Southern European Populism: Not the Same Home

• In Event: ‘Populism in Europe’ or ‘Populism and Europe’? Causes and Consequences

Abstract

Populism has gained new momentum in Western Europe during the financial crisis. Germany’s role as top creditor fuelled anger, anxiety, and accusation towards traditional political forces and elites in Greece. Podemos exploited the same crisis in Spain to ‘generate discursively a popular identity that [could] be politicized along electoral lines’ (Iglesias 2015). Similar contested debates emerged in Italy, with a harsh campaign against the Eurozone during the 2014 European Parliament elections. All these cases bring together Euroscepticism, populism and in some cases implicit references to nationalism. Drawing upon Derrida’s notions of aporia and hospitality, this article argues that these forms of Southern European populism projects a home of the people that is at the same time inclusive and exclusive towards an antagonistic Other. This Other, both threatening and welcomed at the home of the people, oscillates ambiguously between images of the EU and corrupted political elites. To support this argument, our narrative proceeds with comparative deconstructive discourse analysis, looking at speeches of their political leaders in the run-up of elections that have seen them successful, in Greece, Spain, and Italy.

Author

• Simona Guerra, University of Leicester