José Filipe Pinto – Populist Leaders: The New Prince

Abstract

Centuries ago, Machiavelli wrote his most book, The Prince, and offered it to Lourenço de Medici, hoping that it would be useful to persuade him to accept the challenge of unifying Italy and becoming a new prince. In the second decade of the twentieth century, Gramsci, arrested in the fascist prison, refused the image of a man as new prince, and presented the party-prince as the inventor of a new political and social model. In Portugal, after the end of the dictatorship, Adriano Moreira conceived the Army Force Movement as the very new prince because some members of the military forces, after having overthrown the regime, intended to control the new political conjuncture. Nowadays, all over the world, populist leaders are presenting themselves as the new prince. The only who can embody the pure people and guide it in the fight against the corrupt elite. The chapter analyzes this scenario, identifying the several types of populism and the populist strategies, both while in opposition and after reaching power. Moreover, it points to some financing scandals involving populist parties or leaders and proves that the charisma of the very new prince is rather a problem than a solution for representative democracy.