1. INTRODUCTION

2016 was a year of political upheaval with two major political earthquakes shaking up long-ossified political norms of both right and left. It began with Brexit (the referendum in Britain to leave the European Union) and was followed by the election of President Donald Trump in the US. Across Europe, there has been a subsequent surge of support for populist politicians (including in France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Holland, Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland). In the southern hemosphere, Brazil has joined the new populist movement.

The old centre-right and centre-left parties of the political establishment were exposed as zombie parties, catering to an economic and cultural elite that is out of touch with the material interests and major social concerns of their national working classes. The radical left, of authentic Marxist providence, was also left floundering, its political shortcomings rendered in stark relief as its abandonment of the working class and illiberal pursuit of a noisy but inconsequential ‘identity politics’ intensified.

It has largely been the populist right (also known as the ‘Dissident Right’, or the ‘Alt-Right’) that has surfed the populist wave of discontent. A populist left (with the partial exception of Italy, where it governs with the populist right) has been noticeably absent, with the traditional left staying in the field, in denial about the populist feelings of their traditional class base and applying od, stale political formulae to the populist right movement (that it is ‘fascist’, ‘racist’, etc), almost uniformly rejecting the new populist dynamic and its class roots and vibrant political promise.