The West’s mainstream news sources all bleat one refrain: populism is bad. According to the oracles that never saw Brexit and Trump coming, populism is angry, irrational, bigoted, and anti-democratic. Case closed.
Well, perhaps not – if you listen to some of the populists themselves. Steve Hilton, previously a key advisor to David Cameron, is one of them, and he has emerged in recent years as an increasingly consequential figure as a result of his weekly American television programme, The Next Revolution. His latest book, Positive Populism, presents a compelling argument for such a revolt, and gives American populists a solid agenda with which to launch their effort.
Hilton emigrated to the US in 2012 and his book is addressed to his new countrymen, advising Americans how to take their country back and reclaim power. While the book is sprinkled with specifically American references, to the Declaration of Independence and the Statue of Liberty, for example, its powerful analysis is rooted in something that transcends national identity. Hilton’s populism is about understanding people in all their facets, as workers and as consumers, but most importantly as parents, neighbours, and friends.
Populism is gaining strength across the Western world precisely because the elites who rule us no longer view us in those roles, or in that way. Hilton’s book decries Western elites for viewing people as things to be moved about for their benefit. That is what underlies their commitment to free markets, free trade, and free movement of peoples. Modern elites know what ancient patricians and medieval aristocrats knew: if the people can be denied political power, those who have domination of financial and intellectual power can rule without restraint for their own selfish benefit. That is why the elites prefer rule by international institutions which are not directly elected by the people, such as the EU or the UN. And that, according to Hilton, is why the Davos set must be dethroned.
Hilton’s populism is profoundly egalitarian. It rests on the idea that all of us deserve a shot at living decent lives in decent communities. That’s why he contends that economic security should trump aggregate economic growth as a political value and, if providing for the former reduces the latter, then so be it.
It’s also why he dedicates nearly a third of the book to reinvigorating local communities, not normally something attributed to populist demands. Hilton understands what many in the elites don’t, that populism is at heart a demand for self-determination and human dignity. That requires economic and political reforms so that real power rests with the many, not with the few.
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