Affect, Populism, Politics: Paradoxical Promises of Agency

This chapter discusses the narrowing of political feelings as merely populist by engaging with the connection between populism, politics, and affect in a broader sense. It argues that a take on populism as merely emotional falls short since it implies a narrow notion of the political. The chapter suggests acknowledging affect and emotions as an integral mode of politics. It explains how such an approach can open up an insightful analytical perspective to better understand populism and, thus, allow a more complex notion of populism to emerge. The chapter explores how populism and emotion share an entangled history of delegitimization. It proposes the notion of a ‘political grammar of feelings’ that moves beyond the opposition of good versus bad affect. This notion provides the backdrop for developing the understanding of populism as paradoxical promises of political agency, with regard to both right-wing and left-wing populisms.