A Study Of Contemporary American Populism

Populism is the production of political modernization,which runs through the political development of the United States.In the context of contemporary globalization,populism has brought profound influence to the United States and the entire Western world.In addition,it also has tested the self-correcting ability and the future-development direction of Western liberal democracy.In theory,as a thin-centered ideology,populism owns a controversial concept.Its concept represents different kinds of contents,such as the ideology,political mobilization,politics style,or even just a social mentality.This thesis ignores the controversy and focuses on the inner core of populism in terms of “appeal to people”,“general will”,“popular mobilization”,and dynamic leaders”.Through defining the relationship between populism and democracy,the author concludes the essence of populism which means to oppose the institutional attributes of liberal democracy rather than the democracy.At the same time,it shows the characteristics such as “breaking but not establishing” and “self-contradictory”,which restrict the political practice seriously.When it comes to the contemporary American populism,the left-wing and right-wing of it take place at the same time,illustrating the characteristics of polarization.Meanwhile,the right-wing populism rose when Trump was elected as the American president.It shows a stronger tendency of anti-establishment than that in American history in aspects of manipulating the race,culture,trade protection,and so on.There are many reasons for the outbreak of contemporary American populism.In terms of the demand side,it includes the economic stagnation,the expansion of the income gap,and the internalization of civilized conflicts.With regard to the supply side,it consists of the polarization politics,the normalization of the institutional deadlock,the extreme of political correctness and the intensification of public opinion by social media.All above reasons represent the failure of elite politic in the United States,which leads the contemporary American populism to the intensive anti-establishment,and has a profound impact on the United States or the world from the domestic and international levels From the domestic perspective,the outbreak of American populism,on the one hand,would trigger the self-correction switch of the American liberal democracy,including promoting perfection of the democratic system in the United States,and bringing the return of traditional American values.On the other hand,it brings the greater uncertainty to reorganize the political party and unite society.From the international perspective,the anti-establishment of Trump's right-wing populism points to the international institutions,and changes the direction of hegemonic construction which means that the shift from the hegemonic structural power to the hegemonic relational power.All the above will lead to the deficiency of supply from international public goods,and the challenges or opportunities to the world.Meanwhile,the recession of the open-economy will bring more and more negative effects on the process of economic globalization,including the rise of trade-protectionism,the aggravation of international capital competition and so on.