Populism In Asia

Across Asia, "populist" leaders emerged on an unprecedented scale around the start of the 21st century. Populism in Asia is the first book to examine this phenomenon. The 1997 Asian financial crisis undermined established political leaders and stirred popular discontent. Voters in East Asia responded by electing maverick politicians who promised to target corruption and establish fresh agendas. In Southeast Asia, populist leaders based their appeal on the frustrations and aspirations of groups excluded from political power. Leaders who came to office during this period include Thaksin Shinawatra in Thailand, Joseph 'Erap' Estrada in the Philippines, Roo Moo-hyun in South Korea, Chen Shui-bian in Taiwan and Jun'ichiro Koizumi in Japan. Local politicians in Indonesia likewise adopted a populist stance, as did Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad in Malaysia. In the present volume, leading Asian scholars consider the many faces of contemporary populism in the region, analyzing the phenomenon through case studies of political leaders with populist credentials and using these accounts to evaluate the achievements and failings of democracy. Benedict Anderson provides a reflective afterword. Despite its allure, populism has not been a success in Asia. Populist leaders are in retreat across the region and their fall can be spectacular, as in the Philippines and Thailand. However, the editors of this collection argue that populism will recur because Asia's oligarchic political systems do not fulfill the imagined role of the state as a provider of well-being, citizenship rights and equality.

This handbook presents state of the art research on populism from the perspective of Political Science.

Conceiving of populism as the charismatic mobilization of a mass movement in pursuit of political power, this Element theorizes that populists thrive where ties between voters and either bureaucratic or clientelistic parties do not exist or have decayed. This is because populists' ability to mobilize electoral support directly is made much more likely by voters not being deeply embedded in existing party networks. This model is used to explain the prevalence of populism across the major states in post-authoritarian Southeast Asia: the Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand. It extracts lessons from these Southeast Asian cases for the study of populism.

Democracy in Southeast Asia has been explained using a number of factors including historical legacies, social structures, developmental levels, transitional processes, and institutional designs while other elements, such as elite-level relations and social coalitions, have been overlooked. This book offers a new explanation for democracy’s collapse or persistence in Southeast Asia today. Focusing on Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia — the three countries in the region with the most democratic experience — William Case shows that existing accounts based on contextual factors are by themselves incomplete. Hence, they lead us wrongly to anticipate democracy’s persistence in Thailand and its collapse in Indonesia. They more accurately, though only partially, correlate with democracy’s fluctuations in the Philippines. Advancing a new argument, Case shows that democracy’s fate is determined instead by the opportunities that contextual factors can provide for populist mobilization. His model enables us better to understand democracy’s breakdown in Thailand, its survival in Indonesia, and its slippage in the Philippines. Presenting research into vital questions over democratic durability and authoritarian backlash, this book will be of interest to scholars in the field of comparative politics, specifically comparative democratization and Southeast Asian politics.

"Drawing on evidence from eight Asian cases across three subregions, this volume highlights the distinctive features of Asian populism in comparison with Western experiences. In contrast to the latter, populist practices in Asia tend to exhibit an ambiguous nature, often characterized by ad hoc and mixed ideological add-ons. The case studies shed light on the cultural dimension of populism, an aspect that has been largely overlooked in Western contexts. Empirical evidence shows that political culture and identity politics exert an influence on populist practices in Asia. In the meantime, populist attitudes towards the role of politicians, the popular will and the relationship between the elite and the people can serve as an explanatory variable for political outcomes. The relationship between populism and democracy in Asia is observed to be more intricate than that in Western contexts. Populism is not necessarily endogenous to democracy, and thus its emergence may not solely be a response to the crisis of democracy. The book presents a valuable resource for scholars and students of Asian politics and those looking at the phenomenon of populism through a comparative lens"--

This volume assembles renowned scholars to address, for the first time, the relationship between minorities and populism in South Asia and Europe from a critical perspective. Despite the very different and to some extent opposite historical and political trajectories, there is today a convergence on nationalist affirmation and on majoritarian politics between South Asia and Europe. In India, the Hindu majority rebels against wide-ranging minority rights anchored in the Constitution. In Europe, the refugee crisis and Islamic radicalization bring to the forefront the postcolonial legacy. Despite all rhetoric, there are obvious dangers of majoritarianism. Populist parties are divisive, partisan, disregard minority rights, engage in lynching, social division, stigmatization and exclusion, turning minorities into second-class citizens. There is a profound structural connection between minorities and the current rise of populism in India and Europe. But there remains a deep perplexity and also anxiety: Does the presence of minorities necessarily have to trigger majoritarian policies? Are there no solutions to this dilemma? Many observers considered multicultural policies and affirmative action programs in India as a possible model for Europe to adopt in order to achieve greater integration. But eventually they seem to have failed. Why so? Are multiculturalism and the recognition of differences still options today? On the other hand, most scholars in India typically reject the European model of liberal democracy and secularism as impracticable in India and locate the reason for the current malaise in the west. But is liberal democracy really so bad in dealing with pluralism? This volume, collecting a selection of the Reset DOC Venice-Padua-Delhi dialogue series, is going to answer two fundamental questions. First, what precisely is the nexus between minorities and populism in South Asia and Europe? Starting from those case studies, the authors will also draw some general theoretical inferences about the nature of populism. Secondly, given the dangers of populism for minorities, the volume will look for the most adequate and feasible solutions.

In Populism in Asian Democracies: Features, Structures and Impacts, members of the Asia Democracy Research Network (ADRN) discuss the diverse subtypes of populism in 11 countries across Asia, their structural elements and societal impacts.

Democracy in Southeast Asia has been explained using a number of factors including historical legacies, social structures, developmental levels, transitional processes, and institutional designs while other elements, such as elite-level relations and social coalitions, have been overlooked. This book offers a new explanation for democracy’s collapse or persistence in Southeast Asia today. Focusing on Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia — the three countries in the region with the most democratic experience — William Case shows that existing accounts based on contextual factors are by themselves incomplete. Hence, they lead us wrongly to anticipate democracy’s persistence in Thailand and its collapse in Indonesia. They more accurately, though only partially, correlate with democracy’s fluctuations in the Philippines. Advancing a new argument, Case shows that democracy’s fate is determined instead by the opportunities that contextual factors can provide for populist mobilization. His model enables us better to understand democracy’s breakdown in Thailand, its survival in Indonesia, and its slippage in the Philippines. Presenting research into vital questions over democratic durability and authoritarian backlash, this book will be of interest to scholars in the field of comparative politics, specifically comparative democratization and Southeast Asian politics.