomy, including the right to decide in the case of
Catalonia. The balance between these two types of
nationalism is quite intricate, and Podemos lacks a strong
national infrastructure, since it cooperates with other
regional parties, and its position on sovereignty and inde-
pendence has often been characterised as ambivalent.
Homeland in Podemos is attached in its first years to
populism as expressed by the idea of “homeland is the
people”. In this sense, the defense of the homeland implies
the defense of “the ordinary people”. Homeland reflects
the populist divide. Homeland is identified with “the
people”, but those who are against the interests of “the
people” are betraying the homeland. The corrupt
politicians, the ones responsible for privatising the public

service, or those who destroy public education or force the
young generations to leave Spain, are betraying their
homeland. Patriotism is rooted in populist antagonism but
relies on guaranteeing social protection, security and wel-
fare to the people. Pablo Iglesias portrays the patriots in
the following lines:
They [the patriots] wake up early to go to work

or to look for a job. The real patriots care about
their people […] To us the fatherland is the
people. To us defending the fatherland is to
defend that there are public hospitals, public
schools, having the best services. The fatherland
should be more like its people and less like its
elites (Iglesias, 2016).
The resulting homeland, or the nation, is not based on the

ethnical community; instead institutions and the constitution,
which was strongly questioned (particularly in the first years
of Podemos), can become the ground for patriotism. The
strategy of redirection of Podemos is about directing loyalty to
welfare institutions, incarnating the interests of the common
will. Comparing with France Insoumise, the universal
dimension is missed and the conflictual dimension prevails in
Podemos’ articulation of the homeland. A similar articulation
is used by Tsipras when in the debate on the constitutional
reform, he claimed: “The Greek people surged to power
through their stand and their activism against austerity pol-
icies and in demand of greater democracy, and also with their
vote in the electoral contests of 2015.” Tsipras continued and
attributed the representation of “the people” to his own party.
The leader of New Democracy, then in the opposition, is
portrayed as contrary to the interests of “the people”: “The
Greek people did not come to the fore only to withdraw again
after four years, Mr Mitsotakis” (Konstandaras, 2019).

Patriotism generates new loyalties from the left and appeals to
civic values (universal or welfare-related) but it also works as
political divider between those who represent “the people”
and those who do not.
I want to conclude with a final note on patriotism.
The expanding frameworks to account for the diverse
economic, political and social dynamics demand new con-
ceptualisations. From left-wing populism, the articulation of
patriotism is among the proposed solutions. Clara Ramas
(2018) sharpens this approach by proposing a “democratic
patriotism” under the following premises: Patriotism is not
the same as right-wing ethno-centrism, and democracy is
not the same as cosmopolitan left. Ramas, in line with the
point of view of Garrido presented above, looks at patri-
otism as sovereign since the national and the popular
coincide. The goal is to create a community of belonging
against the wild powers of the free market to offer security,
solidarity and protection. The nation-states become the
space to recompose the community’s social bonds from a
feminist, ecologist and non-xenophobic perspective. Thus,
left-wing populism can fill patriotism, as formulated by
Ramas, with progressive content. Contrary to the initial
impression, patriotism does not deepen an emotional or
anti-institutional dimension but demands the development
of affect and identity formation within an institutional
framework. Despite the reaction against neoliberal global-
ization and the offer of security in times of uncertainty,
patriotism is at its best a project to develop politics within
the nation-state but insufficient to deal with the global
economy. The alliances of (patriotic) states defended by
sovereignism cannot address some of these global issues,
and transnationalism is underdeveloped or in the hands of
elite institutions.
4.3 INDEPENDENCE
Although it cannot be considered left-wing populism, I would

like to add some reflections about independence. The refer-
endums are a moment of direct participation by the people
who can influence the political route. The Scottish referen-
dum for independence and Brexit are recent examples which
have been associated with populism, probably as an expres-
sion of dislike towards some of the preferences or the final
result in the Brexit vote. The referendum of the 1st of
October 2017 in Catalonia is different because the call for
the referendum was banned by the Spanish state, and despite
the repression there was a strong political and social mobi-
lisation and the consultation was affected under such unusual
circumstances. The Catalan referendum has been analyzed as
part of a larger international trend termed “referendums
from below”: “[R]eferendums that are no longer devices used
by institutional actors to retrospectively legitimize techno-
cratic decisions but are rather, participatory processes
generated by grassroots mobilisations which pre-date the
actual vote by years of civil society agitation” (Connor, della
Porta, Subirats Ribas, & Portos, 2017). The combination of
participation and mobilization with the expression of popular
will vs technocratic decisions explains the reason why
populism turns to referendums as political means. It also
explains why referendums are susceptible of provoking
populist moments. Maybe it would be more precise to talk
about “populist events” due to their short duration as well as
their capacity to transgress mainstream narratives and offer a
new frame to interpret those events. This is the case of the
October 1 referendum where independence became a matter
of democracy rather than of nationalism.
The goal of pro-independence parties is to create a new
nation-state and their main claim is, consequently, national
sovereignty, i.e. the recognition of the Catalan nation as state.

The period of conservative nationalism ended in 2016 with
the coalition between the center-left and center-right. The
referendum strengthened the already ongoing alliance between
pro-independence parties and civil society and originated a
populist event in which the appeal to popular sovereignty was
dominant. The reflection of the existing institutions and legal
framework, fixed by the Spanish state, was made in the name
of the will of the people. The national and the popular were
thus interconnected. The conflict is between the Spanish state
(the oppressor) and the Catalan people (the oppressed).
Despite the emphasis on the Catalan people and popular
sovereignty, it is a peculiar populism in which the divide
between “the elites” and “the people” is not quite clear, since
it is rather between Catalonia and the Spanish state. There
were no political actors either who took a populist position
from the right or the left. The media accusations against the
Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, for being an authori-
tarian populist referred to his constant disobedience of the
Spanish law, culminating with the unilateral declaration of
independence.
The political situation certainly blurred the left- vs right-
wing axis. This could contribute to shaping a left-wing
populism in Catalonia by the articulation of “the people”
against the Catalan “elites” (Juberı́as & Pérez, 2017). How-
ever, the polarisation caused by the populist event between
pro-independence and pro-union groups hindered such a
possibility. In fact, Podemos in Catalonia experienced severe
difficulties in positioning itself politically in relation to inde-
pendence. The claim for shared sovereignty or the right to
decide was unsatisfactory for the independent side and too
close to independence for the unionist bloc. The referendum as
populist event caused transversal and cross-ideological alli-
ances and framed the Catalan conflict as the struggle for
democracy, based on popular sovereignty. The overlapping

national frames (Catalan people vs Spanish state) became an
obstacle to a populist, or national-popular, articulation. The
wish for independence, relying on national sovereignty, was
contested by the state through police repression the day of the
referendum and by tough legal measures later, on the one
hand, and through the reinforcement of Spanish nationalism,
on the other.
5
INSTITUTIONS AND
REPUBLICANISM
When Luis Alegre aspired to be elected as General Secretary

for Madrid, then-secretary for Political and Social Analysis of
Podemos Carolina Bescansa (in Rı́os, 2015) responded to the
critical voices against Alegre, the official candidate. When she
referred to the divisions generated by the different candida-
tures (the official and the anti-capitalist), she claimed that
there were two versions Podemoses, one to win and another
one to protest. The former aimed to win in order to change
things whilst the latter was oriented toward the field of social
protests. This early tension in Podemos captures the dis-
agreements regarding the goal of a movement-party, rooted in
social protests and becoming a parliamentary force with
ambition to govern. There is a dual shift here: from social
protest to political party; and from protest party to govern-
mental or coalition party. Protest becomes institutional in the
first case, concretely in organizational form, and institution-
alized in the second, embedded within the structures of power
and the parliament. When becoming a party is avoided, the
action is performed from the logics of the social movements;
81
when avoiding to take on government responsibilities, the

party can remain a protest party. Left-wing populism pursues
becoming a party but remaining still connected to the move-
ments and to govern but without becoming a traditional
party. The contradictions are obvious and require deep
reflection. In the following, I focus on the institutionalization
of left-wing parties by looking at the debate (or lack hereof)
between populism and republicanism.
The distinction between social movement and political
party is used by some authors to distinguish between “pop-
ular” and “populist”. Nadia Urbinati (2013) notes that some
movements invoke the same kind of discourse as populism.
The separation between the 99% and the 1% and the
contestation of representative institutions are constituting
elements of populism. Acknowledging the fluidity between
social movements and political parties (the movement-parties
are the best example of this), Urbinati explains that they share
the populist rhetoric but only political parties can be charac-
terized as populist. Movements articulate a polarizing and
anti-representative discourse but they want to preserve their
autonomy from the political and electoral system. Occupy
Wall Street or the Spanish indignados are, according to her,
“popular” movements of contestation and protest. The
movement turns populist when it “wants instead to occupy
the representative institutions and win the majority in order to
model the entire society to its ideology” (2013, p. 139). The
shift from movement to government coincides with the one
from popular to populist. Urbinati adds that organizing a
narrative (polarizing the masses) and a charismatic leadership
are the main populist means to conquer the government.
Without following a populist strategy, the popular movements
remain “a sacrosanct movement of protest and contestation
against a trend in society that betrays some basic democratic
principles, and in particular equality” (2013, p. 139). The
Institutions and Republicanism 83
distinction is relevant for Urbinati to show that movements

are compatible with representative democracy, since it is well-
accepted that civil society critiques the existing institutions.
Populism, on the other hand, cannot be fulfilled within
representative institutions, because it pursues to make the
opinion of the majority identical to the authority of the sov-
ereign state. In sum, she points to an authoritarian drift of
populism in contrast to pluralism corresponding to social
movements.
Returning to Bescansa’s words, the debate is substantially
different. Podemos could become an example of a populist
project to take power, also according to Urbinati’s criteria
(“the people” vs “the establishment” and vertical leader-
ship). The transformation from movement to party shows
already contradictions around organization and internal
plurality, as well as around the objective of Podemos to gain
institutional power. I consider it erroneous to think that the
party would impose its ideology by replacing the principles
of representative democracy. The immediate reason to refuse
that thought is the unlikelihood of Podemos obtaining
absolute majority in the parliament to govern without other
parties. This is a practical reason but there is also another
important objection: Left-wing populist parties are not only
populist since a diversity of projects converge within them. I
have already emphasized that left-wing populism entails,
above all, a left project. Another political tradition, impor-
tant from the institutional perspective, is republicanism.
Populist and republican values and principles can coexist,
albeit with tensions. Bescansa, quite pragmatically, reveals
that there are differences between “the popular” (the party
acting as a movement) and “the populist”, as well as between
“the populist” (appealing to the people) and “the repub-
lican” (assuming the institutional and constitutional
framework).
I am not arguing that populism and republicanism have a

harmonic relation; the same happens with the popular and the
populist. The European context does not offer conditions for
the type of populism described by Urbinati, given that the
insurrectional processes (the popular or the populist) must be
understood within the ones of institutionalization (the
republican). When Podemos started to express their will to
become part of a coalition government, or before supporting
the social democratic government, the republican turn of
Podemos became quite evident. Mélenchon, as expected from
the French tradition, combines the appellations to “the peo-
ple” with those to the Republic. His call for the Sixth Republic
illustrates the importance of redefining the Republic that
incarnates the will of the people. However, the famous
episode in which Mélenchon reacted against the investigations
for campaign finance fraud and faced an officer and shouted,
“I am the Republic!” projects a worrying impersonation of
politics and appropriation of institutions. There are, I insist,
tensions rather than contradictions, since left-wing populism
can hardly evolve to an authoritarian scenario to impose their
ideology. Therefore, there is a need for reflecting on the con-
nections between populism and republicanism both in the
consideration of the political subject (“the people” and “the
citizens”), the translation of the social majority (“the many”)
into electoral majorities, the fight against domination and the
explorative models of improving representation and
participation.
5.1 WE THE REPUBLIC
Populism and republicanism are usually seen as incompatible.

The main reason is that populism tends to be conceived as an
anti-institutional movement whose objective is to dismantle
liberal democracy and all means of institutional representa-

tion. From populist theory and practice, there is a kinder
invitation to dialogue with republicanism due to the limita-
tions perceived in populism, but from the republican side it is
difficult to find a similar acknowledgment of a valuable
contribution coming from populism. Philip Pettit (1997), one
of the most important neo-republican authors, states that
republicanism offers an alternative to liberalism and popu-
lism. He is, indeed, more receptive toward liberalism, since
some of its values are integrated within his principle of
freedom as non-domination, but totally contrary to populism
and its way of understanding the relation between citizens and
institutions and democratic means.
Populism “represents the people in their collective presence
as master and the state as servant”, whilst republicanism
considers “the people as trustor, both individually and
collectively, and sees the state as trustee” (Pettit, 1997, p. 8).
“The people”, from the populist perspective, would only
require something from state representatives when they think
that it is convenient. On the other hand, for republicanism, the
people trust the state because it is capable of guaranteeing
non-arbitrary rule. Besides, Pettit strongly refuses the demo-
cratic means deployed by populism, which are not just those
of representative democracy, particularly assemblies and
plebiscites. It is important to notice that participation for Pettit
and other republicans is subordinated to fostering liberty
rather than being a democratic value in itself. Pettit is in favor
of participation, meaning deliberation, of civil society and
proposes that democracy is contestable. Contestation is,
obviously, not the same as conflictual because the conditions
and institutional basis for contestation must be fixed. The
process of contestation, in opposition to populism, is “not one
that necessarily involves majority decision-making. There is
no suggestion that the people in some collective incarnation,
or via some collective representation, are voluntaristically

supreme” (1997, p. 201).
Republicanism, at least in its position closer to social
democracy, is not completely opposed to neoliberalism. Pettit
(2008) recognizes that the republican social project is better
drafted than the economic one. Contrary to the right, social
democracy promotes the “social state”. Pettit, who inspired
the politics of the Spanish president José Luis Rodrı́guez
Zapatero, was surprised by the impact of the economic crisis
in Spain and the indignados and 15M mobilizations. He
admitted the lack of attention that he had paid to the
economic dimension as well as his optimism about the inter-
national financial system (and its reliability to enable the
Spanish government to provide economic welfare) and about
the membership of the Eurozone. Pettit (2011) perceived two
risks to the republican project: Neoliberalism and populism,
whose simplistic approaches consist of the liberation of the
power of the market (neoliberalism) and the reassertion of the
collective will of the people (populism). Besides suggesting
more market regulation to mitigate neoliberalism, it is quite
relevant that Pettit is concerned about how to channel the
15M movement by improving the institutional design. He is
skeptical about the populist rhetoric by the indignados
(claiming to give voice to the popular demands and mis-
trusting the political representatives). Contestation must
happen within institutional means, and the relevance of social
movements to promote social change is thus missed in Pettit’s
approach. The demands for more democracy and participa-
tion point to an institutional crisis and lack of legitimacy of
existing representative institutions. It would be more pro-
ductive (Agustı́n, 2018) to think of populism in how to con-
nect those demands with the institutional framework instead
of looking at populism as a threat emanating from the eco-
nomic crisis. The challenge is to reconcile the dimension of
populism (conflictual division between “the elite” and “the

people”), popular participation and republicanism (rule of
law, distribution of power, constitutionalism). Such an
attempt requires, on the one hand, admitting to the crisis of
representative institutions and assessing the potential of left-
wing populism to contribute to solving that crisis; and, on the
other, recognizing the limitations of populism to develop itself
as an institutional and constitutional project without entering
into dialogue with the existing institutions and constitutions.
Following Lawrence Lessig (2011), what is at stake is how to
maintain the potential of “We”, as a people, when “We”, as a
republic, have lost this potential. “We”, as a people, can play
an important role here to recover “We” as a republic.
5.2 CITIZENS AND THE PEOPLE
Luis Alegre (2018), former General Secretary for Madrid,

recalls that Podemos in its origins was defined as “a platform
for popular and citizens’ empowerment” as proof of the
coexistence of the populist and republican “souls”. Podemos
was, indeed, presented as an instrument to recover “our
sovereignty” and as a force for the citizens to recover effi-
ciently the democratic control over “our institutions” and
“our destinies” (Podemos, 2014, p. 7). This coexistence is
important not as much as a nominal issue (if the articulation
of the signifier “the people” or “citizen” defines a discourse as
populist or republican), but rather to explore how they are
intertwined. Populist ideas like popular sovereignty and the
questioning of the capacity of representation of existing
institutions are consequent with improving control of insti-
tutions and means to express the will of the people.
Mélenchon, who agrees that sovereignty is the link and the
motor of “the people” to institutionalize their own laws,
highlights the need of a constitution as a result of a constituent

assembly (in Flenady, 2014). The constituent process remains
still an ideal goal. Podemos initially claimed for a constituent
process but later adopted a more pragmatic approach and
asked for constitutional reforms. The intention is, in any case,
to find institutional means to channel popular means.
Pettit’s notion of populism as the people as master and the
state as servant must be nuanced with his notion of republi-
canism whereby the people are the trustor and the state is the
trustee. From a left-wing perspective, institutions must be put
at the service of the people. Therefore, it could be concluded
that the people are the master and the state is the servant but I
would not simplify it in that way. Being at the service of the
people implies, consequently with the populist logic, an
antagonism with those who use the institutions in their own
interest. It is, in reality, a complaint about the appropriation
of the uses of institutions by those whose interests do not
correspond with the common will. “The people” are not mere
trustor due to the reasons to mistrust the representative
institutions. I find the notion of “critical trust” by Donatella
della Porta (2012) quite useful in this regard. Although della
Porta refers to social movements, she explains that critical
trust is created in conflict, singling out the shortcomings of
representative democracy. By organizing distrust, critical trust
can be useful to give the citizens the opportunity to participate
in decisional processes so social movements can bring their
ideas into political discussion. Critical trust entails a potential
to reconstruct political trust instead of being a frontal attack
against representative institutions and liberal democracy in
general. Left-wing populism contributes thus to restoring trust
in institutions, expanding representativeness and serving the
interests of the people, and to exploring other democratic
forms such as deliberation and participation. The emphasis on
“the people” as sovereign (as master, Pettit would say)
becomes the basis to recompose and redefine the relation

between “the people” and the state as trustor and trustee. It is
difficult to imagine how institutions by themselves could
restore the lost trust.
The crisis of parliamentarism illustrates how one of the
main representative institutions is at a crossroads. Before
Syriza won the elections, parliamentarism already showed
signs of exhaustion. Besides diminishing turnout in the elec-
tions and the low level of public trust toward parliaments or
MPs, parliamentary autonomy was questioned. Although its
autonomy is bound to the constitutional division of powers,
the parliamentary public image and connection to citizens
were seriously damaged (Sigalas & Blavoukos, 2014). The
elitist image projected by MPs, defending the interest of eco-
nomic powers or directly their own interests, compromised
citizens’ trust in the parliament. The situation was worse due
to the loss of autonomy of the Greek parliament, whose
action depended on satisfying the international economic
demands. Representative democracy is criticized in this case
because of abandoning the interests of the citizens and
benefiting, instead, the financial powers and international
institutions. Far from rejecting the institutions or the consti-
tution, “[p]acts for the Euro and stability, imposed in
exchange for loans, are considered as anti-constitutional
forms of blackmail, depriving citizens of their sovereignty”
(della Porta, 2012, p. 317). As Alegre (2018) notes, the
detachment from parliamentarism can lead to anti-
parliamentarism and to rejecting all types of politics as
public deliberation, but it can also be used to claim the core
values of parliamentarism against those who act as usurpers.
Critical trust points in the second direction. The combination
of populism and republicanism within left-wing populism
does the same. The revitalization of the parliament, the
encouragement of political participation and engagement of
the constitutional reforms should boost the republican

framework. The formation of a constituent assembly to
elaborate a new constitution is more ambivalent and depends
on how such a constituent process would be developed.
Another thing is, as happened in Greece, that the renewed
trust in the parliament and more concretely in the Syriza
government collided with the lack of autonomy of the Greek
parliament and the acceptance to sign the Third
Memorandum.
In any case, “the people” must not replace the laws. The
point made by left-wing populism is to increase democratic
control and democratize institutions. As mentioned, institu-
tions cannot always be changed from within, and critical trust,
provided primarily from social movements, creates a wider
social framework to discuss political alternatives. Social
movements cannot reform the political system by themselves,
and search for political interlocutors contributes to restoring
citizens’ trust. Podemos has included the division of powers
and the independence of the judicial power in its relation to
the executive power. This is quite important in order to pre-
vent the centralization or personalization of power arisen
from the populist dependence on the leader as unifier for
social demands. The lack of division of power could be more
dramatic if populism in power prolongs the identification of
the leader as the only one capable of fulfilling social demands.
Sara Carreño (2017), former MP for Podemos, points out that
it is law (not the people) which controls power: “Rule of law
needs not only laws elaborated by the Parliament, which is
democratically elected, but also that those norms are applied
to all the citizens and, specifically, to the political power.”
According to Carreño, cutbacks in social policies put the
constitutional system at risk since social rights and well-being
are being threatened. The defense of the Constitution, in this
sense, requires the democratization of institutions. In the
electoral campaign of 2019, Pablo Iglesias used the Spanish

Constitution to prove that social demands could be fulfilled
only by the application of the existing legislation.
5.3 REPUBLICANISM WITH OR WITHOUT POPULISM
Chantal Mouffe (2019) reflects on how Podemos originally

framed their project as “assault of the heaven” and how that
was caused by a misunderstanding of the populist strategy.
The antagonism between “the caste” and “the people”,
deployed to win the elections, was based, says Mouffe, on the
assumption that the populist strategy was a “war of maneu-
ver”. When they realized that winning the elections promptly
was not possible, some leaders of Podemos considered that the
populist strategy had failed and they explored other options.
They did not realize, concludes Mouffe, that the populist
strategy is a war of position. When Podemos accepted in 2015
that they would become a parliamentary force and the gov-
ernment was a remote possibility, their leaders brought two
options into the debate: A stronger left-ideological turn
(position taken mainly by Iglesias after the alliance with
United Left) and republicanism, adopted from different fac-
tions of the party and at different moments. On the one hand,
the recognition of the failure of “the assault” politics as war of
maneuver led Podemos to a political situation in which doing
politics happens within and in tension with the existing
institutional and constitutional framework. In agreement with
Mouffe, this type of politics must be seen as war of positions
and the coexistence of populism and republicanism. Podemos
reacted quickly, albeit more or less accurately, to the changing
political panorama. When the party embraced republicanism,
it was a consequence of the political conjuncture (as the party
hesitated between supporting the social democratic party and
becoming an opposition party) and of the internal struggles

within the party. Iñigo Errejón, the main defender of the
populist strategy, was the first one to approach republicanism.
Iglesias followed the same move with slight differences and
later, with Errejón out of the party, the kind of republicanism
was conditioned by the wish of Podemos to be part of a
coalition government in 2019.
Iglesias (2015) launched the idea of “trench warfare” to
emphasize the importance of ideological victories made during
the phase of the war of maneuver. To him, there are three
elements to notice: despite the diminishing role of the populist
strategy, populism (preserving the “popular unity” against the
elite) is still relevant; the institutional work entails a new
rhythm and strategy in which the protests of the streets lose
significance in terms of gaining power; and the “trench”
obtains a certain sense of resistance against the neoliberal
offensive. The main problem is that Podemos was gradually
abandoning populism as well as, to some extent, the connec-
tion with street protests as political driver. Podemos has
become an institutional alternative to social democracy and
republicanism within populism. Due to the lack of “popular
unity” against the elite, such an alternative sounds ambiva-
lent. In 2017, once the “constituent process” was considered
unrealistic, Iglesias grounded the republican values in two
pillars: republic (in opposition to the “right-wing monarchic
bloc”) and plurinationality. The former reintroduces the
traditional axis between the left, associated with the Second
Republic, and the right. Podemos was reluctant about such a
debate due to its ideological character and the risk of losing
transversal appeal. Podemos’ leadership clarified that Pode-
mos’ republicanism is not about evoking the Second Republic:
We defend another idea of Spain, with republican

values. The republic is not the foundation of the
project. Republicanism is. That is, defending the

public sector, the dignity of a social state. Fraternity,
decentralization and a plurinational state as opposed
to the “uninational idea” of Spain (Riveiro, 2017).
If the first republican turn by Podemos responded to the

parliamentary strategy, the second one adapts to the “Catalan
crisis” to offer an institutional solution, beyond the one sug-
gested by the unionist parties, where the position of the
monarch is associated with the interests of the right wing.
There is no trace here of populist strategy. The new division is
between monarchist and the republican bloc. The interesting
distinction between republic and republicanism goes unno-
ticed because the antagonism between monarchic and repub-
lican blocs prevails in ideological terms (right vs left).
When Iglesias deepened his defense of “republican values”,
he had in mind the formation of a coalition government
between PSOE and Podemos. He kept distinguishing between
two conflicts: The social and the territorial which should be
addressed from a republican perspective. Republicanism is
related to politics (although he mentioned a series of social
claims and “the people” as a synonym for “social majorities”)
and to hegemony:
In Spain, to talk about republicanism since the 19th

century is to draw out a series of signifiers that are
unquestionable and hegemonic which the term
“democracy” refers to. To talk about republicanism
in Spain is to talk about the extension of the right to
vote, […] about development and progress, […] about
regeneration as opposed to corruption, […] about
social justice, […] about progress for women,
although limited. […] It is to talk about an
institutional framework at the service of the social
majorities, at the service of the people (Iglesias, 2019).
It is excessive to conclude that Podemos’ republicanism

rejects populism since institutions must serve social majorities
and “the people” (the people as master) and not the dominant
classes, but the hegemonic articulation is totally different and
based on signifiers such as “progress” or “regeneration”. In a
similar way as occurred with the populist strategy, Podemos
offers the impression that theoretical approaches adapt to the
political conjectures in order to find a quick solution but reject
them when the conjuncture changes.
5.4 THEORIZING REPUBLICAN POPULISM
The experience of left-wing populist parties has been accom-

panied by important theoretical debates about the relation
between populism and republicanism. There is a coincidence
regarding the convenience of conceptualization of populism in
dialogue with republicanism; in some cases republicanism
becomes the way of taming populism. I introduce very briefly
the writings, grounded in the European context, of Chantal
Mouffe, José Luis Villacañas and Carlos Fernández Liria.
Similar reflections searching for theoretical convergence
between populism and republicanism have been made in Latin
America (Coronel & Cadahia, 2018).
5.4.1 Agonistic Republicanism
There is no doubt that Chantal Mouffe has been the most

relevant voice in defining left-wing populism based in the
specificities of the European conjuncture. Mouffe (2018)
defines her own understanding of politics as “radical
reformism”, a position in-between “pure reformism” and
“revolutionary politics”, due to the combination of the legi-
timacy of the principles of liberal democracy and the attempt
to implement a different hegemonic formation. It is a third

way implying the possibility of change, not provoked through
rupture, and an alternative to economic neoliberalism. This
position connects with the project of “radical democracy”,
formulated by Laclau and Mouffe, and their understanding of
the hegemonic struggle as a war of position. Despite being
quite close to the theory on populism by Ernesto Laclau,
Mouffe presents substantial differences, especially her
emphasis on the institutional linkage of populism. Mouffe
points out that the goal is not the establishment of a “populist
regime”. This statement should be enough to remove the
concerns about the authoritarian nature of populism. To
Mouffe, left-wing populism is not even opposed to liberal or
representative democracy but rather complementary. She
prioritizes the creation of a hegemonic formation in which
“democracy” would be the hegemonic signifier to articulate
diverse struggles around. The idea of recovering and deepening
democracy is compatible, and not against, liberal institutions.
In this regard, institutions should be more representative. The
problem does not relate to representation but to the lack of it
(the lack of agonism, in Mouffe’s terms) which deprives citi-
zens of their voice. Contrary to other diagnoses, Mouffe does
not believe that there is a crisis of representative democracy
per se; there is a crisis of post-democracy, meaning the absence
of agonistic confrontation.
There is no solution outside representative democracy, and
the engagement with the state and representative institutions
must be strengthened in order to transform them. Institutions
play the role of institutionalizing social conflicts and antago-
nism. That is the reason I label Mouffe’s approach “agonistic
republicanism”, since institutions tame and channel social
antagonism (the populist articulation around the antagonistic
relation between “the people” and “the elite”) and transform
it into agonism (where pluralism is recognized as well as the
difference and legitimate positions taken by the adversaries).

The discursive construction of the collective will, “the peo-
ple”, is not homogeneous and does not result in a uniform
identity. The populist frontier enables the creation of “We”
and “They” whilst institutions acknowledge the plurality
which is not eradicated before, given that the differences
remain active within “the people”.
5.4.2 Minimal Populism
With the brief book Populism, José Luis Villacañas (2015)

managed to influence Podemos, concretely in the circle around
Iñigo Errejón, through his critique of populism from a
republican perspective. Instead of rejecting populism as a
philosophical and political phenomenon, his proposal is that
republicanism would be “the way of channeling the populist
movement, the populist politization, toward the strengthening
of structures, institutions, which are in conditions to make us
strong against the neoliberal agenda” (Villacañas, 2016a). In
other words, he aims to republicanize (meaning minimize) the
populist impact and to revitalize institutions to counteract
neoliberalism. This approach is actually quite close to
Mouffe’s but Villacañas does not consider populism an
alternative to neoliberalism. Republicanism would be the
antidote against the populist threat and the inequality pro-
voked by neoliberalism. Villacañas presents a dichotomy
between populism and republicanism and there is no demo-
cratic translation of populism into institutions. There would
be two models of representation: the division of powers
(republicanism) and personalization (populism). Therefore,
populism is anti-institutional and does not accept political
normalization, given that populism relies on unsatisfied
demands, the existing establishment and the need to keep “the
people” mobilized. The critique of personalization is relevant
as are two potential risks: centralizing power to reflect the

capacity attributed to the leader to solve the people’s unsat-
isfied demands, and the use of the institutional framework to
perpetuate leadership in power. In these cases, the division of
power and mechanisms of control should be required.
Republicanism plays here an important role to control
centralized and personalized power. However, republicanism
does not always address the unequal economic structures,
despite Villacañas (2016b) rightly sustaining that the real core
of domination relies on the economic structure. The “minimal
populism” defended by Villacañas ends up being close to
Mouffe’s “radical reformism”. The difference is that “minimal
populism” implies a weaker impetus to challenge and renew
the representative institutions.
5.4.3 Republican Objectivity
Carlos Fernández Liria (2016) is an influential Spanish

philosopher for some of the founders of Podemos. He wrote the
book In Defense of Populism, which, despite the title, is rather
a defense of republicanism and the recognition of some of the
mistakes made by the Marxist tradition (mainly its rejections of
the modern state and the rule of law; i.e. the achievements of
the Enlightenment). Populism is saluted, in cooperation with
republicanism, as a way of challenging the principles of the
radical left and embracing institutional politics, including the
state and the law. Because capitalism deprives institutions of
their democratic potential, the function of populism would be
to recover such a potential. Populism is not anti-institutional, as
Villacañas considers it, but aims to recover institutions. Left-
wing populism should contribute to reshaping the distinction
between “We” vs “They”. Liria believes that the “We” vs
“They” dichotomy should structure republicanism and is
applicable to institutions, rather than to the people. According
to Liria, “They” are the group whose goal is to destroy insti-

tutions; “We”, on the other hand, become the “conservatives”
who want to maintain the things that deserve to be maintained
such as public schools, a public healthcare system, the right to
retirement and to housing, and so on. Thus, being revolution-
ary would mean being conservative and reformist (of the
emancipatory and democratic potential of institutions). Left-
wing populism is necessary, so the existing conflict between
“We” vs “They” can be channeled institutionally to reclaim the
democratic function of the modern state and law which relies
on the principle of “republican objectivity”. The possibility of
producing objectivity in the political world must be realized
through a system of balances between powers and the articu-
lation of institutions. This would create a space for reasoning.
Left-wing populism should adapt their project to the defense of
the republican objectivity. The defense of populism becomes
the defense of republicanism. Objectivity means that laws rule
and not the people. In the rule of law, any change must be
made in accordance with the law (and not through arbitrary
decisions). This “introduces a distancing of the people from
itself; a distancing that makes people think it over twice, so to
say, or, in the end, to reason” (Liria, 2016, p. 111). Law is
above people, and any change made by the people should be
carried out through reasoning. Sharing also a position similar
to “radical reformism”, the principle of objectivity establishes
the framework for connecting the people’s demands with the
reform of the institutional order.
All in all, the three approaches to republicanism and popu-
lisms (two of them from an explicitly left-wing populist
position) agree with the need to search for a constitutional and
institutional realm to develop populism. It leads to a reformist
path, rather than an institutional breakthrough, to renew
liberal and representative institutions and to build an alter-
native to neoliberalism.
6
SOVEREIGNISM AND
TRANSNATIONALISM
James Bohman presents in a very simple way the main chal-

lenge of states in times of globalization: They are “too big to
generate the loyalty and legitimacy needed for a demanding
democratic ideal, and too small to solve a myriad of social
problems” (2010, p. 3). Proposals in both directions fail to
grasp such complexity. From a state perspective, communi-
tarians are in favor of renewing the social consensus through a
democratic ethos, and participatory democrats advocate for
decentralization; from a cosmopolitan perspective, the
supranational level is considered the only one to solve the
existing global issues from human rights to global warming or
terrorism. This distinction is quite relevant since it reflects the
dual challenge for left-wing populism: the claim for sover-
eignty and the articulation of “the people” as a political
subject. Popular sovereignty is one of the main features of
left-wing populism but, placed in international settings, the
differences between popular and national or state sovereignty
blur as well as the difference between “the people” and “the
nationals”, or “the national people”, if preferred. Not without
99
reason, sovereignism, or the defense of sovereignty, has been

highlighted as the main common characteristic for both left-
and right-wing populism (Verstrynge, 2017).
The European Union (EU) is conceived as a neoliberal
project, and consequently the rejection of neoliberalism entails
the rejection of the EU in the claim of the nation-state to be
sovereign. This double rejection implies that “the people” are
reduced, at the European level, to the aggregation of “national
peoples” whilst a collective European program is missed,
given that the priority is to recover national sovereignty from
Brussels. The already complex relationship between demos
and ethnos (Stavrakakis, Andreadis, & Katsambekis, 2017) is
intensified when “the people” and “the nation” apparently
become the same. Coming closer to the notion of people-as-
nation poses the risk of a culturalized notion of the people.
“The people” as ethos entails its conceptualization as “a
collectivist entity, based on culture, ethnicity, race or generally
on blood” (Akkerman, 2003, p. 151) whereby a cultural
community should precede the political community. The
identification of “the people” with democracy, the people-as-
demos (De Cleen, 2017) should be enough to move away from
the culturalized version of “the people” as ethos, accurately
attributed to right-wing populism, and develop a progressive
project. The bottom vs top axis, reflecting a power and hier-
archical position, is deployed to characterize the antagonistic
relation with the political and economic European elites.
There is, however, a problem when the distinction between
left-wing populism and nationalism moves to an international
setting: If “the people” are articulated as democracy or the
people-as-demos, the main question here is which demos can
be articulated at the European level and how to relate it with
the singular demos existing at the national level? This question
has no easy answer. The alternatives differ from the belief of
“the people” as sovereign within the nation-state to the
Sovereignism and Transnationalism 101
possibility to transnationalize “the people” across borders. I

name these two options: International sovereignism, which
has been the dominant one so far, and transnationalism.
Despite acknowledging the predominance of nation-states,
international sovereignism advocates for addressing global
issues at the international level. Transnationalism does not
consider the national arena as the central one and attempts
instead to explore transnational connections and ways of
governance.
Before addressing the articulation of the people at the EU
level, it is important to clarify that the transnational
dimension makes it evident that there is no single demos, a
political unity already organized democratically. Bohman
notes that the idea of demos “requires a delimited political
community of citizens, consisting of all those and only those
who are full citizens and thus both authors and subjects of
the law” (2010, p. 29). Thus, when democracy takes place
transnationally, it happens differently from the nation-state.
Within the nation-state, the political authority appeals to
a singular demos or unified “will of the people”; in the
transnational space, says Bohman, the demos becomes
insufficient. There must be a shift from the demos to demoi.
The subject, demoi, is plural and not singular like the demos.
It is true that the same can happen within nation-states but at
the transnational level a different issue arises: the necessity or
not of a sovereign for each of the plural demoi. The lessons
we can learn from Bohman are very useful to understanding
that the objective is neither to shape a unified global demos
nor to create a new centralized power of some sovereign.
These reflections point to some of the problems faced by left-
wing populism in its attempt to promote (popular or
national) sovereignty as its main goal (instead of searching
for alternative ways of global governance or transnational
politics) or in its attempt to shape a collective subject as an
ensemble of national demos (instead of recognizing the

complexity of the demoi and their implications beyond
representation).
6.1 THE POPULIST VS COSMOPOLITAN DICHOTOMY
The relation between globalization and nationalism was

explained in the 1990s as two intertwined opposites in a
causal relationship: Nationalism was triggered and reinforced
as counterreaction against globalization (Sabanadze, 2010).
Particularism in its multiple forms (nationalism, religion,
ethnicity) has since then been labeled part of identity politics
and a source of conflict “challenging the stability of the post-
Cold War international system and mounting backlash
against ideational, normative and material influences of
globalization” (Sabanadze, 2010, p. 15). Populism is now
called upon, together with nationalism, to occupy this space,
and the dichotomy between populism and cosmopolitanism
gains terrain as explanation for current political conflicts.
Cristobal Rovira (2017), for instance, concludes from the
French, Dutch, and US elections that the left vs right axis is
losing its validity while the tension between populism and
cosmopolitanism is becoming predominant. The opposition to
right-wing populism does not come from the left, according to
Rovira, but from cosmopolitans. Populism is portrayed as the
flip side of cosmopolitanism (Costas, 2016a) and a reaction
against the previous social democratic and conservative gov-
ernments. These governments from both center-left and right
did not fulfill their promises, and the benefits of globalization
were unequally distributed. Thus, the separation between the
winners and losers of globalization was shaped (Costas,
2016b), and populism emerged. The demands are legitimate
but the solutions are characterized as wrong. Especially after
the victory of Trump, populism as a global phenomenon

becomes one sole populism and the difference between left and
right wing turns to be irrelevant (Benegas, 2019).
Without denying the importance of the populist/nationalist
vs cosmopolitan dimension on the complex ideological map, it
is quite problematic to simplify the political conflict to this
axis. Firstly, as mentioned, it blurs the distinction between
left- and right-wing populism, and more generally between left
and right. Secondly, cosmopolitanism is associated with
values such as free market, pro-migrant policies, or interna-
tional cooperation which transform the acceptance of
cosmopolitanism into the assumption of free market and,
more or less moderate, global neoliberalism as the only
option. Finally, it reduces any use of cosmopolitanism to its
identification with the global elite whilst it obstructs an
international perspective for left-wing populism. This is an
important issue at stake. If the winners of the globalization are
the cosmopolitans, the global elite, the working class ends up
being the national working class or an anti-cosmopolitan one.
There is no trace left of working class’ internationalism when
it is depicted as nationalist or coinciding with national inter-
ests. Nancy Fraser (2016, 2017) contributes to shedding light
on this matter. She interprets Trump’s victory as the result of a
confrontation between “progressive neoliberalism”, the
convergence of emancipatory projects and financialization,
and “reactionary populism”. The solution would be to
develop a “progressive populism”, the combination of
emancipation and social protection. The point is not to
abandon the emancipatory struggles (feminism, migration,
diversity) and adopt a reactionary and nationalized version of
“the people” but rather to explore a cosmopolitanism from
below.
Moreover, republicanism can embrace cosmopolitanism
when trying to settle transnational institutions, but left-wing
populism is trapped within the national-popular collective will

where the focus is on the national. As Juan Dal Maso (2019)
points out, the heterogeneity of the people cannot be reduced
to a homogeneous national community. Rather, the “national
sentiment” must be articulated to conform to a new cosmo-
politanism. In other words, the national is one scale, and
probably still the most important one, but far from being the
only one. Actually, the local scale is already plurinational, and
cosmopolitanism can be shaped from local and national
realities without being abstract or empty. In this regard, the
articulation of a political subject remains pending as well as
the reshaping of transnational institutions. From left-wing
positions this task has been developed in different directions.
6.2 THE LIMITS OF NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY
The need to explore an alternative to national solutions

emerges paradoxically from the first and last electoral victory
of a left-wing populist party, Syriza, and its incapability in
government to fulfill a radical reformist program. Contrary to
his announced intentions, Alexis Tsipras accepted austerity
measures imposed by the Troika (European Commission,
European Central Bank, and International Monetary Fund),
and the intention of leading a solidary and equalitarian project
against the neoliberal Europe vanished. The support of the
Greek population via the referendum against the bailout
conditions imposed by the Troika was in vain, and the
international solidarity, like the Oxi movement, witnessed
how neoliberalism reigned still as the only paradigm within
the EU. The fact that one sole country was not able to alter the
EU politics reveals the weakness of national sovereignty as the
only place to do politics, even though “real” national sover-
eignty is the main populist demand. Left-wing populism
reacted by scaling up and trying to build international coali-

tions or transnational movements. An additional paradox is
that Syriza was excluded from both projects. Despite being a
member of the European United Left/Nordic Green Left
(GUE/NGL) in the European Parliament, Syriza incarnated
the surrender to neoliberalism and thus the impossibility of
articulating an alternative to the existing EU. Leaders close to
Syriza then like Pablo Iglesias, who used the Syriza govern-
ment as inspiration for Spain, and specially Yanis Varoufakis,
former Greek Minister of Finance, were involved in different
projects, Plan B and Diem25 (Democracy in Movement 2025),
in which the recovery of national sovereignty and the gener-
ation of a transnational movement were promoted. The two
initiatives have so far been the major political attempts to
address the international or transnational arena from a left-
wing populist perspective.
6.3 INTERNATIONAL SOVEREIGNISM
Plan B started as a public declaration and has ensured conti-

nuity through annual summits. Due to the elections for the
European Parliament in 2019 several parties involved in Plan
B decided to join forces as the political movement “Now the
People!” in order to push a European agenda. During all this
time, the initiative has been characterized by the diversity of
actors participating in it and by combining the critique of
neoliberalism and the defense of sovereignty. Plan B was
launched in 2015 through a joint statement signed by well-
known figures from the left: Oskar Lafontaine (former Die
Linke leader in Germany), Stefano Fassina (Italian deputy and
economist), Jean-Luc Mélenchon (then leader of the French
Left Front), Zoe Konstantopoulou (former deputy and par-
liamentary speaker in Greece), and Yanis Varoufakis who
soon distanced himself from it and put his efforts into devel-
oping DiEM25. From the beginning the initiative has been led
by political leaders and includes political goals (renegotiation
of the European Treaties, accountability for the Eurogroup,
denouncement of the political interference of the European
Central Bank), but the need to cooperate with civil society and
European social movements against austerity policies is
acknowledged. The statement defines the struggle for a dem-
ocratic Europe, in opposition to the EU, and creates a division
between the powers that be and the majority of Europeans.
Besides the discursive opposition between us and them, the
initiative pursues to promote deliberation:
Our Plan A for a democratic Europe, backed with a

Plan B which shows the powers-that-be that they
cannot terrorise us into submission, is inclusive and
aims at appealing to the majority of Europeans. This
demands a high level of preparation. Debate will
strengthen its technical elements. (Plan B, 2015)
Nonetheless, the transnational connection was insuffi-

ciently developed. The declared intention of creating local
working groups was not carried out. Plan B already aimed to
shape an alternative to the GUE/NGL, manifesting their dis-
agreements with the internal dynamics of the group and
concretely with the role played by Syriza and Die Linke, so the
European Parliament was not the platform to elaborate such a
transnational discussion. Therefore, Plan B favors mainly
annual summits (France in 2016, Spain in 2016, Denmark in
2016, Portugal in 2017, Greece in 2018, and Sweden in 2019)
where members of civil society, politicians, and intellectuals
meet. These forums have barely concretized the character of
Plan B, which was not defined in advance. There is indeed no
common position between the main actors of Plan B. France
Insoumise leads a very critical position against the EU,
together with the traditional Eurosceptic left from Denmark

and Sweden, whilst Podemos and Left Bloc are more ambiv-
alent and do not reject the EU entirely. Jean-Luc Mélenchon
very explicitly frames Plan B as the application of “our pro-
gram” against the will of the European Commission. He
summarizes the strategy in three points:
One: we will apply our program. Two: we will

negotiate to ensure that European regulations allow
it. This is what we call the ‘Plan A.’ But three: if
Europe refuses, we will apply our programme
anyway, along with those who think like we do. This
is what we call the ‘Plan B’. (Mélenchon, 2018)
In this version, national sovereignty prevails (what citizens

decide within their nation-states) and the problem is Brussels
treaties. If those treaties cannot be abandoned within the EU
framework, the only option consists of acting unilaterally and
maybe leaving the EU. Plan B prioritizes the national arena
and it is structured around it. The invitation to civil society
and social movements becomes quite limited since the initia-
tive is led by political parties, and the idea of representation,
rather than participation, becomes dominant. Actually, at the
summit in Copenhagen, despite not counting on many par-
ticipants, the extension of Plan B was emphasized since the left
parties present represented a remarkable number of people
(meaning voters in this case) in Europe. The goal of Plan B
reinforces the importance of national representativeness in
order to be feasible. Pablo Bustinduy, then in Podemos,
recognized that it was necessary to win national elections and
accumulate material power before concentrating their efforts
on a debate about how to reform Europe (Bonet, 2018). The
return to the nation-state and international cooperation are
consequently the main features of Plan B. People’s sovereignty
is expressed through their nation-states, and international
cooperation should help to respect the will of the people. The

chief obstacle for Plan B is that the main field of battle is not
just sovereignty but winning the national elections so the
governments can represent the will of the people. However,
left-wing parties, with the exception of Syriza that is not part
of the Plan B, are not involved in the national governments so
cooperation between governments is not feasible yet.
Furthermore, EU politics are not a priority at all and a com-
mon European project is barely outlined. Plan B is a reflection
on how left-wing populism is gaining momentum at the
European level and moving away from the marginalized place
occupied by the radical left in the European Parliament
(Bonet, 2018) but without formulating an alternative Euro-
pean project and appealing to a collection of national demos,
instead of the demoi.
The EP elections in 2019 made Plan B crystallize into the
alliance “Now the People” launched in 2018. It is an inter-
esting geographical alliance connecting Southern European
(France Insoumise from France, Podemos from Spain, Left Bloc
from Portugal) and the Nordic countries (Red-Green Alliance
from Denmark, Left Party from Sweden, and Left Alliance
from Finland). Although the underlying idea of international
cooperation and solidarity beyond the EU remains intact, the
electoral platform is used to address transnational issues which
cannot be resolved at the national arena and require interna-
tional solutions, such as climate change, tax havens, or social
dumping. Deepening the Lisbon declaration “Our Europe, for
and by the people!” of Plan B, the alliance articulates a populist
discourse through the division between the European elites and
“the people”. The enemies are capitalism, as the cause of the
climate crisis, the EU elites, the co-existence of economic and
political interests behind the increasing precarity and
inequality, and racism and xenophobia, incarnated by the
radical right. It is a political conflict against extremism (Iglesias,
Martins, Mélenchon, & Søndergaard, 2018): both from the

center (Macron) and the right (Salvini). The international alli-
ances aim then to save Europe from political extremism and
economic neoliberalism: “We are willing to do something that
the EU-elite is both unable and unwilling to do: offer real
solutions to face the problems caused by liberal policies built
against peoples” (Now the People!, 2019a).
“The people” are here people-as-demos, since it is a demo-
cratic battle against the EU elites, and the plural form,
“peoples”, is deployed to reflect the plurality of demos. This
plurality is sometimes clearly multinational, as the sum of
national people, but also intersectional, referring to refugees,
women, and LGTBI communities. There is, indeed, a claim
for rights which can transcend the national borders (and
correspond to the demoi) beyond the mere defense of sover-
eignty attached to the national demos. Being nationally rooted,
the Lisbon declaration “For a citizen revolution in Europe”
opens up, at least, the logics of the international-popular:
We call on the peoples of Europe to unite on the task

of building an international, popular and democratic
political movement to organize the defense of our
rights and the sovereignty of our peoples in front of
an old, unfair and failed order that is taking us right
to the catastrophe. (Now the People!, 2019b)
The electoral moment created the possibility of organizing

across nation-states and adding to the transnational agenda a
progressive vision of issues which go beyond the control of
nation-states. The ambiguity about the position toward the EU
(a lexit or not) lingers. The attempt to cater to majorities from a
populist left-wing angle has not contributed to increasing the
electoral results. On the contrary, the European left is even
more fragmented. The other initiative, DiEM25, contributes
likewise to that division.
6.4 TRANSNATIONALISM
A few months after “A Plan B in Europe”, DiEM25 was

launched in Berlin. Although the overlap of participants and
political diagnoses made both initiatives look quite similar, the
differences emerged soon and their respective evolution
deepened their incompatibility. The DiEM25 manifesto
highlights that the political subject, “we, the peoples of
Europe”, is going to bring change forward in Europe so that
the people “regain control over our Europe from unaccount-
able ‘technocrats’, complicit politicians and shadowy institu-
tions” (DiEM25, 2016). The antagonistic relation between the
EU powers that be and the power of the peoples grounds a
populist discourse (Panayotu, 2017) at the transnational level
(aspiring to appeal to the demoi rather than forming a
homogenized European demos). DiEM25’s conception of
people-as-demos cannot be fulfilled in the national space and
“constantly endeavours to construct a transnational political
space and become a transnational force able to offer demo-
cratic change in Europe” (De Cleen, Moffitt, Panayotu, &
Stavrakakis, 2019, p. 17). The transnational call for a way of
organizing was evident in the first stage of DiEM25, where
social movements and the atmosphere created by the cycle of
protests of 2011 were the main inspiration for DiEM25. As
expressed by Srećko Horvat, one of their founders:
At the moment, DiEM25 is not a party, nor an
organisation or think tank. We consider the
conventional model of political parties obsolete.
Rather than build at a national level and then expand
to Europe, we are turning that process upside down
and starting a movement at an international level,
but taking into consideration existing movements
and grassroots at national, regional and local level.
(Horvat, quoted in Oltermann, 2016)
DiEM25 wanted to differentiate itself from other projects

in two aspects: overcoming the traditional party form, by
assuming a more fluent one, and moving beyond the national
arena as the core space to do politics (Agustı́n, 2017). The
movement began as international and pursued to connect with
existing local and national movements. DiEM25 can be
labeled transnational populism in the sense that it articulates
“the people”, or “the peoples” as a transnational political
subject, on the one hand, and it promotes a transnational and
participatory organizational form, on the other. In both cases,
the challenge lies in how to address the national scale.
Comparing with Plan B, DiEM25 presents a well-elaborated
and coherent discourse. The many voices expressed in the Plan
B forums do not contribute to delivering a unified discourse
due to the differences between their participants. DiEM25 has,
however, a more centralized source of enunciation and its
articulation is made by very few people. Actually, DiEM25 is
basically personalized in their leader, Varoufakis, who
reproduces some of the dynamics of left-wing populism but at
the transnational level.
The organizational dimension has proved to be very
complicated. The initial idea was to use DiEM25 as a trans-
national movement capable of articulating existing local
movements within. John Malamatinas (2016) from Blockupy
recalled in an open letter to Varoufakis that transnational
movements and activists existed already and wondered why
he did not speak with these movements before launching
DiEM25. Therefore, it can be said that DiEM25 has been
more efficient in being involved in social struggles than in
connecting them as part of a common movement. Varoufakis
(2016b) is, besides, critical of the predominance of the
national level to raise an alternative to the neoliberal EU. He
refers to Gramsci to stress that rebellion can happen in towns
and regions. Connecting people’s struggles and the progressive
politics of city councils with a transnational movement could

shape a counter-hegemonic project not restricted to the
nation-state framework.
When DiEM25 decided to participate in the EP elections,
the omission of the national level became impossible. Despite
maintaining the transnational dimension, mutating from
transnational network (DiEM25) to transnational party
(European Spring), the party had to deal with the existing
electoral dynamics, led by national parties from the member
states, and the limited scope of EU, still nationalized and
characterized by the domestic agenda and interests from each
country. The novelty of launching a common European
agenda to all the members of the coalition European Spring
entails a significant shift in the way of understanding Euro-
pean politics and the transnational dimension as a dimension
in itself and not as the aggregation of national politics.
Infrequent moves, challenging the national logic of politics
behind EU elections, were made like Yanis Varoufakis being
the head of the electoral list in Germany. Moreover, DiEM25
expressed their will to continue being a movement and not
becoming a traditional party. However, the coalition, named
MeRA25 (The European Realistic Disobedience Front), was
forged in cooperation with national parties assuming
DiEM25’s European New Deal. Génération-s (France), Razem
(Poland), Alternativet (Denmark), DemA (Italy), MeRA25
(Greece), Demokratie in Europa (Germany), Der Wandel
(Austria), Actua (Spain), and Livre (Portugal) joined in. These
parties are, after all, rooted in national politics, with their own
internal history and dynamics and positioning vis-à-vis other
left parties. The assumption of the DiEM25 program proved
to be inadequate to change the perception of those parties as
national parties. It is noteworthy that the parties are not
especially relevant electorally in their respective countries, and
that reality remained the same after the elections. The
difficulties experienced by DiEM25 in articulating existing

local networks evolved in MeRA25 as the impossibility to
attract major left parties to the transnational political alliance.
Apparently, the transnational project faces its main challenge
in being rooted into local and national realities.
In any case, the plan for the European Spring is consequent
with the project formulated by DiEM25 and highlights some
of the aspects which make it distinguishable from Plan B: A
transnational left-wing project which combines the power of
“the peoples” with the proposal for a European constitution
to replace the existing treaties. As a result of this combination,
DiEM25 incorporates populist (the power of “the peoples”)
and republican (a new constitution) elements and, due to their
position against the radical right and skepticism about
nationalism, embraces cosmopolitanism too. In the following
lines, Varoufakis’ words are almost prefigurative about what
kind of politics the left should carry out and in which space it
should happen:
To show voters that there is an alternative, even

within the rules designed by the establishment to
further the interests of the top 1%. No one expects
the EU institutions to adopt our proposals, least of
all us. All we want is for voters to see what could be
done, instead of what is being done, so that they can
see through the establishment without turning to the
xenophobic right. This is the only way the left can
escape its confines and build a broad progressive
coalition. (Varoufakis, 2019)
“The people” (meaning here “the voters”) are necessary to

change the institutions, since change is not going to happen
from the institutions themselves. The enemy is not only the
1%, the establishment, but also the xenophobic right. In
response to that, DiEM25 develops a cosmopolitan discourse,
and solidary politics towards refugees becomes one of their

main objectives. The space for the transnational left would be:
the opposition to the establishment (combining populism and
republicanism) and to the radical right (assuming cosmopoli-
tanism). The critique is extensive to nationalism and the fence
of national borders made by the left. David Adler (2019),
DiEM25’s Coordinating Collective, denounces the inoppor-
tune and dangerous boundaries redefined by the left-wing
leaders like Sahra Wagenknecht, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, and
Jeremy Corbyn. Against them, DiEM25 advocates for sup-
porting open borders. The confrontation with the European
“left nationalists”, as Adler calls them, reflects the tension
between sovereignism and transnationalism and reproduces
the opposition between nationalism and cosmopolitanism as
axis for the political conflict. The nationalist vs cosmopolitan
dichotomy is not deployed to replace the left vs right but to
deepen the differences between the already fragmented left,
split between multiple “unity projects” (Balhorn, 2019), and
signals the impossibility so far to overcome fragmentation
both at the national and the transnational level.
FIVE DILEMMAS OF LEFT-WING
POPULISM
In his speech to the Labor Party Conference in Brighton in

2018, Jeremy Corbyn declared: “We are now the political
mainstream. Our manifesto and our policies are popular
because that is what most people in our country actually
want, not what they’re told they should want” (Corbyn,
2018). Of course, that is easier to say from the Labour Party,
where voters voted for Corbyn or for the party (or both),
than stemming from the radical left. Nonetheless, Corbyn
was capable of consolidating his leadership after having been
elected in 2015 and reached the best electoral results for the
party since 1997. Thus, there are good reasons to claim that
Corbyn and Corbynism abandoned a marginalized space to
be at the core of national politics. Becoming mainstream is
related to the capacity of influencing and changing the
political rules while the main characteristic idea of the party
is having a project which reflects what “most people” want,
in opposition to what “they are told they should want.” I
believe that such a statement summarizes the contribution
and, at the same time, the inherent dilemma of European left-
wing populism. On the one hand, becoming mainstream
implies changing the political rules but also adapting to them
and, not least, to the electoral logic. On the other hand,
leading a popular project entails capturing what “the
115
people” want but also to translate it into concrete politics,

which must be presented and discussed in the public and
institutional spheres.
In a very short period of time, left-wing populism
managed to create the sense of a possible change in Europe.
The convergence of several parties aiming to develop a
“politics of the people” forged the environment. Even
though the disappointment provoked by the Syriza govern-
ment already showed weakness for left-wing populism as a
project to govern, the good electoral results of Podemos, the
emergence of new municipalism as progressive local politics
from below, the progressive impact of Corbyn and
Momentum in the Labour Party and the creation of France
Insoumise expanded the increasing development of left-wing
populist politics. The EU elections in 2019, however,
reflected a quite different panorama due to the poor results
obtained by left-wing populist parties as a consequence of
the multiple problems they experienced. The Brexit and the
Catalan situation did not favor the development of left
politics through a social agenda based on equality and social
justice. The political conjuncture seems to point to the end of
the populist moment, at least as the moment, for the left.
Social democratic parties are back in power in some coun-
tries, the center parties are framed as the best solution
against the tumultuous politics of populists and nationalists,
and the far right gains more influence and imposes the
debate on immigration and integration as the central one in
each country. The focus on climate change, although
incorporated in the left-wing populist programs, can benefit
Green parties as the alternative, rather than the populist
ones. The most worrying aspect is the lack of a left project in
this context which can aspire to become mainstream and to
represent the majority, as was the goal of left-wing populism
from the beginning.
TO WIN OR NOT TO WIN?
Syriza proved for the first time in Europe that the radical left
could win the elections. This is an important achievement for
left-wing populism and entails a substantial change in the
mentality of the radical left. It was not about representing the
critical or protest voices in parliaments anymore, or about
being the political force which takes up the space left of the
social democracy (aiming to support a social democratic
government at best). The model of Syriza is a model aimed to
win the elections just like the Latin American models which
preceded it. When a left-wing party wins the elections (and so
far only Syriza has achieved that), uncertainty is waiting:
Which kind of politics would be implemented, which kind of
(radical) economic and political change, and which relations
would the government have with other political parties and
the economic elites that they had condemned before? It is not
only about which program to apply but about the applica-
bility of such a program. Syriza ended up replacing PASOK
and becoming a new center-left party. Tsipras maintained the
populist discourse (“the people” against “the elites”) and, at
the same time, gained political credit, also in the EU, as a
pragmatic politician.
The situation is not any better if left-wing populist parties
do not win the elections. Podemos has come to a crossroads
due to the loss of electoral support and the recovery of the
social democratic party as the biggest force on the left.
Podemos needs to negotiate with the social democratic party
(considered not a long time ago a party of the establishment)
to reach a coalition government. The political profile of
Podemos has been vanishing since the ambition was first to
win the elections and later to become part of the government.
When these aspirations are not met, Podemos loses its purpose
and its space in the political arena.
Winning (Syriza) or not (Podemos, France Insoumise), left-

wing populism lacks a long-term alternative to shape a project
for the majority or, at least, to assess the conditions or pos-
sibilities to condition the political agenda on a wide range of
issues such as political participation, economic redistribution,
climate, feminism, immigration, and refugee policies. The
political approach in absolute terms of winning or not has led
to the adaptation to the center or to the difficulties to play a
significant political role. In the latter case, the situation could
push parties like Podemos and France Insoumise toward the
traditional marginal positions occupied by the left.
POWER AS KNOWLEDGE OR POWER AS POWER?
I borrow the title from the famous scene from the series Game of
Thrones. Lord Petyr “Littlefinger” explains to Cersei Lannister
that “power is knowledge,” letting her know that he is aware of
her affair with her brother. Lannister orders her men to kill him
and show him the supremacy of using brute power. She
concludes, contrary to “Littlefinger,” that “power is power.”
Left-wing populism, based on populist and discourse theory by
Laclau and Mouffe, has placed hegemony as the main strategic
political goal. In opposition to neoliberal hegemony, the arti-
culation of different chains of equivalences (the heterogeneous
social demands) around “the people” or the leader symbolizing
those demands aims to create a new common sense and a new
hegemony. Iñigo Errejón defines hegemony as a type of power
which works through a game of openness and closure: It cannot
be totally open because the political project would blur, and it
cannot be completely closed either or it would lose the capacity
of seducing or bringing together the society around the project
(Errejón, Thomassen, & Stavrakakis, 2016). The main charac-
teristic of hegemony is thus instability.
From a left perspective, the hegemonic strategy consists of

opening the project to include a wider number of social groups
or, in other words, to favor the identification of a greater
number of individuals or groups than those who already define
themselves as leftist. On the other hand, there is a risk of
emptying the ideological content of the party (becoming a
catch-all party, adapting its profile to what is perceived as the
interests of the voters). The populist appeal to “the people,” as
a larger subject than the working class, in antagonistic relation
with “the elite,” aims to articulate a new hegemony. The
cultural struggles, changing the dominant frames and imple-
menting a new political common sense, contribute to the
hegemonic formation. This is when the idea of the political and
economic elites responsible for worsening the conditions of the
ordinary people opens up the possibility of a popular political
alternative. It is difficult not to acknowledge the discursive
abilities of left-wing populism to contest the neoliberal narra-
tive frames or to articulate popular sovereignty around the
need for a new Republic or welfare. The populist articulation
has seriously challenged the neoliberal common sense. How-
ever, as the knowledge of power by “Littlefinger,” left-wing
populism has focused on hegemony as consent (based on
Gramsci or post-structural theory) but has underestimated the
coercive side of power, namely the power is power.
The appellation to popular sovereignty and the call for a
referendum in Greece are so far the most serious warnings
about the limitations of hegemony not involving the existing
power structures. The assertiveness of the people’s will and
involvement and participation were not enough to counteract
the powers-that-be. It is clearly a problem that left-wing
populism lacked a determined political and economic
program, but also that the adverse economic powers and
conditions to make any reformist or radical change possible
were not properly assessed. This limitation, as well as the
strong reaction from the establishment, has conditioned left-

wing populism which has shown difficulties in reacting and
taking the initiative in such situations.
MOVEMENT OR PERSONAL PARTIES?
The cycle of social protests from 2011 evidenced the crisis of

representation and people’s mistrust toward politicians. When
new parties emerged such as Podemos, Five Star Movement,
Initiative for Democratic Socialism or, partly, Syriza, the
possibility of exploring new ways of participation and politi-
cal engagement within parties stayed open. DiEM25 was also
established, at the transnational scale, as a mix of movement
and think tank and embraced later the party form. The notion
of movement-party captures such incipient dynamics. Pre-
sented as a hybrid organization between movement and party
(della Porta, Fernández, Kouki, & Mosca, 2017), movement-
parties have overlapping memberships (social activists moving
to the arena of party competition, combining horizontal and
vertical structures, moving between institutional parliamen-
tary politics, and extra-institutional mobilization). The
populist emphasis on leadership and non-mediated relation
has not been very productive to develop the movement-party
as a transversal organization, meaning a combination of
horizontality and verticality. It is difficult not to perceive
movement-parties as a transitional phase toward verticalized
and personalized structures. The organizational movement
structure has actually proved to be fragile and susceptible to
becoming appropriated by the leadership. It is difficult to
imagine Syriza without Tspiras, Podemos without Iglesias or
France Insoumise without Mélenchon. Even worse, it is diffi-
cult to imagine the survival of these parties without these
leaders.
Left-wing parties have shown innovation and solvency

during the electoral campaigns where the collective creativity
and mobilization have distinguished them from traditional
parties. One of the challenges is to move away from the state of
perpetual elections as the best way of mobilizing the party,
because there is also a limit as to how much we can expect of
people’s engagement in the same kind of processes. Podemos’
initiative of cı́rculos (circles) was interesting to translate social
assemblies into politics but the party did not succeed in inte-
grating such semi-formal structures within the party or in giv-
ing them a function as deliberative units. Curiously, the Labour
Party, a historic and mainstream party, has been capable of
benefiting from the movement-party organizational model.
Besides the self-organized group Momentum to support Cor-
byn’s candidature, the launch of community-organizing teams
(Foster, 2019) to work locally with the communities and to
come closer to the ordinary voters prompts a different way of
conceiving parties as organizational forms.
The point is not to have a leaderless party but having a
stronger political structure which enhances internal checks and
balances, and finding the equilibrium between the parliamentary
group, the party (the formal and informal structures), and civil
society. If the initial horizontal forms were complicated to
manage, a well-defined structure, including clear functions
assigned to the formal and informal relations, should contribute
to moving toward a transversal organization and avoid the
vertical trap, and consequently personalization of the party.
NATIONAL OR TRANSNATIONAL?
Left-wing populism moves through a paradox. The appeal for

popular sovereignty is a consequence of the lack of democracy
and the claim for participation or for being heard with the aim
of bringing politics closer to the people. Populist parties target

the elites within the nation-state framework but also the
transnational elites, when the scope is more international, like
in the cases of the European Union, or transnational com-
panies. However, they pursue to reach sovereignty by
regaining control and power at the national level. There is no
doubt that political empowerment or people’s participation
(popular sovereignty) can be reinforced within the national
framework and influence the state and the legislation. The
limitation lies in how to recover the national sovereignty
which has been appropriated by transnational powers. When
populism, embedded in electoral politics, is anchored in
national politics, it is quite difficult to address the loss of
sovereignty, now transformed and transposed to other arenas.
Popular sovereignty should not be reduced to national sov-
ereignty since the idea of shared sovereignty through multi-
level governance better reflects the existing reality. Multilevel
does not connect only the national and transnational scale but
also the local. If governance is more contentious at the
European level and more cooperative at the municipal level,
that is a different issue.
Left-wing populist imaginaries to transform the common
sense and foster a hegemonic articulation have mainly been
national. David Featherstone and Lazaros Karaliotas point
out that “the nation is not an inevitable geographical imagi-
nary through which populism is necessarily articulated”
(2019, p. 43). Despite the difficulties, transnational left-wing
populism, or a multi-scalar left-wing populism, needs further
elaboration to move beyond the idea of international coop-
eration as the confluence of national interests. In fact,
deepening the transnational connections and scaling-up
populism cannot be considered as abandoning the national
arena but rather as the possibility to contest other levels of
governance and articulate global responses. It is not a debate
between patriotism and cosmopolitanism, since “the people”

in an inclusionary sense are already part of transnational
practices. The “good sense” generated trans-locally by civil
society during the “crisis of the refugees” in 2015 illustrates
how transnational cooperation and articulation can shape a
culture of hospitality in contrast with the hostile politics
promoted by nation-states and the EU. The universalism
inherent to patriotism can easily assume that cosmopolitan
impetus from below. DiEM25 has attempted to connect the
local and global levels disregarding the national. Plan B has
aimed to come back to the national. If popular sovereignty is
not constrained to the borders of the nation-state, the issue
would be how to move through all the scales and contest
neoliberalism through them (without ignoring that spaces like
the cities are already affected by transnational dynamics).
LEFT-WING POPULISM OR BACK TO THE LEFT?
If the populist moment is over, what is the next move for the
left? I will distinguish between the populist moment as
political conjuncture and populism as a political project to
articulate political conflict and increase people’s participa-
tion. The populist moment can facilitate the emergence of
populist parties. In the second case, populism does not vanish
and is integrated more or less explicitly as response to liberal
democracy and assumes different features according to the
historical and political moment. The fact that there were left-
wing populist parties before the crisis of 2008 in Europe, not
to mention the relevance of the Latin American governments,
proved that they do not depend on the economic crisis but
can be seen as a response to the larger crisis of the radical
parties, de-ideologization, disaffection in politics, etc.
Regarding the first phenomenon (the end of the populist
momentum), it can be applied more clearly to left-wing

populism rather than to right-wing populism. Right-wing
populism is still politically vigorous, threatening the parties
of the establishment and conditioning the public and political
debate, especially around migration. This fact cannot be
ignored. It does not imply that left-wing populism should be
the reverse of right-wing populism but rather that left parties,
in whatever form, would compete with far-right parties and
center-left and right parties trying to recover their centrality
in leading the political way.
The main problem with left-wing populism would be that
some of the issues it is supposed to address would remain
without a satisfactory solution. If the organizational form is
not a solution to decreasing party membership, if the princi-
ples and practices are not sufficient to counteract the declining
participation rates, if the party ends up being perceived as “yet
another party” belonging to the political class, the general
disaffection would continue. Left-wing populism would not
have lost its momentum but the opportunity of doing politics
differently. If the left moves to “socialism” or “democratic
socialism” to articulate a progressive project, it would be
wrong not to start from the left-wing populist lessons and the
challenges they faced. The risk for the factions of the left
distancing themselves from left-wing populism would result in
deepening fragmentation and moving away from a progres-
sive alternative for the majorities and from becoming the
politics of the people.
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INDEX
Agonistic republicanism, Creative class, 61

94–96 Crisis of refugees, 70
Alegre, Luis, 81, 87
Democratic patriotism, 77
Ambiguity, 2, 61, 109
DiEM25, 110, 111,
Blair, Tony, 20 113–114, 120,
Bloom, Peter, 34 123
Disruptive movement, 41
Catalan conflict, 79 Domènech, Xavier, 70
Catalan referendum, 78 Dragsted, Pelle, 31
Center-left wing populism,
Dybvad, Kaare, 61
23–24
Centralization, 90 Elite people, 34–39
“Citizenism,” 25 En Marche, 15
Ciudadanos, 49 Environmentalism, 39
Civic nationalism, 72 Equivalence, 38, 25, 37, 38,
Civil society, 2, 26, 85, 107, 57
123 Errejón, Iñigo, 16
Class European Spring, 112
determination, 52 European Union (EU), 44,
position, 53 100, 122
working class, 48 European United Left/
Colau, Adu, 16 Nordic Green Left
Community works, 30 (GUE/NGL), 105
Constitutional democracy, Exclusionary populism,
40, 41, 67 58–60
Corbyn, Jeremy, 16, 23, 26,
Fassina, Stefano, 105
60, 114, 115, 121
Féin, Sinn, 28
Corruption, 6, 10
149
150 Index
Five Star Movement, 58, Left-wing populism

120 ambiguity, 2
France Insoumise, 15, 16, charismatic leadership,
22, 27, 106, 120 24–26
class, 47–63
Garrido, Raquel, 74
contemporary populism,
Garzón, Alberto, 49
4
Greek population, 104
definition, 8–12
Hegemonic articulation, 19, dilemmas, 115–124
94, 122 Europe, 13–31
features, 19–20
Identity politics, 34, 102 Latin America, 16–19
Iglesias, Pablo, 25 liberal position, 2
Inclusionary populism, migration, 47–63
58–60, 63 movement parties,
Independence, 20, 78–80, 26–27
90 multi-scalar, 122
Indignados movement, 10, populist moment, 4–8
51 social democracy,
Initiative for Democratic 20–21
Socialism (IDS), 26, Liberal democracy, 2
29 Linera, Álvaro Garcı́a, 17
Institutionalization Losers of globalization, 21,
political party, 82 44, 53, 102
social movement, 82 LIVRE, 16
Intersectional populism, 54
Maduro, Nicolás, 18
Konstantopoulou, Zoe, 17, Manipulation, 39
18, 105 Más Madrid, 16
Labor Party Conference, Mediation, 39
115 Mélenchon, Jean-Luc, 17,
Labour Party, 16, 29 18, 22, 105
Lafontaine, Oskar, 105 MeRA25 (The European
Leadership, 6, 20, 24–25, Realistic
27, 115, 120 Disobedience Front),
Left Alliance, 108 112
Left Bloc, 107 Migrants, 56, 60–63, 69
Left Party, 108 Minimal populism, 96–97
Index 151
15M movement, 10, 26, 86 Personalization, 22, 90, 96,

Momentum, 16, 23, 62, 121
116, 121, 124 Personal parties/movement,
Movement parties, 26–27, 120–121
81, 120, 121 Podemos, 13, 15, 16, 17,
Multi-scalar left-wing 18, 19, 26, 28, 40,
populism, 122 49, 51, 75, 76, 84,
88, 92, 93, 107, 116,
National community, 68
117, 120
Nationalism, 67–71
Political community, 41,
Nationalist loyalty, 72
44, 46, 74, 101
National liberalization,
Political movements, 6–7
46 Political participation, 58,
National sovereignty, 46,
89, 118
66–71, 75, 104–105,
Popular democracy, 40,
122
67
Neoliberal globalization,
Popular Party, 13
40, 43–46, 69
Popular sovereignty
Neoliberalism, 3, 9, 12, 45,
definition, 39–43
86, 96, 103
Europe, 41
Neoliberal politics, 46 neoliberal globalization,
New Democracy (ND), 20
43–46
“Now the People,” 108
people, 33–46
Panhellenic Socialist Populist interpellation,
Movement 54–58, 62
(PASOK), 20 Power, 19, 41, 67, 83, 90,
Parliamentarism, 89 118–120
Party for the Sustainable Power bloc, 57
Development of Precarity, 54–58, 108
Slovenia, 29 Prentoulis, Marina, 14
Party system crisis, 5 Puigdemont, Carles,
Patriotism, 15, 65–80, 79
123
Radicalism, 14
Pen, Le, 22
Razem, 16
People
Red-Green Alliance (RGA),
citizens, 87–91
16, 30, 45, 108
elites, 4, 10, 34–39, 108, Reorientation, 39
122
152 Index
Republicanism Sovereignism
agonistic republicanism, cosmopolitan
94–96 dichotomy, 102–104
citizens, 87–91 demos, 101
contestation, 86 European Union (EU),
decision-making, 85 100
minimal populism, international
96–97 sovereignism, 101,
objectivity, 97–98 105–109
parliamentarism, 89 national sovereignty,
populism, 91–94 104–105
“social state,” 86 Spanish indignados, 10
Spanish government, Syriza, 13, 15, 18, 25, 46,
86 74, 104, 105, 117,
Respatializing power, 67 120
Right-wing populism, 5, 8,
Tesfaye, Mattias, 61
21–23, 34–36,
“There Is No Alternative”
65–66, 100, 124
(TINA), 45
Sánchez, Pedro, 23 Third Way, 20
Scottish Socialist Party, 28 Thomassen, Lasse, 14
Self-proclaimed intention, Trade unions, 50
74 Transnationalism
Self-reflection, 33 companies, 36
Shared sovereignties, 70 DiEM25, 111, 113–114
Sixth Republic, 40, 84 MeRA25, 113
Skipper, Pernille, 31, 45 national, 121–123
Social Democrats, 30, 61 Trump, Donald, 4, 48
Social division, 41 Tsipras, Alexis, 25
Socialism, 4, 27–31, 120, Two-dimensional
124 discourse, 36
Socialist Party, 20, 22, 28,
United Left (IU), 49
60
Social liberalization, 46 Varoufakis, Yanis, 105
Social mobilizations, Victims of globalization, 46
26–27, 30
Social transformation, Wagenknecht, Sahra, 62
43 Workers, 48, 55, 60–63
Index 153
Working class Zapatero, José Luis

class-based Rodrı́guez, 86
interpretations, 47, Zeitgeist, 4
48
plebs, 49–54, 57, 63

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LEFT-WING POPULISM

What is Left populism? In this book, Óscar

The last few decades were marked by the

The author manages to do exactly that: not

ÓSCAR GARC ÍA AGUST ÍN

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India

First edition 2020

© 2020 Óscar Garcı́a Agustı́n

Reprints and permissions service

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

ISBN: 978-1-83909-206-0 (Print)

About the Author vii

Why Left-Wing Populism? 1

Óscar Garcı́a Agustı́n is Associate Professor at the Depart-

It is becoming a kind of commonplace that every piece of

The main controversy awoken by populism is what can be

belonging to the left or right axis. In other words, the populist

populist features), and on the political and academic debates

THE POPULIST MOMENT

Before the economic crisis, the idea of the populist Zeitgeist

including those associated with the right as ethnic or national

• Party system crisis: The cartelization of political parties

• Corruption: Cas Mudde in his deﬁnition of populism

• Political movements: It would be erroneous to consider

digital tools), and mobilization of citizens (Klaukka, Van

These three features show an overall picture of how the crisis

I share Fassin’s concern about the political implications of

DEFINING LEFT-WING POPULISM

One of the main reasons to keep the distinction between

cosmopolitanism is basically that the left and right axis,

In her analysis of the Spanish indignados or 15M movement,

demands and proposals aim to reach a social majority, they

institutions and producing an alternative to neoliberalism. The

THE LEFT-WING POPULIST

Although the populist turn from left parties in Europe can be

the option of a progressive populism shook the political stage.

Three days before the election, on 22 January, a

Luke March and Daniel Keith (2016) comment that times

people” and “the elite,” the transversal and across-classes

• The electoral victory of Syriza in January 2015 in Greece,

• The spectacular irruption and growth of Podemos in Spain

• The good electoral results obtained by France Insoumise

• Jeremy Corbyn became the new leader of the Labour Party

These parties present commonalities but also their own

1.1 FROM LATIN AMERICA TO EUROPE

When left-wing populism in Europe gained visibility, the cycle

Three differences have impeded reaching a similar electoral

projecting a more critical approach to the Latin American

1.2 EUROPEAN LEFT-WING POPULISM:

Based on the experiences of the main left-wing populist parties,

more can be added ― to be useful to understanding the extent of

1.2.1 Alternative to Social Democracy

Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) dominated the polit-

The possibility of social democratic parties ending as an

1.2.2 Alternative to Right-wing Populism

The decline of social democratic parties in some countries invited

and, at the same time, appealing to their voters or former voters.

populism or the appropriation of their tools. Some social

1.2.3 Center-left Wing Populism

Left-wing populism is usually applied to parties placed on the

connects with the idea of movement party promoting participa-

But of course, they [the media and the establishment]