We the People: On Populism and Democracy

Lecture III: Real Problems – and How to Respond to Them

Populism is not just some form of political pathology. It also points at real problems, both in how democracy is justified as an ideal and in how actually existing democracies conduct themselves. For instance: what legitimately constitutes the boundaries of the “people”? The last lecture will try to make some headway in addressing these problems. The series as a whole will finish with some thoughts on how best to respond to populists politically, culturally, and, sometimes, legally, and also ask whether it is possible to distinguish populists on the one hand from demagogues and democratic activists on the other.

Jan-Werner Mueller is Professor of Politics at Princeton University, where he is the Founding Director of the Project in the History of Political Thought. From 1996 until 2003 he was a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford; from 2003 until 2005 he was a Fellow at the European Studies Centre, St. Antony’s College. Mueller is also co-founder of the European College of Liberal Arts (ECLA), Berlin, for which he served as founding research director. His recent publications include Wo Europa endet: Ungarn, Brüssel und das Schicksal der liberalen Demokratie (2013) and Contesting Democracy: Political Ideas in Twentieth-Century Europe (2011).

Lecture Series
We the People: On Populism and Democracy

25.11.2013, 6:00pm
Lecture I: What Is Populism?

26.11.2013, 6:00pm
Lecture II: Intrusions of the People: Ideals of Popular Sovereignty in History

Further Reading/Listening:“Der Populismus sieht nur demokratisch aus”, Standard, Forschung Spezial, 26.11.2013
Rechtes Bündnis zur EU-Wahl, Ö1, Mittagsjournal, 26.11.2013

IWM Lectures in Human Sciences

The IWM launched this series of public lectures in 2000 on the occasion of the 100th birthday of Hans Georg Gadamer, supporter of the Institute since its inception. Selected lectures are published in English (Harvard University Press, Cambridge), German (Suhrkamp Verlag, Berlin) and Polish (Znak Publishers, Cracow, and Kurhaus Publishers, Warsaw) (see Publications).

Previous speakers included Peter Brown, Vincent Descombes, Claus Offe, Ryszard Kapuscinski, Abraham B. Yehoshua, Cornelia Klinger, Paul Ricoeur and Charles Taylor.

Agenda

Populism is not just some form of political pathology. It also points at real problems, both in how democracy is justified as an ideal and in how actually existing democracies conduct themselves. For instance: what legitimately constitutes the boundaries of the “people”? The last lecture will try to make some headway in addressing these problems. The series as a whole will finish with some thoughts on how best to respond to populists politically, culturally, and, sometimes, legally, and also ask whether it is possible to distinguish populists on the one hand from demagogues and democratic activists on the other.

Jan-Werner Mueller is Professor of Politics at Princeton University, where he is the Founding Director of the Project in the History of Political Thought. From 1996 until 2003 he was a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford; from 2003 until 2005 he was a Fellow at the European Studies Centre, St. Antony’s College. Mueller is also co-founder of the European College of Liberal Arts (ECLA), Berlin, for which he served as founding research director. His recent publications include Wo Europa endet: Ungarn, Brüssel und das Schicksal der liberalen Demokratie (2013) and Contesting Democracy: Political Ideas in Twentieth-Century Europe (2011).