A Political Sociology of Populism and Leadership

In the face of change in the social bases of advanced European democracies, politics has delayed the articulation of new cleavages characterising a society that can no longer be attributed to the perimeter of belonging and the social classes of the 20th century. The crisis is therefore not an expression of criticism against democracy as a political regime per sé, but rather corresponds to a crisis in the legitimacy of traditional political players. The democratic deficit feeding populism is not weakened by the claimed desire to broaden the participatory dimension of politics, insomuch as it derives from the loss of collective references in a society divided in new winners and new losers of globalization and in the midst of a crisis of the concept of equality. These aspects shall be analysed further as part of the interpretation of populism as a phenomenon comprising an appeal to the people and an opposition to the élite. The purpose of this paper is to address the issue of the politicization of anti-establishment sentiment, where populism is considered not so much as an ideology but as a political strategy of politicization of the rift between society and politics, where political leaders and parties are the key players in shaping the disaffection of the people toward the traditional mass politics

THE NEW LEFT IN THE EUROPEAN DEMOCRACIES. The case of the German Radical Left.

The new form of the social and political conflict cannot be explained by the traditional categories of right and left, but it articulates to them on two plans, that of the establishment, intended like plan of the struc-tured political conflict from the traditional actors, and that of the anti-establishment, in which new repre-sentations of politics emerge. The New Left is characterized by type of intermittent participation and new perspectives on mobilization inside the parties and the social movements. This type of parties differs moreover from the traditional ones left of the socialist and social democratic left in not arranging of organi-zations collaterals placed under the direction of the leadership of the same party. The mobilization that spontaneously assumes not conventional forms of active participation of the citizens, or is primed by the action of an associative network of which the same parties take part, than however does not monopolize the collective action. In this regard, the attention will be dedicated to the study of Die Linke: an anti-establishment party of the non-socialist German left-wing, heir to the communist tradition. The choice was affected to the German model because: 1) Germany is a country with a strong social democratic tradition, but 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall the German political system identifies a new antagonist political party; 2) Die Linke represents an interesting case in the political landscape of the European radical left be-cause is a one-party that gives up at the federation of parties to try to unify the political parties of German radical left-wing

Turning to the Right? The Impact of the "Long Crisis Decade" (2008-2019) on Right-wing Populist Vote and Attitudes in Europe

This paper questions the thesis that transformations in European politics after the financial, eurozone, and migrant crises have been led by populist radical right (PRR) and left (PRL) parties and attitudes in Northwestern (NWE) and Southern (SE) Europe, respectively. Contrary to most of the literature, we claim that, although the populist radical left has grown in SE, the more significant outcome of the crises has been to push PRR parties to a similar (high) consensus in SE and NWE. We also argue that the crises facilitated the growth of PRR forces in SE more than NWE. To test this perspective, we analysed elections and citizens' orientations towards the key issues of populism - immigration, European integration, "authoritarianism versus liberal democracy" and "state versus market" - in five NWE and four SE countries. Findings show that during the "long crisis decade" (2008-2019) there has been an alignment on right-wing populism between European regions

The New Left in the European Democracies: The Case of the German Radical Left

The new form of the social and political conflict cannot be explained by the traditional categories of right and left, but it articulates to them on two plans, that of the establishment, intended like plan of the structured political conflict from the traditional actors, and that of the anti-establishment, in which new representations of politics emerge. The New Left is characterized by type of intermittent participation and new perspectives on mobilization inside the parties and the social movements. This type of parties differs moreover from the traditional ones left of the socialist and social democratic left in not arranging of organizations collaterals placed under the direction of the leadership of the same party. The mobilization that spontaneously assumes not conventional forms of active participation of the citizens, or is primed by the action of an associative network of which the same parties take part, than however does not monopo-lize the collective action. In this regard, the attention will be dedicated to the study of Die Linke: an anti-establishment party of the non-socialist German left-wing, heir to the communist tradition. The choice was affected to the German model because: 1) Germany is a country with a strong social democratic tradition, but 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall the German political system identifies a new antagonist political party; 2) Die Linke represents an interesting case in the political landscape of the European radical left because is a one-party that gives up at the federation of parties to try to unify the political parties of German radical left-wing

Platform party between digital activism and hyper-leadership: the reshaping of the public sphere

The so-called crisis of representation has formed the theoretical framework of many studies on media and democracy of the past thirty years. Many researches have highlighted the crisis of legitimacy and credibility of the ‘traditional’ parties (Katz & Mair, 2018) and communication was considered, at the same time, one of the causes of acceleration towards post-representative politics (Keane, 2013) but also an indispensable tool for re-connecting citizens to politics. Various phenomena have developed within this framework: a) the birth of political aggregations as a result of mobilization in the digital ecosystem; b) the development of digital platforms for democratic participation; c) the birth of parties defined as "digital" or "platform"; and d) the growing centrality of digital political activism, both as a phenomenon within the digital communicative ecosystem (also in the context of social media) and as a result of the transformation of social movements. This article studies the role of platform parties as a space for the emergence of authoritarian tendencies (hyper-leadership) but also as an organizational opportunity for the development of new forms of digital activism. In particular, the article presents a research on the use of digital platforms (and their political and organizational consequences) by political parties in Italy, France, and Spain. The study shows the relationships between the evolution of digital ecosystems and the way in which political organization is organised, also highlighting how the new forms of mobilization and aggregation have opened up different yet interconnected public spaces

On political parties in contemporary democracies. From the classic perspective to the current debate.

The crisis of political parties in contemporary societies and democracies is composed of different points of views, that require a joint effort for social and political science to try to understand the changing relation-ship between citizens and parties. Compared to the political mass models, which are typical of the second half of the twentieth century, parties undergo deep processes of transformation. The beginning of a critical season for the traditional forms of political organization goes back to those years; and this critical season can be configured as ideological, organizational and institutional. Between the twentieth and twenty-first century, the political parties has strengthened the structure of their political organization and the weight of their parliamentary activities within the institutions, becoming more and more «state-centered parties», characterized by the progressive reduction of the forms of territorial settlement and the growth of the im-portance of central organisms and the representatives of the assemblies, especially those elected in na-tional parliaments. This results in significant changes of the organizational model and their political func-tions. In the face of these changes, will the parties still remain a key player for the functioning of contem-porary democracy? We will focus on three fundamental steps: the analysis of the creation process of par-ties and of their function; the description of the most recent perspectives in political parties; the analysis of the relationship between the personalisation of politics and the passage to leader democracy

Max Weber: politica e società

Come può la sociologia del nostro tempo confrontarsi con la lezione di Max Weber nel leggere i processi di mutamento sociale e politico nella società contemporanea? Questa è la domanda che anima i contributi presenti nel volume. Ripartendo dalla celebre lezione di Weber sul Beruf della politica ai Liberi studenti di Monaco del 28 gennaio 1919, il volume si propone di riannodare i fili della lezione sociologica weberiana con i problemi della società contemporanea, a partire dalla comprensione (Verstehen) del senso dell’agire sociale che connota gli ulteriori sviluppi del processo di razionalizzazione nelle società e nelle democrazie occidentali. Il volume raccoglie una serie di contributi in cui si affrontano le prospettive di sviluppo della democrazia plebiscitaria, il ruolo della leadership nei processi di trasformazione delle democrazie contemporanee, la relazione fra burocrazia e politica, le dinamiche del potere e i suoi processi di legittimazione, la rilevanza del carisma nella politica contemporanea. Il superamento delle ideologie del Novecento e della democrazia dei partiti ha progressivamente riportato al centro dell’analisi socio-politica il ruolo della leadership come variabile interpretativa del mutamento all’interno della relazione fra rappresentanza e legittimità, così come nelle strutture di intermediazione fra società e istituzioni e nelle dinamiche di selezione e formazione del ceto politico professionale. Riflettere sulla prospettiva weberiana consente di leggere sociologicamente fenomeni di disintermediazione diversi, in particolare fra carisma, personalizzazione della leadership democratica e forme di personalizzazione populista. In quest’ottica, e senza indulgere in tributi rituali, Weber continua a essere fonte di ispirazione e pietra d’angolo della riflessione teorica ed empirica per questa e per le prossime generazioni di sociologi

On Political Parties in Contemporary Democracies: From the classic perspective to the current debate

The crisis of political parties in contemporary societies and democracies is composed of differ-ent points of views, that require a joint effort for social and political science to try to understand the changing relationship between citizens and parties. Compared to the political mass models, which are typ-ical of the second half of the twentieth century, parties undergo deep processes of transformation. The beginning of a critical season for the traditional forms of political organization goes back to those years; and this critical season can be configured as ideological, organizational and institutional. Between the twentieth and twenty-first century, the political parties has strengthened the structure of their political organization and the weight of their parliamentary activities within the institutions, becoming more and more «state-centered parties», characterized by the progressive reduction of the forms of territorial set-tlement and the growth of the importance of central organisms and the representatives of the assemblies, especially those elected in national parliaments. This results in significant changes of the organizational model and their political functions. In the face of these changes, will the parties still remain a key player for the functioning of contemporary democracy? We will focus on three fundamental steps: the analysis of the creation process of parties and of their function; the description of the most recent perspectives in political parties; the analysis of the relationship between the personalisation of politics and the passage to leader democracy

Leadership e democrazia: il contributo di Vittoria Cuturi alla sociologia politica

l saggio di Vittoria Cuturi ha una collocazione particolarmente rilevante per la storia della sociologia politica in Italia. In una sua versione prelimina-re il saggio fu infatti presentato al primo convegno nazionale della Sezione di Sociologia politica, dal titolo “Leadership e democrazia”, che si svolse a San Miniato fra il 5 e il 7 dicembre 1986. Proprio quel convegno segnò l’inizio della continuità scientifica e organizzativa della Sezione di Sociologia politi-ca dell’Associazione Italiana di Sociologia, coordinata da Luciano Cavalli che, insieme al nucleo originario della Sezione particolarmente attivo al “Cesa-re Alfieri” di Firenze, invitò la comunità scientifica nazionale a confrontarsi su un tema che avrebbe reso la sociologia politica riconoscibile e centrale nel panorama italiano e internazionale. Si trattò di un’occasione di dialogo che assunse una particolare rilevanza nello studio della politica in Italia, anche per il confronto che si realizzò fra i maggiori sociologi e sociologi politici del tempo, al contempo coinvolgendo studiosi di altre discipline senza per questo abdicare a un “primato della sociologia” nel leggere la politica

Le sfide alla democrazia rappresentativa e lo spettro del populismo. Una riflessione con Nadia Urbinati

Colloquio con Nadia Urbinati su democrazia, populismo, crisi della politica fra sociologia politica e filosofia politica