Thomas Klikauer and Nadine Campbell for BuzzFlash: Will Authoritarian Populism Survive After Trump?
August 10th 2020
Trump, Mount Rushmore, USA (Foto-Rabe)
By Thomas Klikauer and Nadine Campbell
At some point, even Donald Trump will be gone. Either in November 2020, the 20th of January 2021 or a few years later. One day, Trump will be history. But populism, authoritarianism, right-wing politics and with it authoritarian populism will be still with us. Given our past and recent experience with the structural shortcomings of liberal-democracy, one is indeed tempted to conclude that liberal-democratic societies, almost by default, tend towards authoritarian populism. There certainly has been a surge of right-wing extremism and authoritarian populism in the Philippines, Brazil, Hungary, UK, India, USA, etc. Historically, the idea of authoritarian populism dates back to cultural theorist Stuart Hall’s study on one of Europe’s star of authoritarian populism, Margret Thatcher.
Perhaps even more important is Walter Benjamin’s Theories of Fascism (1930). Only three years before Hitler was put in power by a coalition of German conservatives and Nazis, Walter Benjamin – one of Germany’s finest – forecasted, "Millions of human bodies will indeed inevitably be chopped to pieces and chewed up by iron and gas". This is precisely what came next. Hitler, like so many other authoritarian populists, as the omnipotent father figure mirroring the authoritarian structure of (not only) German families.
Authoritarian parents ossify authoritarian values through decades of authoritarian education. The authoritarian populists feast on this. Like the authoritarian father, Hitler – and many other authoritarian populists – do not need to justify their decision-making power made from the top. Their power to make decisions come from their position at the top of the pile. We see the same in the CEOs of business corporations. Like former business CEO and TV-show host Donald Trump, most authoritarian populists do not represent a break from capitalism but a continuation of capitalism. Conceivably even a logical consequence of authoritarian capitalism.
Overall, one might argue that authoritarian populism operates with four key features: domination, submission, destructiveness and a kind of automation conformity. Authoritarian populism isn’t much more than an emotional attitude of the suppressed “little man” created through an authoritarian propaganda machine that exploits some people’s emotional susceptibility to authoritarianism. Authoritarian populism thrives on the so-called little man. He embodies pettiness, anxiety, vindictiveness, selfishness, self-hatred, and conformity. Most importantly, the little man follows the great man – be it Mussolini, Modi or Trump. He depicts devotion to the demagogue and accepts his anti-democratic attitudes.
This, of course, is paired with defeatism, resignation, and staunch anti-intellectualism signified in Trump’s “I love the poorly educated”. Without them, authoritarian populism would not be possible. It is no surprise that many surveys find that in the left-right continuum, one finds an educational continuum mirroring this. It ranges from virtually no education at all beyond K-12 to university professors. As a consequence, authoritarian populism does rather well among Trump’s favourites, the poorly educated. And it also does well in geographically backward areas where education is sparse. Authoritarian populism thrives in Kansas rather than in Boston. This is not to say that there are no authoritarian populists in Boston. There are. Still, Trump did better in Kansas than in Boston, and in November 2020, this will be the same. Kansas outshines Boston when it comes to voting for Trump.
Like many other authoritarian populists before and after him, Donald Trump also shows two core features. The first feature is destructiveness. This is often paired with sadism. The second feature is necrophilia. This is someone who loves death. On the first feature, Trump’s bullying sadism has been on display for decades. His necrophilous character might be part of the 160,000 COVID-19 deaths – twice the number (80,000) he needed to become president.
Many of those – who voted for Donald Trump as well as those who died – might have been from the blue and white-collar working-class who fell for the temptations or perhaps the “skilled propaganda” of authoritarian populism. Unlike European authoritarian populists, the US populist has no pre-liberal-democratic tradition to fall back on. Despite this, it can promise to bring security and privileges to the little man shaken by four decades of neoliberal pathologies that started with the election of Ronald Reagan in 1981. Diverting attention away from the devastating impact of neoliberal capitalism, the authoritarian populist comes at the right time to promise the nostalgia of former greatness and to make American great again.
The 3 and 8 of Authoritarian Populism
All of this is part of the explicit rhetoric of an authoritarian populist that presents a strongman. The ultimate leader is framed as the legitimate commander in chief – the “only” one who can fix things, in Trump’s language. Overall, authoritarian populism depends on three things. These pre-conditions have to fall into place to make it happen.
It needs the social-psychological disposition of its supporters: the strong father figure enforcing authoritarianism;
It needs political propaganda: Fox News and Fox and Friends, etc.; and
It needs poor socio-economic conditions: the devastating impact of neoliberalism.
Once these three conditions are in place, authoritarian populism is ready to develop its eight characteristics. Authoritarian populism starts with rigid conventionality. Those susceptible to authoritarian populism show an unreflective attachment to strict norms. They also show submissiveness to an authoritarian leader favouring the in-group over the out-group. They also show aggressiveness wanting to punish those who violate “their” rules – lock her up!
They are infatuated with power and toughness accepting the dominant-submissive, strong-weak, and leader-follower dichotomies. Their destructiveness is paired with cynicism based on the vilification of human beings. They also depict stereotypical, xenophobic, racist, and prejudicial thinking. And they tend to carry paranoid attitudes viewing the world as a dangerous place, and they believe to be surrounded by dark forces that are after them. Needless to say, there is also a fixation on sexuality ranging from Pizzagate to rape to paedophilia to viewing the other as sexual predators and Mexican rapists.
Much of this is manifested in a rejection of modernity – a key feature of authoritarian populism. Supporters of authoritarian populists fear that the forces of modernity will destroy their remaining social privileges and extinguish the last remnants of a feeling for self-worth. It is a mixture of passivism and resentment. Many supporters of authoritarian populism live in a small world that is ever more enclosing on him. He has nothing to learn and no experience to gain. There is little sense of adventure. He sees next to no possibilities for him. Criticism, equality, women, sexual freedom, human rights, environmentalism, scientific discovery, and human progress fill his heart with apprehension. He lives on odi ergo sum – I hate, therefore I am!
He also tends to lives in a conspiratorial world of half-truths, fake news, fabricated l’idée fixe, racism stereotypes and prejudice. There is almost nothing the supporter of authoritarian populism rejects more than open and deliberative debate and discussion, cosmopolitan sentiments, democracy, and liberal pluralism. Building on this, apparatchiks conjures up the old “divide and rule” theme through on four strategies:
It underscores the positives about the in-group;
It highlights the negatives of the out-group;
It lessens the negatives of the in-group; and finally,
It decreases the positives of the out-group.
In the end, authoritarian populism largely depends on the three conditions mentioned above. It needs a society in which authoritarianism is still present, in which the nuclear family is still seen as the core of society. Inside which, the authoritarian father figure represents the authoritarian state. Its rule is not democratically legitimised but has to be accepted. The authoritarian populist merely continues what the authoritarian father has implanted during the formative years of the young adult. Secondly, authoritarian populism depends on right-wing propaganda. Without that, the authoritarian populist leader cannot present himself as the strongman, the Über-father and the superhuman. As a consequence, in those countries with a strong right-wing press, we see strong authoritarian populism succeeding.
Finally, authoritarian populism depends on the social and economic conditions that allow it to thrive. In those countries that have applied Hayek’s neoliberalism to the latter, this is most advanced. Once job insecurity, a precariat, wage stagnation, gig-jobs, the elimination of the welfare state, the privatisation of health (e.g. Coronavirus), and extermination of trade unions, etc. had advanced to a sufficient degree, neoliberalism, furnished by the above mentioned right-wing propaganda apparatus, is ready to shift the blame away from neoliberal capitalism and towards scapegoats. All the authoritarian populist needs to do now is step up to the plate.
Thomas Klikauer was born in the German city of Darmstadt located between Castle Frankenstein and the birthplace of Johannes Gutenberg in the Southern German state of Hessia. After completing an apprenticeship in a local car factory, he finalized a BA at the University of Darmstadt and continued at Bremen University graduating with a MA. He also holds an MA from Boston University and a PhD from Warwick Business School (UK). Thomas Klikauer has been teaching undergraduate and postgraduate students at Western Sydney University, Australia for twenty-five years. He also supervises master of research students and PhD candidates.
Among his 500+ publications are ten books on management, business ethics, a textbook on HRM called “Managing People in Organizations”, and a recent book (2020) on a right-wing extremist party in Germany called AfD. Thomas Klikauer writes for Counterpunch, Tikkun, and Buzzflash. He lives in the beach suburb of Coogee in Sydney, Australia.
Nadine Campbell was born in Jamaica and raised in Toronto, Canada. She moved to California (US) and completed her BA at UC Berkley and worked in space defence. After completing her MS, she worked as a business consultant with IBM. She also holds an MA from CSU, Dominguez Hills and a PhD from the University of Sydney (AU). Nadine Campbell teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students at Western Sydney University, Australia for past twenty-one years.
Nadine Campbell writes for Counterpunch and Buzzflash and has a passion for academic literacy and has written several books on the topic. She is also the founder and CEO of Abydos Academy providing online courses in academic and professional writing.