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Das Gespenst des Populismus: Ein Essay zur politischen Dramaturgie
Der Populismus gewinnt Mehrheiten, da das Projekt des Liberalismus in einer tiefen Krise steckt. Brexit, AfD, Marine Le Pen, Beppe Grillo, Viktor Orbán und als irrer Höhepunkt des Jahres 2016 der Wahlsieg von Donald Trump haben das doppelte Problem des Liberalismus brutal aufgedeckt: Er ist zum einen in einer Kollaboration mit dem Neoliberalismus gefangen und er ist zum anderen in sich selbst gefangen.
Das Gespenst des Populismus geht um in Europa und der Welt. An populären Erklärungen für den Populismus mangelt es nicht und es scheint, als wären sie extra für unsere Gegenwart geschrieben worden: Es braucht eine Finanzkrise, eine Flüchtlingswelle, ein Misstrauen in die Eliten, eine wachsende Ungleichheit und schließlich Parteien und Politiker, die daraus eine Bewegung formen. Die Regierungen sehen sich in der Zwickmühle, ihren Einwohnern die globale Revolution aller Lebensbedingungen zuzumuten und zugleich den Protest gegen die Entfremdung abzuwehren. Kritik an der wachsenden Ungleichheit ist für sie eine populistische Gefahr.
Bernd Stegemann analysiert die Dramaturgie des politischen Sprechens und geht der Frage nach, ob der Populismus allein als Gefahr für die Demokratie anzusehen ist oder ob er nicht vielmehr ein Symptom dafür ist, was in ihr falsch läuft. Die eingespielten Regeln des politischen Sprechens über Alternativlosigkeiten haben eine große Abwehr provoziert. Könnte die populistische Rede nicht ein Versuch der Mitsprache derjenigen sein, die sonst über keine Stimme verfügen – denn die zentrale Frage der Demokratie lautet immer noch: Dürfen die Ausgeschlossenen sprechen?
Das Gespenst des Populismus geht um in Europa und der Welt. An populären Erklärungen für den Populismus mangelt es nicht und es scheint, als wären sie extra für unsere Gegenwart geschrieben worden: Es braucht eine Finanzkrise, eine Flüchtlingswelle, ein Misstrauen in die Eliten, eine wachsende Ungleichheit und schließlich Parteien und Politiker, die daraus eine Bewegung formen. Die Regierungen sehen sich in der Zwickmühle, ihren Einwohnern die globale Revolution aller Lebensbedingungen zuzumuten und zugleich den Protest gegen die Entfremdung abzuwehren. Kritik an der wachsenden Ungleichheit ist für sie eine populistische Gefahr.
Bernd Stegemann analysiert die Dramaturgie des politischen Sprechens und geht der Frage nach, ob der Populismus allein als Gefahr für die Demokratie anzusehen ist oder ob er nicht vielmehr ein Symptom dafür ist, was in ihr falsch läuft. Die eingespielten Regeln des politischen Sprechens über Alternativlosigkeiten haben eine große Abwehr provoziert. Könnte die populistische Rede nicht ein Versuch der Mitsprache derjenigen sein, die sonst über keine Stimme verfügen – denn die zentrale Frage der Demokratie lautet immer noch: Dürfen die Ausgeschlossenen sprechen?
173 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 10, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 27, 2018
Man, this is an important one. The book picked up so many of my recent lose ideas and threads and combined it into a coherent story. I love it when this happens (and sent frantic messages to German speaking friends to read the book).
In a nutshell, the book 'Das Gespenst des Populismus' ('The spectre of populism') (2017) argues that populism (in the west) is winning as a result of a deep crisis of the project of liberalism. The crisis of liberalism - and arguably loss of hegemony since at least 2016 - is due to liberalism's 'collaboration' with the new liberalism, the neoliberalism, where 'freedom' has become the freedom of capital and openness the removal of protection for the vulnerable (retreat of welfare, de-regulation of labour etc).
As a result, there is a massive uprising against this kind of liberalism that propagates freedom and openness which for many only means being exposed to the full brutality of capitalism and the tyranny of the market.
The liberal elites' 'unwillingness' to confront the 'actual' social contradictioms (while mobilizing big time for gender neutral toilets) prevents them from understanding the structural causes of the rise of the right. In this liberal framework, any kind of questioning of neoliberal 'openess' or 'freedom' is branded populism at best, often in combination with racism and nationalism (think the left's critique of the neoliberal EU - backward nationalism! Criticism of the fake open borders while eroding the living conditions for the bottom of society - appealing to the racist working class!).
As long as the liberal elites represent the interests of capital, the right will advance. The power of right-wing populism consists of its correct claim that liberal values and social inequality are two sides of the same coin (but with totally wrong solutions).
Being unable to understand that the populism is an uprising against the liberal elites' totalitarian neoliberalism, the elites' attempts at winning back the disappointed through strict policing of what can be said combined with moral superiority over the racist, unenlightened 'losers of globalization' (look at the liberals' contempt for Trump supporters while applauding Clinton and Obama for representing the interest of wallstreet) remain futile.
The so-called refufee crisis highlighted the paradox of liberalism in a way that unintentionally triggered a 'revolution' against the liberal hegemony. While liberal moral superiority dictates openness and freedom (but in its neoliberal sense) the physical arrival of nearly a million refugees in Europe in 2015 (as a result of global inequality) exposed the lies and real class interests of liberal elites. For once, the liberals were now demanding solidarity with the global poor from the national poor with whom they showed no solidarity when their neoliberal project destroyed the lives of the bottom 40 per cent. While the national poor are objects of ridicule and disgust, the global poor who made it alive through the 'open doors' were welcomed and objects of liberal elites' concern and care.
Given that the vast majority of refugees will compete for the same low wage jobs and low rent housing, the actual social 'costs' and fear of integrating hundreds of thousands of people into the bottom 40 per cent is borne by the people at the bottom whose existence is precarious in the absence of protection from exploitation in the labour and housing market. Maybe calls for a refugee tax on the top 10 percent to finance social housing for all poor plus legislation for better protection in the labour market could have taken some of the anxiety and demonstrated that the liberal elites who demand openness are willing to ask the social question that comes with it.
The biggest lie, however, was Merkel's moment of humanitarian farce, after actively building 'fortress Europe' and a foreign and trade policy that causes migration in the first place, she presented herself, in line with the liberals' hypocritical soft spot for all victims brown and gay, as the saviour of the global refugees and 'opened' the border which long ago moved to Libya and Turkey.
For years, the problem of refugees was left to mainly Italy and Greece through the Dublin agreement. Despite repeated requests, Germany showed no solidarity with these Governments in dealing with the refugees. Then, when the so-called Balkan route was opened, Germany called on European solidarity and blamed other countries for not exhibiting European values; again the German arrogance of being the best European in class.
At home, any criticism of Merkel's temporary opening of the border while drafting the agreement with the Turkish military to keep refugees away, was declared taboo by the liberal establishment. Any questions on this paradox policy of demanding openness (while fortressing Europe) from people who have been left out hanging to dry without asking the bigger social question were immediately branded 'dangerous' and as populist attempts to appeal to the resentment of the stupid working class (only the educated liberal elites are rational and noble to welcome refugees, the rest is driven by lower instincts or populist calculation).
Thus it was up to the right to rise up against liberalism while the elites lecture and ridicule the ugly white working class not yet seeing that capitalism can do very well without democracy.
A central thesis of the book (whose argument my summary doesn't do justice) is that the refugee crisis which exposed the great liberal lie created a rupture in the liberal hegemony which the left must exploit to build a truly free (freedom for people not the market) society.
In a nutshell, the book 'Das Gespenst des Populismus' ('The spectre of populism') (2017) argues that populism (in the west) is winning as a result of a deep crisis of the project of liberalism. The crisis of liberalism - and arguably loss of hegemony since at least 2016 - is due to liberalism's 'collaboration' with the new liberalism, the neoliberalism, where 'freedom' has become the freedom of capital and openness the removal of protection for the vulnerable (retreat of welfare, de-regulation of labour etc).
As a result, there is a massive uprising against this kind of liberalism that propagates freedom and openness which for many only means being exposed to the full brutality of capitalism and the tyranny of the market.
The liberal elites' 'unwillingness' to confront the 'actual' social contradictioms (while mobilizing big time for gender neutral toilets) prevents them from understanding the structural causes of the rise of the right. In this liberal framework, any kind of questioning of neoliberal 'openess' or 'freedom' is branded populism at best, often in combination with racism and nationalism (think the left's critique of the neoliberal EU - backward nationalism! Criticism of the fake open borders while eroding the living conditions for the bottom of society - appealing to the racist working class!).
As long as the liberal elites represent the interests of capital, the right will advance. The power of right-wing populism consists of its correct claim that liberal values and social inequality are two sides of the same coin (but with totally wrong solutions).
Being unable to understand that the populism is an uprising against the liberal elites' totalitarian neoliberalism, the elites' attempts at winning back the disappointed through strict policing of what can be said combined with moral superiority over the racist, unenlightened 'losers of globalization' (look at the liberals' contempt for Trump supporters while applauding Clinton and Obama for representing the interest of wallstreet) remain futile.
The so-called refufee crisis highlighted the paradox of liberalism in a way that unintentionally triggered a 'revolution' against the liberal hegemony. While liberal moral superiority dictates openness and freedom (but in its neoliberal sense) the physical arrival of nearly a million refugees in Europe in 2015 (as a result of global inequality) exposed the lies and real class interests of liberal elites. For once, the liberals were now demanding solidarity with the global poor from the national poor with whom they showed no solidarity when their neoliberal project destroyed the lives of the bottom 40 per cent. While the national poor are objects of ridicule and disgust, the global poor who made it alive through the 'open doors' were welcomed and objects of liberal elites' concern and care.
Given that the vast majority of refugees will compete for the same low wage jobs and low rent housing, the actual social 'costs' and fear of integrating hundreds of thousands of people into the bottom 40 per cent is borne by the people at the bottom whose existence is precarious in the absence of protection from exploitation in the labour and housing market. Maybe calls for a refugee tax on the top 10 percent to finance social housing for all poor plus legislation for better protection in the labour market could have taken some of the anxiety and demonstrated that the liberal elites who demand openness are willing to ask the social question that comes with it.
The biggest lie, however, was Merkel's moment of humanitarian farce, after actively building 'fortress Europe' and a foreign and trade policy that causes migration in the first place, she presented herself, in line with the liberals' hypocritical soft spot for all victims brown and gay, as the saviour of the global refugees and 'opened' the border which long ago moved to Libya and Turkey.
For years, the problem of refugees was left to mainly Italy and Greece through the Dublin agreement. Despite repeated requests, Germany showed no solidarity with these Governments in dealing with the refugees. Then, when the so-called Balkan route was opened, Germany called on European solidarity and blamed other countries for not exhibiting European values; again the German arrogance of being the best European in class.
At home, any criticism of Merkel's temporary opening of the border while drafting the agreement with the Turkish military to keep refugees away, was declared taboo by the liberal establishment. Any questions on this paradox policy of demanding openness (while fortressing Europe) from people who have been left out hanging to dry without asking the bigger social question were immediately branded 'dangerous' and as populist attempts to appeal to the resentment of the stupid working class (only the educated liberal elites are rational and noble to welcome refugees, the rest is driven by lower instincts or populist calculation).
Thus it was up to the right to rise up against liberalism while the elites lecture and ridicule the ugly white working class not yet seeing that capitalism can do very well without democracy.
A central thesis of the book (whose argument my summary doesn't do justice) is that the refugee crisis which exposed the great liberal lie created a rupture in the liberal hegemony which the left must exploit to build a truly free (freedom for people not the market) society.
August 5, 2025
Interessante Ansätze und Gedanken, allerdings anstrengend zu lesen und trocken.
Mir haben klare (!!) Definitionen (wer sind für den Autor „die Eliten“/„die Liberalen“, etc) und Satzstrukturen gefehlt, ich hätte mir weitaus mehr konkrete Bezüge oder Beispiele gewünscht, um beim Lesen ein Bild im Kopf zu haben. So blieb alles sehr abstrakt und es gab einige Wiederholungen.
Trotzdem lohnt es sich meiner Meinung nach auf jeden Fall, sich mit dem Inhalt auseinanderzusetzen, das Buch hat mich auf jeden Fall zum Nachdenken angeregt.
2,6/5
Mir haben klare (!!) Definitionen (wer sind für den Autor „die Eliten“/„die Liberalen“, etc) und Satzstrukturen gefehlt, ich hätte mir weitaus mehr konkrete Bezüge oder Beispiele gewünscht, um beim Lesen ein Bild im Kopf zu haben. So blieb alles sehr abstrakt und es gab einige Wiederholungen.
Trotzdem lohnt es sich meiner Meinung nach auf jeden Fall, sich mit dem Inhalt auseinanderzusetzen, das Buch hat mich auf jeden Fall zum Nachdenken angeregt.
2,6/5
June 11, 2017
few books i fail to finish, particularly with only 200 pages. this is one of them. pointless vacuous intellectual humdrum to the effect that after 100 pages i still had not had one new thought, let alone know what the author was actually driving at. extremely disappointing.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews