Populism Talks

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Armenia’s 2026 parliamentary elections have been widely interpreted as a pivotal moment in the country’s post-Karabakh trajectory. Taking place amid the aftermath of military defeat, the forced displacement of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh, ongoing normalization efforts with Turkey and Azerbaijan, and growing tensions between Russia and the West, the elections raised fundamental questions about democratic resilience, populism, sovereignty, and geopolitical realignment in the South Caucasus.

In this wide-ranging interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Professor Cengiz Aktar—adjunct professor of political science at the University of Athens, guest lecturer at Yerevan State University, and one of the foremost analysts of Turkey-Armenia relations, memory politics, and regional geopolitics—offers a provocative assessment of Armenia’s democratic future and its increasingly complex international environment.

While acknowledging Armenia’s democratic achievements, Professor Aktar stresses the extraordinary constraints under which the country operates. As he observes, Armenia remains “the only democracy in the Caucasus, indeed in the region,” a small, landlocked state surrounded by authoritarian neighbors and exposed to intense geopolitical pressures. Yet he warns that many assumptions currently shaping discussions of Armenia’s future rest on unrealistic expectations regarding Europe’s role and capacity.

The most striking theme of the interview concerns Armenia’s growing rapprochement with the European Union. Contrary to prevailing narratives that portray Armenia’s recent political direction as a decisive shift toward Europe, Professor Aktar argues that Armenia’s economic, energy, and security dependence on Russia remains overwhelming and cannot be easily replaced. In his view, European policymakers are encouraging expectations that they cannot realistically fulfill. “None of this can be replaced by the European Union,” he argues. “Yet the EU is systematically giving false hopes to Armenia. In that sense, the greatest populist actor in this game is Europe. Because Europe is offering hopes that it simply cannot fulfill.”

Professor Aktar is equally skeptical of assumptions that Armenia faces a straightforward geopolitical choice between Russia and Europe. While recognizing the country’s genuine democratic aspirations and strong cultural connections with Europe, he contends that geography, energy dependence, trade networks, and security realities continue to bind Armenia closely to Moscow. For this reason, he warns that unrealistic promises of European integration may ultimately prove counterproductive, potentially undermining Armenia’s stability while provoking Russian backlash.

The interview also explores Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s evolving populism, the politics of peace and normalization with Turkey and Azerbaijan, democratic backsliding, Russia’s continuing influence, historical memory, and the unresolved legacy of the Armenian Genocide. Throughout, Professor Aktar returns to a central dilemma confronting Armenia today: how a fragile democracy can preserve its autonomy and democratic character while navigating an increasingly hostile regional environment shaped by authoritarian power politics and great-power competition.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Professor Cengiz Aktar, lightly edited for clarity, readability, and publication: https://www.populismstudies.org/prof-...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

At a time when democratic institutions are under mounting pressure from populist movements, partisan polarization, and growing distrust in public authority, understanding how democracies erode—and how they endure—has become one of the most urgent challenges in political science. Few scholars have contributed more to this debate than Professor Stephan Haggard, Research Professor and Lawrence and Sallye Krause Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of California San Diego. Over a distinguished career spanning comparative politics, political economy, authoritarianism, and democratic governance, Professor Haggard has produced some of the most influential scholarship on democratic transitions, institutional change, and regime durability.In this wide-ranging interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Professor Haggard reflects on the relationship between populism, democratic backsliding, judicial erosion, polarization, and the resilience of democratic institutions. Challenging simplistic understandings of democratic decline, he argues that contemporary autocratization increasingly unfolds not through military coups or abrupt regime collapses, but through gradual institutional weakening carried out by elected leaders operating within formally democratic systems.One of the interview’s central themes is the fragility of democratic institutions when public support begins to erode. As Professor Haggard observes, “courts operate as checks only to the extent that there is support for courts operating as checks,” emphasizing that “democratic institutions survive only when citizens support them.” For him, the durability of democracy ultimately depends not only on constitutional design, but also on the willingness of political actors and citizens alike to defend the norms and institutions that sustain democratic rule.Throughout the discussion, Professor Haggard distinguishes between populism as a political ideology and democratic backsliding as an institutional process. Drawing on Cas Mudde’s concept of populism as a “thin ideology,” he argues that populism becomes dangerous when commitments to majoritarian rule are accompanied by efforts to weaken rights, judicial independence, oversight of institutions, and other components of liberal democracy. “Populism is a kind of motivating ideology that can drive backsliding,” he explains, while democratic erosion manifests itself through concrete institutional consequences.The interview also explores the growing challenge posed by anti-institutional rhetoric, attacks on electoral integrity, transnational networks of illiberal cooperation, and the emergence of authoritarian regional organizations that seek to reshape global governance. Particularly striking is Professor Haggard’s candid assessment of the contemporary United States. Reflecting on the resilience of advanced democracies, he acknowledges that he is “beginning to have doubts”about earlier assumptions that consolidated democracies are largely immune from authoritarian drift. Indeed, he remarks that if asked whether the United States remains a democracy, he would “have to scratch [his] head over that question.”At once sobering and illuminating, this interview offers a powerful examination of the institutional foundations of democracy and the conditions under which they can be preserved—or lost.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Professor Stephan Haggard, lightly edited for clarity, readability, and publication: https://www.populismstudies.org/prof-...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

India's 2026 state elections delivered massive political shocks, from the BJP’s historic win in West Bengal to the rise of actor-turned-politician C. Joseph Vijay in Tamil Nadu. 

Host Selcuk Gultasli sits down with Yamini Aiyar (Brown University) to discuss why young India is growing completely exhausted with traditional politics. They dive into the "One Nation" project vs. plural federalism, and how a satirical social media movement like the "Cockroach Janta Party" highlights deep generational anxieties.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Yamini Aiyar, lightly edited for clarity, readability, and publication: https://www.populismstudies.org/yamin...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

At a moment when the liberal international order faces mounting pressures from geopolitical rivalry, democratic backsliding, technological disruption, and the resurgence of authoritarian power, questions about the future of American leadership have acquired renewed urgency. In this wide-ranging interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Rudy deLeon—former US Deputy Secretary of Defense and Senior Vice President for National Security and International Policy at the Center for American Progress (CAP)—offers a sobering assessment of the strategic challenges confronting the United States and its allies in an increasingly fragmented world.Drawing on decades of experience in defense policy, alliance management, and international security, de Leon, as one of Washington’s most experienced national security practitioners, argues that the world is entering a period of profound transition marked by uncertainty and the absence of strategic leadership. While emphasizing that the post-1945 order helped prevent great-power war, preserve peace in Europe, and facilitate the rise of global economic integration, he warns that many of the assumptions underpinning that order are now under strain. As he puts it, “all these things are in play,”from climate change and migration to artificial intelligence, shifting demographics, and renewed geopolitical competition. Yet, he contends, the situation has been aggravated by “a president and an administration that are not strategic, that are not diplomatic, and that are very insular.”Throughout the interview, deLeon repeatedly returns to the importance of long-term strategic thinking. Contrasting the institution-building vision of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and Dwight Eisenhower with contemporary policymaking, he argues that today’s American leadership often operates without a coherent strategic framework. “What America says on Monday is not what it says on Thursday,” he remarks, describing a pattern of unpredictability that has generated anxiety among allies and weakened confidence in US commitments.The discussion examines a wide range of contemporary issues, including NATO’s future, transatlantic relations, the rise of China, the implications of populism for international cooperation, and the evolving relationship between democracy and globalization. De Leon also explores how technological transformations, particularly artificial intelligence, may reshape labor markets, democratic governance, and international competition. In his view, policymakers remain overly distracted by ongoing military conflicts while neglecting the strategic questions that will define the coming decades. “The most pressing issue right now,” he argues, “is to figure out what the rules are for artificial intelligence and what that means for the nature of work.”Ultimately, this interview is not simply an assessment of American foreign policy under Donald Trump. It is a broader reflection on leadership, institutions, and the future of international order in an era when, as de Leon suggests, the questions confronting policymakers may be more consequential than the answers currently available.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Mr. Rudy deLeon, lightly edited for clarity, readability, and publication: https://www.populismstudies.org/rudy-...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

You can’t easily build a democracy using a state apparatus designed for an autocracy. Following the historic rise of Prime Minister Péter Magyar, Associate Professor Stefano Bottoni joins the podcast to unpack the massive task ahead for Hungary. Moving past the initial euphoria of Orbán's defeat, Bottoni explains why undoing decades of oligarchic wealth, entrenched patronage, and deep political polarization requires a completely new kind of civic patriotism.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Assoc. Prof. Stefano Bottoni, lightly edited for clarity, readability, and publication: https://www.populismstudies.org/assoc...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Giving an interview to the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Tom Davidson warns that the world may be approaching an unprecedented technological rupture in which advanced artificial intelligence fundamentally transforms not only economic production and geopolitical competition, but also the very foundations of democracy, sovereignty, and political agency. A Senior Research Fellow at Forethought and one of the leading analysts examining the long-term implications of AGI governance, Davidson argues that humanity may now be entering an era in which “AI systems create even more capable AI systems in a runaway feedback loop of accelerating progress.” Rather than treating AI merely as a question of productivity gains or consumer innovation, Davidson situates artificial intelligence within a much broader framework of systemic political transformation. In particular, he warns that the prospect of an “intelligence explosion” could compress decades of technological development into mere years, leaving democratic institutions structurally incapable of adapting to the speed of change. As he starkly observes, there is “perhaps around a 50 percent chance within the next five years” that humanity could witness such a transition, while “political institutions have no serious strategy” for understanding or governing it. For Davidson, the central danger is not simply technological disruption, but the possibility that accelerating AI systems may fundamentally outpace the institutional rhythms upon which liberal democracy depends. Throughout the interview, he repeatedly raises concerns about whether democratic governance — with its reliance on deliberation, elections, legal procedures, and bureaucratic processes — can continue functioning effectively under conditions of machine-speed innovation and geopolitical AI competition. In his account, societies may soon confront a world in which political crises, military confrontations, and technological breakthroughs unfold far faster than human institutions are capable of processing.Davidson also emphasizes that advanced AI could become the decisive strategic resource of the twenty-first century. In one of the interview’s most striking arguments, he warns that the United States may eventually exercise near-unilateral control over frontier AI systems, creating a world in which “the most powerful AI systems are overwhelmingly controlled by the United States.” In such a scenario, access to superintelligent systems could become as essential to national security as access to elite human talent is today, fundamentally reshaping alliances, sovereignty, and global power hierarchies.At the same time, Davidson warns that AI may also generate unprecedented concentrations of political and corporate power within states themselves. Because AI systems can potentially be programmed for “complete obedience,” he argues, governments or corporations could command enormous “legions” of AI workers, creating forms of technocratic centralization historically impossible under human bureaucratic systems. Yet despite these stark warnings, Davidson does not present technological acceleration as inevitably fatal to democracy. On the contrary, he argues that AI could also be used to strengthen democratic responsiveness, improve governance, and help societies coordinate more effectively under conditions of rapid change. The crucial question, in his view, is whether democratic societies can develop institutional mechanisms capable of governing AI before AI-driven transformations outpace human political adaptation altogether.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Tom Davidson, lightly edited for clarity and readability: https://www.populismstudies.org/tom-d...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

At a time when much of the scholarly and public debate on populism focuses on democratic backsliding, authoritarian drift, disinformation, and the dangers posed by the populist radical right, Dr. Laurenz Guenther offers a strikingly different interpretation of Europe’s political transformation. Rather than treating right-wing populism primarily as an external threat to liberal democracy, Dr. Guenther argues that its rise reflects deeper failures within liberal-democratic representation itself. In this sense, his perspective stands in contrast to many previous ECPS interviews, which have largely emphasized the illiberal, exclusionary, and anti-pluralist dangers associated with populist movements. A Research Fellow at the Toulouse School of Economics, Dr. Guenther has become an increasingly influential voice in debates surrounding migration politics, democratic responsiveness, cultural polarization, and the rise of the populist radical right in Europe. Through his research on “representation gaps” and issue voting, he argues that mainstream European parties have become “systematically more culturally liberal than large segments of their electorates,”particularly on immigration. According to Dr. Guenther, this disconnect has created fertile ground for populist challengers who successfully position themselves closer to voter preferences on culturally salient issues. Central to Dr. Guenther’s argument is the claim that European politics is undergoing a profound structural transformation. As he puts it in this interview, “politics in the average European country has shifted from something like a 60–40 balance in favor of economic issues to perhaps 40–60 in favor of cultural issues. We may even be moving toward something like 70–30.” In his view, “culture has, overall, become the more dominant dimension of political conflict.” This diagnosis sharply departs from conventional analyses that continue to treat class, redistribution, or neoliberal economics as the primary organizing principles of political competition. Throughout the interview, Dr. Guenther advances several arguments that challenge dominant liberal assumptions surrounding migration and populism. He contends that mainstream parties increasingly lose credibility when they dismiss or underrepresent concerns surrounding migration, demographic change, asylum policy, and cultural identity. “The main threat,” he argues, “comes from failing to represent people,” which can push voters toward increasingly radical alternatives. Unlike many scholars who interpret tougher migration policies primarily as democratic erosion, Dr. Guenther views the recent convergence of mainstream parties toward stricter border and asylum policies as, at least partly, a democratic response to voter preferences. At the same time, the interview also explores some of the most sensitive and controversial questions currently shaping European politics: the relationship between migration and demographic transformation, the growing salience of Islam and civilizational identity, the future of multiculturalism, and the normalization of culturally conservative politics across Europe. Yet despite his stark assessment of Europe’s political trajectory, Dr. Guenther ultimately rejects the idea that liberal democracy and more restrictive migration policies are necessarily incompatible. “If handled intelligently,” he argues, “Europe does not necessarily have to choose between these two paths.”

Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Laurenz Guenther, lightly edited for clarity and readability: https://www.populismstudies.org/dr-gu...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

How is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP transforming India from a democracy into a "civilizational populist electoral autocracy"?

In this episode, Selcuk Gultasli interviews Dr. Maggie Paul (Lecturer in Politics at La Trobe University) for the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS). Dr. Paul breaks down how the Hindutva project has moved beyond politics to become an "affective mass culture"—using WhatsApp ecosystems, cinema, and religious spectacle to reshape what "being Indian" feels like.

We dive into:

• Futurist Nostalgia: How the BJP uses the promise of a glorious future to normalize majoritarian rule.

• "Migrantizing" Citizens: How policies and discourse target Muslims and marginalized communities.

• The Tools of Coercion: Why bulldozer demolitions and punitive state measures are reframed as "national protection."

• Cracks in the System: Why high youth unemployment means Hindutva's control is never truly total.

  Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Maggie Paul, lightly edited for clarity and readability: https://www.populismstudies.org/dr-pa...
  

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

Professor Giuseppe Martinico, Full Professor of Comparative Public Law at the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa, is among the leading contemporary scholars examining the relationship between populism, constitutionalism, Euroscepticism, and democratic backsliding in Europe. Across a wide-ranging body of work—including Filtering Populist Claims to Fight Populism and the recent The Eurosceptic Mobilization of Constitutional Law, co-authored with Pablo Castillo-Ortiz—Professor Martinico has explored how illiberal and populist actors increasingly seek not to reject constitutional democracy outright, but to hollow it out from within by appropriating its language, institutions, and legal mechanisms. In this interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS), Professor Martinico offers a sophisticated constitutional analysis of the contemporary populist challenge confronting liberal democracy across Europe and beyond. Rather than understanding democratic erosion primarily through the classic image of coups or overt authoritarian ruptures, Professor Martinico argues that today’s populist radical-right movements increasingly operate through what he describes as a “sophisticated internal process of erosion operating under the guise of legality.” As he explains, “Populism acts as a parasite on the host organism of democracy. It does not displace the vocabulary of democracy and constitutionalism; it occupies it. It exploits internal ambiguities and rewrites their meanings and definitions.” Throughout the conversation, Professor Martinico examines how populist and sovereigntist actors weaponize constitutional law, sovereignty, referendums, judicial politics, and memory narratives in order to challenge the pluralist foundations of post-World War II constitutionalism. Drawing on examples from Hungary, Poland, Italy, Russia, Turkey, (Brexit) Britain, and the European Union itself, he demonstrates how contemporary illiberalism increasingly relies on formal legality, constitutional revisionism, and “lawfare” rather than open constitutional rupture.The interview also explores the rise of what Professor Martinico and Castillo-Ortiz call “Eurosceptic constitutional counter-narratives,” through which radical-right movements transform constitutional law into a strategic weapon against European integration. At the same time, Professor Martinico warns against simplistic or purely technocratic responses to populism. Liberal democracies, he argues, must become more participatory and responsive while still preserving the “untouchable core” of pluralism, judicial independence, minority rights, and constitutional limits on majority power. Importantly, the interview moves beyond diagnosis to address the future of constitutional democracy itself. Professor Martinico reflects on the erosion of Europe’s postwar constitutional memory, the delegitimization of intermediary institutions such as universities and courts, the growing tensions between constitutional openness and ethnonationalist identity politics, and the increasingly difficult role of supranational institutions such as the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the European Union in resisting democratic decay.Yet despite these profound challenges, Professor Martinico remains cautiously optimistic. Constitutional democracy, he argues, still possesses “considerable institutional and normative resources,” provided democratic societies are willing to reconnect participation with deliberation, strengthen civic institutions, and defend pluralism without abandoning democratic responsiveness.

Here is the revised version of our interview with Professor Giuseppe Martinico, lightly edited for clarity and readability: https://www.populismstudies.org/prof-...

Interview by Selcuk Gultasli

The 2026 local and devolved elections in the United Kingdom unfolded amid mounting concerns over democratic legitimacy, political representation, and the accelerating normalization of far-right discourse within mainstream public life.

Against a backdrop of Labour’s declining support in key constituencies, the electoral rise of Reform UK, intensifying anti-immigration rhetoric, and growing polarization around nationalism and belonging, Britain increasingly appears caught in what many scholars describe as a broader crisis of liberal democracy. It is within this context that the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS) speaks with Dr. Aaron Winter, Senior Lecturer in Sociology (Race and Anti-Racism) at Lancaster University and Research Associate at the University of the Witwatersrand, whose influential scholarship has long examined racism, populism, Islamophobia, reactionary politics, and the mainstreaming of the far right.

In this wide-ranging interview, Dr. Winter argues that contemporary British politics cannot be understood simply through the language of protest voting or electoral fragmentation. Rather, he contends that Britain is witnessing “the mainstreaming of the far right,” in which immigration, racism, and reactionary politics have increasingly become “the focal points of political discussion and ‘debate’” across both establishment and insurgent political actors. According to Dr. Winter, what is especially striking is not merely the electoral growth of Reform UK, but the extent to which “politics is now increasingly conducted from the center-right through the use of ideas that originate with the far right.” Drawing on his collaborative work with Aurelien Mondon, Dr. Winter examines how overt forms of racism historically associated with fascism and white supremacy have increasingly been replaced by “liberal, colorblind racism and Islamophobia” articulated through the language of free speech, women’s rights, national security, and the protection of liberal values. He warns that this process has steadily expanded the political legitimacy of exclusionary nationalism while simultaneously hollowing out democratic alternatives. “We have hollowed out the left while simultaneously accelerating the trajectory toward authoritarianism and fascism,” he argues. Particularly significant in this interview is Dr. Winter’s analysis of how the discourse of the “white working class” and the “left behind” has functioned as a vehicle for racialized nationalism after Brexit. He contends that contemporary British politics increasingly revolves around a much more explicit form of ethno-nationalism: “What we witnessed this weekend in London with the rallies,” he states, “is the emergence of a much more overt white supremacist and ethno-nationalist discourse operating irrespective of, and far beyond, class.” The interview also explores the intersections between Brexit, Islamophobia, austerity, anti-migrant politics, and democratic decline, situating Britain within broader international patterns visible in Trumpism, European radical-right populism, and authoritarian nationalism.

Throughout the conversation, Dr. Winter repeatedly emphasizes that the crisis facing Britain is not simply electoral, but structural: a crisis of capitalism, democracy, and political imagination itself. Yet he also insists that alternatives remain possible—provided democratic politics moves toward “radical reform, anti-racism, and opposition to inequality.”Here is the revised version of our interview with Dr. Aaron Winter, lightly edited for clarity and readability: https://www.populismstudies.org/dr-wi...