How not to be populist. Anti-hegemonic Individualism and the Crisis of Democracy and of the Rule of Law

Individualism (Christopher Lasch’s “narcissism”, Émile Durkheim’s “anomie”) – that is, the tendency of individuals to retreat within the confines of the self, by pursuing selfish (as opposed to shared) values and goals – has been identified as one of the causes of the crisis of democracy. In this article, I first argue for the need to specify and differentiate that category. It is one thing for those subjected to current forms of social governance to fail to adhere to shared values; it is another for the groups participating in them to carve out privileges for themselves. I will therefore focus on the first type, which I call “the individualism of the subordinated”, asking whether populism is the only possible political response to it. In this sense, I will examine the defense of populism in Laclau’s On Populist Reason, highlighting some of its external and internal problems. Finally, I will suggest a possible alternative, following the model proposed in Acemoglu and Robinson’s The Narrow Corridor.