The Populism as a tool for analyzing the crisis of liberal democracies

Presentation of a research project as part of the "Jeudis de la Maison Suger", a residents' research seminar.

Felipe Calabrez Da Silva is a postdoctoral researcher at CEVIPOF-Sciences Po and INCT Representação e Legitimidade Democrática (ReDem). He holds a degree in Social Sciences from the Universidade Estadual de Londrina. He holds a Masters in Political Science from the Universidade Federal do Paraná, and a PhD in Public Administration and Government from the Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV-SP).

Presentation of the project

"The term populism is frequently used in public and media debates to designate - often pejoratively - heterogeneous political phenomena and figures. Over the last few decades, political science has devoted a substantial body of research to this subject, with the aim of refining its conceptual scope, but without reaching a consensus on its definition. The aim of this research was to identify the different uses of the concept of populism in political science, and to analyze how it is mobilized in studies of extreme right-wing phenomena. One specific aim was to compare the use of the concept in analyses of European countries and the Bolsonaro government in Brazil. A number of questions guided the approach: what is the analytical validity of a concept applied to such heterogeneous phenomena? Does recourse to the concept of populism provide a heuristic gain in the analysis of far-right dynamics? The specific research questions revolve around a central question: can the concept of populism shed light on the issues and challenges facing contemporary democracies?."

Speaker

• Felipe Calabrez Da Silva is a postdoctoral researcher at CEVIPOF-Sciences Po and INCT Representação e Legitimidade Democrática (ReDem).