William Pawlak

William Pawlak
Honors Seminar Paper
19 March 2020
Populism and The Desire for Recognition: An Analysis of Populism through Philosophy and
Contemporary Events
“Can you not see [...] how your bourgeois cleverness, philosophical deism, easy
frivolousness, cosmopolitanism, tolerance, pleasantries, law of peoples, and whatever other
names you give to this stuff, would, once again, have made a miserable old man of the boy?”
– Johann Gottfried Herder, Another Philosophy of History, 14.

1
There are few words that are able to provoke as much disagreement and ambiguity as
“populism” does. Although the term has become ubiquitous in academic journals, foreign affairs
articles, and speeches, there has yet to be a consensus on a single, definitive, explanation of what
this process really is. More often than not, it appears as a type of malediction rather than a
serious area of academic inquiry. This is largely because few serious works have attempted to
uproot the philosophic origins of a process considered by many to be a strictly political
phenomena, not an inherent product of human nature. This paper is meant to provide an
operative definition of the term derived from its philosophical provenance through the lense of
Kant, Hegel, Nietszche, and other notable philosophers. Doing this will reveal the allure of
populism in the post-modern world, its relevance to many societal ills (racism, xenophobia, hate
crimes, social inequality, etc.), and ways of diffusing its inimical consequences. It will prove
who we consider the supporters of populist leaders are not as hysterical as our imagination would
have us believe but are people struggling to maintain their dignity under strenuous circumstances
within a society that seems to have forgotten them. It will be more beneficial to understand
populism as a time when citizens of a community no longer consider the circumstances that give
meaning to the human existence – political standpoints, income levels, or societal ethics –
propitious for furthering optimal recognition. If these conditions were ameliorated for the equal
opportunity for recognition, the energies channeled into supporting populist urges may be
diverted into more beneficial outcomes that offer a greater probability of actualizing the
aspirations that give meaning to the human experience. It is the hope that posterity will rekindle
our faith in these aspirations that will lead us from the depravity political life has increasingly
been characterized by.

2
Kant’s “Unsocial Sociability”:
Though the plethora of definitions that do exist in academia today are revelatory of an
increased interest and attention political events that is every bit as merited as the situation
warrants, such a profusion of terms has only served to obfuscate a comprehensive meaning of
what we call “populism” rather than rendering a universal clarity that can approximate a more
cohesive understanding. In its first use, the word “populism” was employed to describe anti-elite
tendencies of American politics during the 1950’s, of which contemporary strains of thought
have not entirely departed from.1 The term today is almost always associated with a public’s
response to official corruption and other political malpractices, which is what scholars such as
Aurelien Mondon, Dominika Kasprowicz, Agnieszka Hess, have sought to lend credence to.2
The other side of the spectrum posits theories emphasizing the salutary effects of certain
“populist” sentiments that can inculcate a more communitarian lifestyle as a response to the
overly liberal elements of democracy, such as what the Argentinian political theorist Ernesto
Laclau and the Dutch scholar Cas Mudde have both insinuated.3 To begin this paper, however,
we must start with its barest and most indisputable conclusion, that the “populist creates the
people from his or her understanding of what ‘the people’ should be, want and/or represent.”4
This notion of “the people” is not only the result of the particular circumstances of susceptible
communities but from a deeper, underlying motive that was first identified by the philosopher
Immanuel Kant.
1
Allcock, J. B. “‘Populism’: A Brief Biography,” 375.
2
Mondon, “Populism, the People, and the Illusion of Democracy,” 143; Kasprowicz and Hess, “Populism in Poland
– between demagoguery and demophilia,” 203.
3
Abromeit, “A Critical Review of Recent Literature on Populism,” 180.
4
Mondon, “Populism, the People, and the Illusion of Democracy,” 144.
3
Though it is certainly possible to trace the origins of how we may understand populism as
far back as the ideas of the ancient Greek philosophers, such a task would be far too cumbersome
for this paper and derogate the relevance of other thinkers who have more accurately
systematized the meaning of the term as it relates to contemporary affairs. Hence, it is proper to
start perhaps unexpectedly with the groundbreaking philosophy of Immanuent Kant. At first
glance, it does not seem the arguments of this philosopher are pertinent to the task at hand – after
all, he is known mainly for his revolutionary work in transcendentalist metaphysics that was
exhaustively delineated in his 800 page Critique of Pure Reason. In his early career, Kant was
concerned with a priori reasoning, a body of knowledge that was unequivocal, universal, and
necessary; these were self-evident truths grasped through intuition and irrespective of empirical
considerations. Unlike this astounding version of metaphysical knowledge able to be located in a
single voluminous book, however, Kant’s historical and political viewpoints are less advertent.
Students must laboriously track down the development of these thoughts through a collection of
other works the philosopher is less known for. Included in this category is an uncharacteristically
short essay titled “Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Intent,” the first major attempt by any
other philosopher (perhaps with the exception of Johann Gottfried Herder) of providing a
systematic analysis of human history and its purpose.
Kant sought to provide a purpose for the creation of human society and of man’s
acquiescence to norms, rules, and institutions. The centerpiece of this magnificent work was the
term “unsocial sociability,” used to describe the simultaneous need for, and yet also the innate
resistance to, society.5 Kant wrote, “Man has a propensity for living in society, for in that state he
5
Kant, “Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Intent,” 31.
4
feels himself to be more than man [...] he also has, however, a great tendency to isolate himself,
for he finds in himself the unsociable characteristic of wanting everything to go according to his
own desires.”6 Humans require social interaction in order to feel themselves more than merely
sentient creatures. Yet, they synchronously isolate themselves for want of having everything
transpire according to their benefit and design. This amour propre – Jacque Rousseau's
definition to the same process– “awakens all of man’s powers” without which “humanity’s
excellent natural capacities would have lain eternally dormant.”7 It is only this desire that can
actuate the striving process necessary for positively impacting the course of human history that
can approximate the form of knowledge he knew humans were ultimately capable of. This
overwhelming sense of human worth – insofar as we are rational creatures endowed with a good
will – is just as much a product of the perfection of reason as it is the antagonism that brings us
into conflict with our peers. This primordial antagonism certainly does produce some negative
externalities – honor, pride, malice or what we may refer to as St. Augustine’s libido dominandi
– but such is the mark of a “wise creator,” not that of a primeval “malicious spirit.”8 Kant
inherently understood the difficulty of living by his own standards and by subsuming human
malfeasance into his method, mankind would evolve into a true “cosmopolitan” state governed
by human reasoning.
To a certain extent, “unsocial sociability” seems remarkably out of place in a philosophy
built predominantly on anodyne reason and Kant does not offer any further explanation of this
idea other than the few pages he devotes in his essay. Such a fact does not dampen its veracity
but only indicates Kant encountered one of philosophy’s perpetual dilemmas that many of his
6
7
8
5
forebears were similarly plagued by: the problem of self-consciousness and self-worth. Kant’s
essay was the first real speculative attempt towards offering a cause for human history and its
natural endpoint derived from this dilemma, which was continued in his later writings such as his
“Speculative Beginning of Human History (1786)” and his theory of “Perpetual Peace (1795).”
His avant-garde interpretation was revelatory in identifying what would be the central topics of
thought for succeeding generations that would provide in far greater detail the cause of this
“unsocial sociability” that was the source of mankind’s misery and advancement; it was
essentially what Kant construed “populism” to be during his own time that is still very much
present today. Still, numerous questions had yet to be answered. Was this something inherent to
human behavior or something far deeper embedded in the human consciousness? Was it simply a
matter of perfecting human reason or becoming a valued member of society? Such a question
would be answered by Kant’s student, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, who offered a more
dynamic analysis of what self-worth really means and how populism would be fueled by these
desires.
Hegel and the “Desire for a Desire”:
It is very unfortunate that many Kantian scholars and historians have inexplicably
forgotten about or failed to properly acknowledge the prescience of the “Universal History with a
Cosmopolitan Intent.” Kant offered posterity the first interpretation of history that offered a
positive trajectory of human affairs based on human nature itself. Yet, all things taken into
consideration, Kant was less descriptive as to what this trajectory was pointing towards and how
it would produce the results he expected it would. Fortunately, the idea of “unsocial sociability”
piqued the interest of his student, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, which would become, it can
6
be argued, the foundation for his life’s work. Hegel’s work offers the most systematic and
reductive standpoint of the need for human-worth and recognition that would furnish much of the
modern definition of populism other political scientists such as Francis Fukuyama have been so
apt to appropriate. Difficult for even the most intelligent students, Hegel takes his readers from
an infinitesimal framework for human behavior to a universal character that prefigures, he
thinks, an “end of history.” Hegel imbibed most of his mentor’s ideas but wanted to delineate
more succinctly the source behind Kant’s “unsocial sociability.” He believed in the Kantian
thesis that the mind was an active organ that shaped sensations into perceptions, then forming
ideas, but he was less confident that the perfection of human reasoning was history’s natural
endpoint. Rather, his answer departed from what his teacher had originally taught him, believing
that the key to learning human nature was not found in a priori reasoning but in the “desire for a
desire.”
egel argued that the

Starting first at the molecular level of what makes humans human, H
fundamental necessity of life was not the perfection of unadulterated reason but bare desire, an
act or a will to do something or “negate” the object of that desire to suit the subject’s needs and
interests.9 To eat food, for example, a person has to destroy the food through the process of
cooking, eating, and digesting. “The (conscious) desire of a being,” in the words of the Hegelian
scholar Alexandre Kojeve, “is what constitutes that being as I.”10 At the same time, however, the
“I” created by the satisfaction of such a desire will have the same nature as the things toward
which that desire is directed.11 A person who desires only to eat will never attain
self-consciousness because the object of the desire (food) is finite, destructible, and insufficient
9
Kojeve, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 4.
10
11
7
to prove the subject he or she is that which they think they are. This is characteristic of animal
life, not that of an independent, thinking person.12 To attain self-consciousness, therefore, is to
desire something that can exceed the physical constraints it has been placed under and reveal an
objective reality other than itself. Therefore, desire must be directed towards another desire – as
Hegel termed it “negating negation” – and we attain a bit of our own self-consciousness by being
desirous of objects only other humans wish to obtain.13 What was the ultimate truth to Kant was
the “spirit” of Hegel, the process of an independent self-consciousness realizing its autonomy
through interaction with other people and, in doing so, eventually realize perfect freedom and
independence.14 This was way more than the “unsocial sociability” Kant had postulated but a
more cogent understanding of the tension between inelcutable elements of the human mind that
produce populist urges.
Humans necessarily need other people to placate their desires not so much to obtain
things or have a better life in an Aristotelian sense, but to simply feel they are active and valued
members of a community. “Self-consciousness is not yet mind’s consciousness of itself,” Hegel
incisively noted, “at that level it is only the worth of the subject that is in question.”15 Taken in
its literal form, humans desire to be desired. For the purposes of describing this behavior here,
we may term this the “desire for recognition,” the conscious acknowledgement of one person
towards the value another person thinks he or she has. When we refer to the process of populism
today, we actually describe the public’s “desire for recognition,” a demand for respect and
esteem they feel their work has entitled them to. Hegel described this behavior in an extended
12
13
Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 118.
14
Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 110.
15
Hegel, Philosophy of Right, 8 0.
8
analogy known as the “Master-Slave dialectic,” where two persons encounter each other but
neither wishes to “recognize” the other as a self-consciousness (a “being-for-self”). Since such
an act would be tantamount to denying their own self-worth, the standoff eventually becomes a
fight to the death between the two persons, resulting in a winner (the master) and the loser (the
slave). As Hegel wrote, “they must engage in the struggle, for they must raise their certainty of
being for themselves to truth.”16 The master has affirmed his “being-for-self” by winning this
struggle and the slave is spared death in order to acknowledge the superiority of the master by
doing his bidding and providing goods for his consumption. Neither the master nor the slave,
however, have fully reached self-consciousness. For the slave, he doesn’t know what it is to be
human, having lost the fight-to-the-death struggle, but he is not also an animal, for no animal
exists for the servitude of another. His clash with the master evinced the “terror” of being killed
and in that fear the slave first learns the value of life (the first negation). With this in mind, the
products he creates for the master are not absolutely negated as the food of the animal but are
molded and changed through his own creativity. The products of the slave’s labor become
something other than what they were originally, and in doing so, the slave starts believing he can
do the same with his existence as well. Embedded with the idea of absolute freedom (the second
negation), the slave gradually overcomes his cowardly existence and develops a
self-consciousness that is eventually recognized by the master who, valuing the work of the
slave, transforms his servitude into a coequal partnership.
Taken in an historical view as Kojeve intended, what was the self-consciousness of the
individual steadily becomes the “spirit” of a culture, its steady realization of its own freedom and
16
Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit 1 10.
9
the demand to apply that freedom.17 This does not necessarily mean liberal democracy (which
Hegel certainly did not support) such as what some other professors have insinuated (notably
Francis Fukuyama) but a society’s realization of its inherent potential which it can then use to
continue the dialectical process of history. This history would culminate and reach its natural
endpoint in the “state,” the apogee of objective right that can make freedom a reality for its
citizens.18 When this fails to occur, populism arises when citizens feel their rulers haven’t
regarded them equitably in a manner consistent with what they deserve. Taking this into
consideration, populism serves as a salutary development for the actualization of the dignity of
members within a community, an ancillary part towards the “end of history.” Hegel himself
thought the popular spirit of Germany in the aftermath of its disastrous war with Napoleonic
France augured this final state. Yet, succeeding thinkers were skeptical that human nature would
follow this linear path, and whether change in and of itself was something more preferable to
what it was prior.
Nietszche and the “Will to Power”:
Hegel’s aspirations for the “state” presaged a new epoch for European history that would
see its growing posperity and its eventual ruin. If any historical parallel can be found for
describing the behavior (or as I should say the “spirit”) of current society, it would be Europe
during the late nineteenth century. Up to this time, Europe had undergone fundamental structural
changes that pierced every fabric of society ranging from material wealth (which was the most
salient), population growth (the highest ever recorded), and political liberalism. If a person from
the 1700’s were to go back in time to the 1600’s, he would see little change in the rigid,
17
Hegel, Philosophy of History, 40.
18
10
monarchical, caste society that was predominant throughout Europe. If that same person were to
jump ahead into the 1800’s, however, he would discover an unrecognizable place brimming with
values, attitudes, and behaviors hitherto unknown to him. The twin industrial revolutions coupled
with a boom in population growth brought the nascent capitalist spirit to its full potential.
Economic data indicates that per capita gnp – the total economic output for every European –
increased by 120 percent between 1830 and 1913.19 In the early nineteenth century, technological
improvements in the manufacture of textiles and steel were complemented by monumental
advances in transportation systems which made Europe a productive, interconnected continent by
the end of the nineteenth century. Exports rose from 9.4 percent in 1860 to 14 percent in 1913.20
This progress was facilitated by a boom in population growth, which provided additional
labor/capital to be used by the expanding economies of European states. By 1913, Europe stood
at 481 million people from only 205 million in 1800 with a life expectancy above the age of
fifty, a marked improvement from previous centuries.21 Considering what it was hundreds of
years before, it is easy to appreciate Europe’s maturity at the dawn of the 20th century. Having
harnessed the power of technological improvements to drastically improve the quality of life for
millions of people and seemingly putting an end to the incessant warfare that had plagued the
continent for decades previously, it stood poised to acclaim the “end of history” Hegel dreamt of.
However, there was one eccentric philosopher in the hills of Switzerland who did not believe so.
Friedrich Nietszhe made it his mission to warn people that the “end of history,” the universal
mutual recognition of others for their intrinsic worth as enforced by the state, was not something
they should necessarily hope for.
19
Blanning, The Nineteenth Century, 82.
20
21
11
It is tempting to become infatuated with the auspicious trends of the nineteenth century
without perceiving the more opaque, deleterious elements of European society, elements
Nietzsche saw in his own time as a decadent, increasingly effete generation that traded its dignity
for pecuniary rewards, the tranquility and arete of monarchy for the vagaries of democracy, and,
most importantly, recognition of genuine superiority for universal belittlement. Nietzsche’s
views aligned strongly with that of Hegel’s (no matter how much the former criticized the latter),
that life for humans was ineluctably a question of struggle. Yet, what Hegel termed the “desire
for recognition” Nietzsche promulgated as the “will to power,” a collection of unconscious
drives that did not end in an harmonious outcome.22 Where Nietszche differed from Hegel was
his contention that power over others, much like the cruel competition social darwinism
ismissive of any form of

espoused, was not a means to an end but an end in and of itself. D
altruism or outlook that espoused it (especially Christianity), only those capable of attaining
superiority over others were those whom we should consider as superior – hence the inspiration
for the “supermen” Nietzsche mesmerized his audience with in his most famous book, Thus
Spoke Zarathustra.23 “The wretched are alone the good; the poor, the weak, the lowly, are alone
the good,” Nietszhe declaimed, “but the aristocrats, you men of power, you are to all eternity the
evil, the horrible, the covetous, instantiate, the godless.”24 To require strength “not express itself
as strength,” Nietszhe argued, “is just as absurd as to require of weakness that it should express
itself as strength.”25
22
Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, 7.
23
Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, 20.
24
Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality, 7.
25
Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality, 13.
12
Nietzsche has too often fallen into disrepute amongst other philosophers and historians
for his provocative statements and his stance against the overwhelming achievements of the
nineteenth century. It is still difficult to describe his philosophy in definitive terms; his works
read more as extended recriminations, especially against the liberal philosophers of his day (of
whom Schopenhaur was his prime target) than providing anything substantively new. However,
he did raise an important question concerning whether mutual recognition was actually
preferable. “What is the point of living,” one can ask, “if everyone were treated the same?” The
striving of the slave in the master-slave dialectic was due to the slave’s discontent with himself, a
feeling which then harnessed the labor and creativity to be worthy of the respect equal to the
master.26 Mutual recognition, Nietszhe argued, would take away this discontent, the impetus for
all human achievement, for what could a human possibly want t o achieve if they were merely
treated equal in every circumstance; the “desire to be recognized as superior to others,” as
Fukuyama inferred, “is necessary if one is to be superior to oneself.”27 The society that was
brimming with technological improvement and broadening political enfranchisement in
Nietszhe’s day was losing sight of what made it great. Such a world was painstakingly killing
religion, art, poetry, history, and philosophy, the products of human development that were the
resultants of the clash between master and slave and the desire for recognition. Hegel’s “end of
history” was approximating the “last man,” the antithesis to the supermen of his imagination, the
loss of culture and the increase of decadence which heralded a society of apathetic, impassive,
and indolent persons bereft of the creativity and virtue of their forebears. Nietszche understood
the problem of sustaining the clash between master and slave, of protecting the ambition that
26
Fukuyama, End of History, 304.
27
Fukuyama, End of History, 304.
13
made life meaningful. Whether this fear was unfounded, many would agree it wasn’t (and still
isn’t), but what Nietszche did underestimate was the versatility of human behavior that did not
accord to the bellicose reality he thought life on earth was.
Primordial Position and Value as a Consequence of Desire:
Each person is given an infinite amount of choices throughout their lifetime. In order for
decisions to have been made, an equal amount of forgone possibilities must have also existed,
choices that must not have been as valuable or important to make (for they would have been
chosen in place of the preferred determination if such were the case). Hegel never seems to have
envisaged a scenario where people could choose their particular bondage, of who or what to
render service to, something his dialectic never fully explains. Given the infinitude amount of
choices one must make and the equal number of forgone opportunities, there must be something
governing our actions that is not entirely rational – at least not to any bystander – but also allows
us to traverse the vagaries of life in the best manner we see fit. Recognition may be a part of this
calculus, maybe even the overarching raison d’etre for why we make these decisions, but this
cannot explain entirely the heterogeneity of human passion. Nietszche’s “will to power” is
equally inadequate at providing an answer to this problem (and thankfully so), as no person can
imagine human beings possessed exclusively of predacious tendencies without also a conduit for
human morality that is not only in the “pejorative sense.” Nietzsche ironically problematized his
own beliefs by animalizing human beings according to a single principal desire alone. The only
other conclusion remaining is a type of recognition that cannot indefinitely be satiated,
something that with each achievement only invigorates the desire for more. Society today
desperately needs an Hegelian interpretation adapted to current circumstances, the rational

14
pursuit of maximum r ecognition that is as much a consequence of the individual’s ambition as it
is the societal circumstances under which he or she finds themselves in. It is a primordial
position, one that propels all of a person’s actions and endeavors, which never entirely desists.
The “primordial position,” if we may call it that, is an inherent quality that incentivizes
individuals to choose the particular occupation and activities they think will reap the highest
accolades amongst their peers. People engage in certain behaviors to conjure in others the
attributes they want for themselves, as in Adam Smith’s version of sympathy, but this does not
necessarily presuppose conformity.28 A person can engage in the most vile, iniquitous, and
disreputable conduct against any public consensus of propriety if they feel it will solicit some
renown; a criminal can commit illegal acts to the same extent that a Wall Street executive trades
stock, both being in search of the optimal recognition circumstances will allow. Their activities
are not a “desire to be desired” in a rigid Hegelian sense, but a desire for intrapersonal value
which money can never buy – “value as a consequence of desire” it can also be interpreted as. It
is not that nature endowed its creations with an ambition inequitably distributed, or that affinity
is the only factor in a person’s vocation, but that perceptions of success and merit vary according
to each person. Talent plays little part in this decision but rather acts as an ancillary attribute that
is either compatible or incompatible with the goal in mind; there can be no telling of how much
wasted effort has been spent on futile goals in the course of human history. A person’s latitude to
make these choices, however, varies indisputably on their social position, which therein lies the
problem of populist tendencies and Emile Durkheim’s fear of societal anomie. Little argument
needs to be made on how social handicaps inhibit preferred decision-making, yet people often
28
Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments, 15.
15
underestimate the emotional toll this has on those unfortunate enough to bear such burdens.
When a person is denied, through no fault of their own, the possibility to be recognized as how
they wish to be seen, they will either begrudgingly accept the conditions under which they find
themselves in or fault society itself as the cause of their plight. Populist urges take root from the
failed aspirations of its citizens, who begin to realize they have been sold empty promises that
only certain groups of people can attain, whether it be the rich, educated, or the low-born, but
that are superficially advertised to all.
Populism is one possible way for society to cope with a significant shift in the
opportunities for recognition by attempting to reconfigure accepted attitudes and behaviors – its
“spirit” – either according to radical ideas of future development or anachronistic conceptions of
what made past societies great. Each successive tide of history enlarges the number of these
possibilities, albeit with the concomitant result that other modes of behavior are steadily
diminished. People are forced to question the efficacy of their chosen occupations as a means of
satisfying the primordial position and reconsider the legitimacy of the approbation they formerly
confided themselves as possessing. In many cases, they ultimately realize that this is no longer
the case. There exist today too many disconsolate persons who clearly realize not a single outlet
exists to direct all one’s effort and assiduous care that is capable of remitting any modicum of
esteem or value. The worth of the individual suddenly vanishes and with it a lasting indignance
and caustic cynicism will be born. It will either give rise to the most morose of temperaments or
the most implacable anger, an anger that the world is experiencing today and struggling to cope
with.
16
Part II: Anger and Anomie
Looking back at history, the world today is not very unlike the world of Nietszche. As
numerous authors have written, the world is generally becoming more wealthy, peaceful,
healthy, and (or as I should say “was” until the last decade) also the most democratic than it has
ever been. Extreme poverty, for example, has fallen from a whopping 90 percent to a current 10
percent and the proportion of people killed annually in wars is less than a quarter of what it was
in the 1980’s, a seventh of what it was in the 1970’s, an eighteenth of what it was in the 1950’s,
and roughly half a percent of what it was during the Second World War.”29 Two thirds of all
countries today, furthermore, are considered “democratic” with elected representatives drawn
from universal suffrage, a monumental achievement considering the plenitude of autocratic
regimes and constitutional monarchies of the early twentieth century.30 Such progress can be
substantiated by a litany of facts and statistics which prove the overall positive trajectory.
However, this process has not been easy, and general statistics such as these can often mask the
more repellent aspects of modern society which warrant greater attention in understanding why
populism has become so prominent today. A concatenation of economic dislocation, political
turbulence, immigration, and other factors have played major roles in enervating the dignity of
ordinary people so much so that they are now pursuing outcomes that stymie the progressive tide
of history and constrain the choices available to their fellow citizens.
29
Pinker, Better Angels of our Nature, 323.
30
Pew Research Center, “Despite global concerns about democracy, more than half of countries are democratic,”
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/14/more-than-half-of-countries-are-democratic/ [accessed 16
March 2020].
17
Modern Capitalism and Anomie:
Increases in wealth are derived from multiple synchronous processes that are sometimes
difficult to understand but relatively simple to recognize. The sophistication of a country’s
economy, whether it be gauged in gross domestic product (GDP) or GDP per capita, is generally
predicated on the specialization of its division of labor. Products are produced more efficiently
when different tasks are allocated amongst a workforce which, because of this division, can then
produce high quality goods at lower cost. This fact was elucidated to readers centuries ago when
the moral philosopher Adam Smith wrote his monumental On the Wealth of Nations arguing
against the mercantile, monopolistic economies of Europe. Improvements in technology
complement this process by increasing the efficiency of individual workers, freeing up existing
labor spent in unproductive industries to pursue more lucrative enterprises. However, with new
technologies also comes new tasks and responsibilities which need to be filled in order to keep
the process moving forward.
Globalization and automation require a generation of educated, professional, and
tech-savvy workers who know how to realize the vast potential of new technologies. Job
dislocation, therefore, is not only an inexorable side-effect of this process but an essential
requirement for economic progress to be made, a reality that can be a hard pill to swallow for
many people. People whose jobs have been affected by these twin processes still work incredibly
hard for their wages and take pride in what they are able to achieve given the opportunities
available to them. The dignity they derive from the long hours spent doing these jobs (many of
which are quite dangerous), they feel, are not adequately recognized by their fellow citizens who
barely notice them. In the words of Katherine Cramer, a political scientist at the University of
18
Wisconsin-Madison, many workers understand their plight to be the fault of, “guilty and less
deserving people, not as the product of broad social, economic, and political forces.”31 Events
such as the financial crisis of 2008 and the growing levels of income inequality in America
corroborate these viewpoints.
Hopefully in the time that this paper is being written, society would have not forgotten
the tumultuous financial crisis of 2008 and the lasting effect this event has had on the American
economy. These effects are too extensive and intricate to be discussed in this paper and other
sources with far more expertise and knowledge on the matter are more adept at informing readers
of the consequences this economic downturn produced. However, what is surprising (and too
often overlooked) in the aftermath of this event was the treatment of those responsible. Not a
single high-level CEO was charged in connection to the financial collapse or faced federal
convictions and jail time.32 In fact, most of them received huge year-end bonuses such as Joseph
Cassano of AIG Financial Products, who required a 99 billion dollar bailout and received a 34
million dollar bonus to himself or Robert Rubin of Citibank who received a 10 million dollar
bonus even though his company required 63 billion dollars in federal funds to stay afloat.33 The
reprobate actions of these men, as well as those of many other Wall Street executives, strongly
substantiate the view that the “elite” have profited from the struggles of the American working
class – 9 million people would eventually lose their jobs as a result of the financial crisis.34
Studies suggest that there were sharp increases in political polarization and fragmentation not
only in the US in the aftermath of the financial crisis but also in Europe as well. Such
31
Fukuyama, Identity: The Demand for Dignity and The Politics of Resentment, 88.
32
Junger, Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging, 129.
33
Dvorak, “Poor Year Doesn’t Stop CEO Bonuses.”
34
Junger, Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging, 129.
19
fragmentation was viewed clearly with the rise of the Tea Party, an ultraconservative movement
stemming largely from the failed Republican bid for the 2008 Presidency and the Wall Street
Movement that burst onto the scene in 2011. Less salient was the share of economic
conservatives, drawn primarily from gallup polls, which had risen to 46 percent by May of 2012
with the liberal share increasing by only 20 percent.35 In Europe, far-right and right-wing
populist parties more than doubled their vote share in many advanced economies, including
France, the UK, Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, Portugal and Japan.36 This pattern continues
as economic inequality continues to ossify political boundaries today.
Many economists and historians have a penchant for quantifying economic success with
modes such as GDP or GDP per capita. Though these mechanisms are useful to a certain extent,
they are unable to reveal the disparities in income that make advanced economies, especially the
US, susceptible to populist urges. As of 2017, US GDP is valued at 19.39 trillion dollars which,
divided by the number of its population (GDP per capita), amounts to over 59,000 dollars – data
is still being compiled for years 2019 and 2020 with a slight increase.37 However, data indicates
only ten percent of the US population’s incomes have kept at or above this amount of money.38
The top one percent of household income, on the other hand, have seen their incomes increase
dramatically, witnessing a cumulative increase of over 229 percent from the year 1980.39 The top
.01 percent of earners have seen a cumulative increase in their wages by 400 percent since 1980.
35
Mian et al. “Resolving Debt Overhang: Political Constraints in the Aftermath of Financial Crises,” 5.
36
Funke et al. “Going to Extremes: Politics after Financial Crises, 1870-2014,” 14.
37
The World Bank. “GDP - United States,” https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD?locations=US
[accessed 16 March 2020].
38
Leonhardt, “How the Upper Middle Class is Really Doing,”
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/24/opinion/income-inequality-upper-middle-class.html [accessed 16 March
2020].
39
Gould, Elise, “Decades of Rising Inequality in the US: testimony before the US House of representatives.”
https://www.epi.org/publication/decades-of-rising-economic-inequality-in-the-u-s-testimony-before-the-u-s-house-o
f-representatives-ways-and-means-committee/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
20
40
In short, only ten percent of the working population in the US is benefitting from the US
economy. The lack of income growth among the middle class is so large that other countries,
such as Britain, Canada, Spain, and Sweden have all surpassed the rate of median income growth
since the early 2000’s; the United States no longer has the highest average income.41 The stark
nature of these estimates cast into doubt the validity of the American dream that many people
have worked their entire lives to achieve. Knowing the rules are somehow no longer in their
favor has conjured a deep ressentiment that has now found ample expression through attacks
against the “elite” establishment, the leadership of President Donald Trump, and the treatment of
foreign nationals and migrants.
Growing Dissatisfaction:
Considering the economic dilemma globalization engenders, it is unsurprising key
deficits in public trust exist towards the federal government in many countries, especially the
United States. Working-class people feel increasingly alienated by a society who seemingly
neither needs them nor particularly wants them. In the words of Francis Fukuyama, this
“perception of invisibility,” the idea that they are “invisible” to politicians, the elite, and the
media, has led many people below the median income gap to attribute their enervated economic
and social status to the connivance of the “elite” establishment of policymakers and beneficiaries
of the world economy. In one of Cramer’s polls a respondent stated, “‘they [Washington D.C.] is
a country unto itself... They haven’t got a clue what the rest of the nation is up to, they’re so
40
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/24/opinion/income-inequality-upper-middle-class.html [accessed 16 March
2020].
41
Leonhardt, and Quealy, “The American Middle Class Is No Longer the World’s Richest,”
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/23/upshot/the-american-middle-class-is-no-longer-the-worlds-richest.html
21
absorbed in studying their own belly button.’”42 Sentiments such as these typify the growing
disillusionment towards the US political institution which, given the lingering ramifications of
the financial crisis, the growing income inequality, and pervasive political malpractices such as
gerrymandering and lobbying, is not fatuous to any extent.
In 2016, the year Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, a poll
showed roughly 80 percent of Americans were dissatisfied with the Federal Government.43 More
recent gallup polls have determined that only a mere 35 percent of the US populace trusts the
government to handle domestic issues.44 An international study conducted by the Pew Research
Center concluded that across 27 countries surveyed, 54 percent think most politicians in their
country are corrupt and only 35 percent agree that elected officials care what ordinary people
think.45 This study also found that the people who say the national economy is in bad shape are
more likely to be dissatisfied with the way democracy is working; those most critical of the
establishment and less faithful in democracy are more likely to have experienced economic
hardships such as unemployment.46 “In 26 nations,” the report stated, “unhappiness with the
current functioning of democracy is more common among those who believe the statement
“‘elected officials care what ordinary people think’ does not describe their country well.”47
42
Fukuyama, Identity: The Demand for Dignity and The Politics of Resentment, 88.
43
Elving, Ron. “Poll: 1 in 5 Americans Trust the Government.”
https://www.npr.org/2015/11/23/457063796/poll-only-1-in-5-americans-say-they-trust-the-government [accessed 16
March 2020].
44
Brenan, Megan. “Americans' Trust in Government to Handle Problems at New Low,”
https://news.gallup.com/poll/246371/americans-trust-government-handle-problems-new-low.aspx [accessed 16
March 2020].
45
Wike et al. “Publics satisfied with free speech, ability to improve living standards; many are critical of institutions,
politicians,”
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/04/29/publics-satisfied-with-free-speech-ability-to-improve-living-standa
rds-many-are-critical-of-institutions-politicians/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
46
Wike et al. “Many Across the Globe Are Dissatisfied With How Democracy Is Working,” 21.
47
Wike et al. “Many Across the Globe Are Dissatisfied With How Democracy Is Working,” 10.
22
Considering these revelations, it is hardly surprising that nonwhites, poorer, and less educated
individuals, and younger adults have lower levels of personal trust than other Americans.48 This
trust enervates the bonds that hold society together, making the connections between them not a
matter of mutual recognition but of Nietzsche's “will to power” over their fellow citizens. If
citizens are increasingly feeling alienated by their own government, greater opposition and “the
will to power” will be exhibited towards people who are not formally citizens of those
governments.
Immigration, Sovereignty, and Identity:
Immigration is the quintessence of the desire for dignity because it forces societies to
reevaluate what it means to be a “citizen” and, in so doing, the value this status should confer.
The character of Western Europe and the United States has certainly been affected by large-scale
immigration, both of which have pursued conservative and generally illiberal measures that have
catalyzed a new, multi-polar, and outwardly nationalistic world. Hegel’s “Master-Slave ''
dialectic can be used far more effectively in explaining resistance to immigration than any other
method.
The first assumption related to immigration that has largely been invalidated is the idea
that immigration poses inimical effects for the recipient country’s economic performance.
Common accusations include fears of immigrants stealing jobs from natural-born citizens,
utilizing services that drain the federal budget, committing crimes at higher rates than
natural-born citizens, or, more commonly, bringing views and values that are incompatible with
those of the recipient country. Such beliefs transgress numerous unequivocal economic
48
Rainie and Perrin. “Key Findings about Americans’ Declining Trust in Government and Each Other.”
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/22/key-findings-about-americans-declining-trust-in-government-an
d-each-other/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
23
principles and modern research, which has largely refuted these viewpoints. Recent research, for
example, has revealed that immigrants lower the price of services such as child-care, gardening,
and cleaning services, benefitting tremendously the people to use such services.49 One study has
even concluded that since the infusion of immigrants actually lowers the price of goods and
services by increasing the division of labor, every citizen regardless of education level stands to
benefit financially.50 Furthermore, it has been shown in the United States that immigrants are not
a drain on the federal budget since the taxes that immigrants and their children pay, such as
income, sales, and property taxes, actually exceed the costs of the services they use. A 2007
Congressional Budget Office Report projected that a path to legalization for unauthorized
immigrants would produce a surplus of 15 billion dollars from greater receipts of social security
payroll taxes.51 Granted, many state and local governments more affected by immigration are
bound to have greater expenses, though there is little reason why these states cannot receive
greater federal aid.
Having elucidated the potential benefits that immigration brings, it is hard to imagine
why some people would choose to believe in farcical evidence of the contrary. What keeps many
people accepting these spurious claims, however, is their faith in the worth and recognition that
citizenship affords. People can take great pride in the historical and cultural heritage of a country
so being a citizen of that country means a great deal to them; it is not so much the material
benefits that are involved in citizenship than the standing and reputation that citizenship implies.
49
Greenstone and Looney, “Ten Economic Facts About Immigration,”
https://www.hamiltonproject.org/papers/ten_economic_facts_about_immigration [accessed 16 March 2020].
50
51
Congressional Budget Office, Cost Estimate: Senate Amendment 1150 to S. 1348, the Comprehensive Immigration
Reform Act of 2007, 2.
24
So, it is natural for some incredulity to be expressed towards foreign people and illegal
immigrants who want to reap the economic benefits of other countries but not undergo the
struggle of becoming a citizen in those countries (though it is much more difficult for a foreigner
to become a naturalized citizen than it is to be born into citizenship). Immigrants have yet to
prove their worth to the society they wish to occupy and to be considered equal to them (by
allowing illegal immigrants to reside in the host country without repercussion) would denigrate
the dignity that naturalized citizens believe themselves to possess. In the words of one expert, the
immigrant is a “symbol of loss of sovereignty and/or identity,” and the “agent of an invasive
stratagem aimed at the displacement and/or replacement of the autochthonous population by
either a new culture/civilisation or a multicultural mix whereby the original population would be
defiled or destroyed.”52 The anger and hatred for immigrants represents the fear of “losing” the
country that naturalized citizens believe they’ve worked hard to build; as the Blauner hypothesis
suggests, citizens do not want to inherit the perceived weaknesses of people from areas that were
conquered in the past and which currently experience political instability in the present.53 This is
perhaps why the southern border of the United States receives a disproportionate amount of
attention despite data revealing most illegal immigrants simply overstay their visas through
ulterior entry points.54 This can also explain more than any economic or social reason why
resistance to immigration has been so widespread in Europe and the United States.
Nowhere has immigration elicited as widespread criticism and opprobrium as it has in
Europe following the mass exodus of immigrants and refugees from war-torn areas in the Middle
52
Mondon, “Populism, the People, and the Illusion of Democracy,” 144.
53
Blauner, Racial Oppression in America, 5 2.
54
25
East and Africa. The highest recorded number of arrivals was in 2015 with over 1,015,078 new
immigrants, the majority of whom arrived in Germany and Sweden via Greece and Turkey.55 The
European Commission determined that in 2018, the number of people residing in an EU Member
State with citizenship of a non-member country was 22.3 million, roughly 4.4 percent of
Europe’s population.56 Therefore, it is unsurprising many populist parties and associations
originally began solely for the purpose of extraditing these individuals. Such was the case in
Germany, where the Pegida movement – otherwise known as the “Patriotic Europeans against
the Islamisation of the West” – took off in October of 2014. What became a movement that
thousands of people attended and millions more were exposed to originally began as a Facebook
page of disgruntled local citizens (specifically a football league) in southern Germany.57 In
France, Marine Le Pen’s National Front h as expressed its desire to make France “more French”
by restricting immigration.58 Across the channel in the United Kingdom, immigration was
reportedly a top concern for 46 percent of survey respondents; this statistic has since been
subsumed under the current and contentious Brexit debates.59 Perhaps the most salient example
of populist politics built heavily on immigration has been the Five Star movement in Italy. In
2017, Italy received 67 percent of the new EU arrivals and the Italian government has gone so far
as to not only block illegal immigrants from arriving in Italy but also prosecuting humanitarian
55
Clayton et al. “Over One Million Sea Arrivals Reach Europe in 2015,”
https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/news/latest/2015/12/5683d0b56/million-sea-arrivals-reach-europe-2015.html [accessed
16 March 2020].
56
“Migration and Migrant Population Statistics.”
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Migration_and_migrant_population_statistics [accessed
16 March 2020].
57
Dostal, “The Pegida Movement and German Political Culture: Is Right-Wing Populism Here to Stay?” 524.
58
Nossiter, “Marine LePen Leads Far Right Fight to make France ‘More French.’”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/20/world/europe/france-election-marine-le-pen.html [accessed 16 March 2020].
59
“UK Public Opinion toward Immigration: Overall Attitudes and Level of Concern.”
https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overall-attitudes-a
nd-level-of-concern/#kp1 [accessed 16 March 2020].
26
organizations that care for those who make the perilous journey through the Meditteranean Sea
to safe harbors in Europe.60 Such actions have largely succeeded due to growing dissatisfaction
towards the EU, which lacks the authority and legitimacy to pursue a unanimous immigration
policy for all of its member states. A study found that while most Europeans associate the EU
with “peace and prosperity,” they still view it as “inefficient” and not understanding of the needs
of ordinary citizens, which is then highly indicative of increased levels of distrust.61 So, the
growing resistance towards immigration coupled with the seeming ineptitude of the EU has
produced circumstances conducive to populist attitudes and urges, which are by no means absent
from the United States as well.
In the US, where the majority of its citizens are overall dissatisfied with democracy,
President Trump has made has made the task of occluding the flow of illegal immigration on the
southern border a top priority. Trump’s stand against illegal immigration can best be summarized
with his now well-known (and much reviled) statement, “They’re bringing drugs. They’re
bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”62 Unfortunately, this
rhetoric has been matched by a plenitude of active policy measures such as travel bans (as in the
case of 2017 against numerous Middle Eastern countries), the ongoing operations of ICE, and,
most seriously, the detention of thousands of migrants at the Southern border. An Inspector
General Report conducted in May of 2019 identified squalid living conditions, overcrowding,
60
“Migration to Europe in Charts,” https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44660699 [accessed 16 March 2020].
61
Wike, Fetterolf, and Fagan, “Europeans Credit EU With Promoting Peace and Prosperity, but Say Brussels Is Out
of Touch With Its Citizens,”
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/19/europeans-credit-eu-with-promoting-peace-and-prosperity-but-say-
brussels-is-out-of-touch-with-its-citizens/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
62
Lee, “Donald Trump’s false comments connecting Mexican immigrants and crime.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
27
and lacking health standards for those detained.63 Under a new Trump measure, migrants would
have to seek asylum claims in the countries they pass through prior to reaching the United States,
a measure that the President intimidated the Guatemalan government into accepting.64 Under this
new rule, there would essentially be an end to asylum seekers at the US southern border but
would increase the burden of host countries such as Guatemala, Honduras, and other South
American states.65 The alacrity which the President has displayed for these measures and the
woeful indifference he has exhibited towards the plight of those affected have sharpened the
public’s opinion with immigration becoming, as the results of one gallup survey showed, the top
overall issue at 27 percent, up from 23 percent in 2016.66 These statistics reveal that populists do
not necessarily have to win large amounts of supporters to put the spotlight on a topic of their
choosing.
The measures implemented by countries such as the United States, Italy, and the UK are
unlikely to provide a permanent solution to the increase in worldwide immigration, which is
projected to continue well into the twenty-first century. This will provide populists with ample
political ammunition in the years to come, making it difficult if not impossible for the topic to
dissipate entirely. The vitriolic stances towards immigration are also synchronous with an overall
rise in hate crimes perpetrated by racist, right-wing extremist groups, which are symptomatic of
efforts towards reframing socially acceptable behavior ... and persons.
63
Office of Inspector General, Management Alert–DHS Needs to Address Dangerous Overcrowding and Prolonged
Detention of Children and Adults in the Rio Grande Valley (Redacted), 2-4.
64
Miroff, “Trump administration to begin sending asylum seekers to Guatemala as soon as this week.”
65
Miroff, “Trump administration to begin sending asylum seekers to Guatemala as soon as this week.”
66
Jones, “Mentions of Immigration as Top Problem Surpass Record High.”
https://news.gallup.com/poll/261500/mentions-immigration-top-problem-surpass-record-high.aspx [accessed 16
March 2020].
28
Violence and Hate crimes: A Worrying Increase
Populism thrives where there exists a general lack of consensus as to what norms, values,
and beliefs should b e accepted. Many people in the US, for example, are uncertain as to what
constitutes “offensive” language (by a margin of nearly 51 percent) and a majority of people do
not believe that there is agreement as to what constitutes “racist” or “sexist” language as well (61
and 65 percent respectively). This disillusionment has spurred the rise of alternative subcultures
and internet meeting places that provide a conduit for venting frustration, often with dire results.
A study from the California State University’s Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism
noted, “As many Americans have become increasingly distrustful in the efficacy and integrity of
the institutions of their pluralistic democracy [and] new alternative subcultures and the internet
have offered a place of refuge for those feeling left behind.”67 Some of these cultures, it must be
acknowledged, have fomented the most bigoted opinions responsible for a rise in hate crimes
both in the United States and Europe.
Hate crimes are defined by the FBI as “crimes that manifest evidence of prejudice based
on race, gender or gender identity, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity.”68 The
majority of hate crimes reported in the United States during 2017 fell under the
“race/ethnicity/ancestry” category (58 percent to be exact), the overall total representing an
increase of 17 percent from the previous year.69 An analysis of hate crimes reported in US major
cities from 2017 to 2018 has also found significant spikes of hate crimes in the cities of Los
67
Levin and Reitzel, “Report to the Nation: Hate Crimes Rise in U.S. Cities and Counties in Time of Division and
Foreign Interference,” 32.
68
Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Hate Crime Statistics,” https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/hate-crime
69
Federal Bureau of Investigation, “2017 Hate Crime Statistics.”
https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2017/topic-pages/incidents-and-offenses [accessed 17 March 2020].
29
Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, Dallas, Austin, San Francisco, Fort Worth, Seattle,
Washington, D.C., Louisville, Sacramento, Miami, New Orleans, and Cleveland, with each city
reporting a decade-high rise.70 A 2018 Department of Justice report did not reveal any departure
from this alarming trend, a year the Anti-defamation League's Center on Extremism concluded
was the fourth-deadliest year for domestic extremist – affiliation with right-wing, left wing, or
islamist movements – events on record since the 1970’s.71 Data has found that the majority of the
extremist-related murders from 2009 to 2018, such as Robert Bowers, the perpetrator of the
“Tree of Life” Synagogue shooting or Nikolas Cruz and the infamous Parkland High School
massacre, were perpetrated by right-wing extremists (over 73 percent).72 These criminals began
“not as hardened bigots” but were susceptible to exploitation by the “purported facts of those
who are bigots, particularly by those [who] promote a strain of Euro-nationalism, Islamophobia
and anti- Semitism as a bulwark against national security threats, demographic change, and a
degradation of traditional American culture.”73 Whether it be Robert Bower’s contributions to
the online chat forum Gab or Patrick Crusius’s online manifesto warning of the “hispanic
invasion” prior to his murder of twenty innocents, disaffected individuals have found refuge in
the dark corners of the web that accept and support their racist, intolerant, and largely
misogynistic opinions.74 These beliefs obfuscate the line between freedom of speech and
70
Levin and Reitzel, “Report to the Nation: Hate Crimes Rise in U.S. Cities and Counties in Time of Division and
Foreign Interference,” 3.
71
US Department of Justice, “Hate Crime Statistics,” https://www.justice.gov/hatecrimes/hate-crime-statistics
[accessed 17 March 2020]; Anti-Defamation League. “Right-Wing Extremism Linked to Every 2018 Extremist
Murder in the U.S., ADL Finds,”
https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/right-wing-extremism-linked-to-every-2018-extremist-murder-in-the-us-adl
-finds [accessed 17 March 2020].
72
Anti-Defamation League, “Murder and Extremism in the United States in 2018,”
https://www.adl.org/murder-and-extremism-2018 [accessed 17 March 2020].
73
Levin and Grisham, “Special Status Report: Hate Crime in the United States,” 14.
74
Ohlheiser and Shapira, “Gab, the white supremacist sanctuary linked to the Pittsburgh suspect, goes offline (for
now),”
30
criminal intent, all of which has been amplified by the relative ease of firearms possession in the
United States. Though right-wing extremism has been more acute in the United States, it is also
apparent in Europe as well.
In Europe, the people exposed to hate crimes are disproportionately immigrants and
foreigners. Though these crimes are not as deadly as the shootings in the US, they are still
becoming prevalent and increasingly more violent. The 2015 stabbings of three people of Middle
Eastern descent at a school in the city of Trollhattan, Sweden, a small town with a history of hate
crimes, has been the most horrific attack to date.75 However, most hate crimes in Europe are less
overt, yet receive the tacit sanctioning of politicians and authorities. Matteo Salvini, a prominent
far-right Italian politician known for his anti-migrant rhetoric is credited with saying in an
interview the need for a “mass cleansing” in Italy of its illegal immigrants, and there has been a
significant spike in violence towards immigrants, including shootings, attacks on minors and
murders in Italy.76 In the UK, Prime minister Boris Johnson has compared the burka to a
letterbox, prompting an increase in Muslim women to reportedly feel unsafe.77 Most
conspicuously, however, has been the treatment of foreigners and Jews in Hungary under the
leadership of Prime Minister Viktor Orban. There, he has only led timid efforts at restraining the
extremist and openly anti-semitic Jobbik party, which directs paramilitary organizations such as
the “Hungarian Guard” to patrol Roma neighborhoods and Hungary’s border in search of “gypsy
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/10/28/how-gab-became-white-supremacist-sanctuary-before-it-
was-linked-pittsburgh-suspect/ [accessed 17 March 2020]; Ailworth et al.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/lost-in-life-el-paso-suspect-found-a-dark-world-online-11565308783 [accessed 17
March 2020].
75
Taylor, “Swedish school worker killed trying to protect students in racial attack hailed as hero.”
76
Dieng, “Street by Street: Systematic Dehumanization in Europe,” 2.
77
Saner, “‘It Has Made Us Unsafe’”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/14/unsafe-muslim-women-fear-abuse-boris-johnson-burqa [accessed
17 March 2020].
31
crime” and illegal migrants. These efforts perpetuate state-sanctioned violence against
immigrants and foreign peoples that is fueled by corrosive, apoplectic desires of racial
purification and national pride. The stance against foreigners of different nationalities and
ethnicities, however, has only been matched by an increasing resistance towards Europe’s
perennial scapegoat, Judaism.
Only decades after the horrific conditions of the Holocaust, the systemic elimination of
Jews and other undesirables within German occupied territory during the Second World War,
Europe has become a place increasingly unsafe for Jews. Just this past year, French officials
have reported a 74 percent increase in offenses against Jews, and German reports acknowledge
that there has been an increase of 60 percent in similar attacks against Jews as well, an account
which reportedly marks a 10-year high with 1,646 incidents this past year, 43 of which were
physical altercations.78 The most egregious case has been in Viktor Orban’s Hungary, which has
pursued a state-sanctioned ridicule campaign against the Jewish Hungarian business magnate
George Soros.79 Conspiracy theories attributing Soros to the financial crisis of 2008 are a key
feature of Orban’s party, which has earned widespread attention and acceptance by many
Hungarian citizens. Furthermore, a 28-nation Eurobarometer report in 2018 revealed a
significant discrepancy between perceptions of antisemitism between the Jewish community, 89
percent of whom believe discrimination against Jews has increased, and the general public, of
whom only 36 percent believe it had; Europe is becoming generally ignorant of the struggles
78
Henley, “Anti Semitism rising sharply across Europe, latest figures show”
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/feb/15/antisemitism-rising-sharply-across-europe-latest-figures-show
79
Kingsley, “Anti-Semitism Is Back, From the Left, Right and Islamist Extremes. Why?”
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/04/world/europe/antisemitism-europe-united-states.html [accessed 17 March
2020].
32
Jews face each day, especially as harrassment and hate speech, the EU Fundamental Rights
Agency declared, is becoming the new “normal.”80 Part of this rise, it is true, is caused by the
influx of Middle Eastern refugees into Europe beginning in 2013, yet statistically far-right,
native citizens have perpetrated more violence against Jews.81 Though some may continue to say
that the link between anti-semitism and populist politics remains tenuous, examples such as
Hungary and the rise of attacks on Jews in Europe reveal that this correlation is becoming proven
each day, portending a a darker reality for Jews which immigrants, foreigners, and the capitalist
“elite,” are having to come to grips with.
Adam Smith’s Solution: Education
Populism has real effects on a nation’s character. Like any addictive drug, it is a trend
that feels good and liberating in the short term but if pursued to its furthest extent, results in a
masochistic desire for a bygone future that is simply not attainable. Many other luminaries have
offered erudite appraisals of this situation though without an attendant solution – studies range
from naive to woefully pessimistic. Since the provenance of populism can be found in
philosophy, it is fitting that we return to that subject for a solution to the same topic, this time
from a different philosopher, Adam Smith.
The genius of Smith, who is known mainly for his groundbreaking work in formulating,
synthesizing, and defending capitalist economics, is that the philosopher diagnosed the problems
his own ideas created and included a way to rectify them while remaining loyal to the tenets he
laid down. Smith believed that human behavior was best defined by interpersonal relationships
rather than human logic or rationalism. In a similar vein with the “desire for a desire,” Smith
80
“Perceptions of Antisemitism,” 6.
81
“Perceptions of Antisemitism,” 6.
33
wrote that people want to inspire in others the feelings they want to associate with themselves
and, because of which, comport themselves according to societal norms and values; instead of
fighting, people can treat each other equitably for mutual benefit.82 Whereas for Hegel this was a
desire for recognition, to Smith this was a mutual relationship built on sympathy, with each party
acting with decorum so as not to be affiliated with any disreputable characteristics. Under this
“sympathy principle,” there would be a “society of perfect liberty” where the government did not
have to intrude on the lives of its citizens and law and order would be upheld by the approbation
or disapprobation of its members towards each other. This, coupled with economic liberalism,
would allow society to reach its highest material reward and ethical standards. However,
capitalism to Smith was not as much a liberative process as it was an oppressive one, which
enslaved humans to new mechanical, prosaic occupations that were denuded of any human care
or creativity. He lamented, “the man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple
operations, of which the effects too are, perhaps, always the same, or very nearly the same, has
no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for
removing difficulties which never occur.”83 Capitalism and the division of labor were tragic
phenomena that anesthetized man and his capacity for ingenuity and creativity; it seems
Nietszche was right when he lambasted the loss of culture during his time. “The torpor of his
mind,” Smith described the modern man, “renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing
a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble, or tender sentiment.”84
In embracing industrialization, which substitutes creative work for anodyne, mechanical duties,
man loses his intellectual, social, and martial faculties, and in return gains a skeptical, pessimistic
82
Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments, 17.
83
Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 988.
84
34
outlook of progress. His disconsolate temper renders him unable to appreciate anything new, but
rather only the halcyon days of the past before industrialism had wreaked its ugly head. Such
feelings are not far from populist rhetoric which stresses a past, idyllic society that has been
ruined by the vices of modernity such as corruption, social and economic inequality, or job
dislocation. The solution to this quandary, Smith articulated, could not be found in more laissez-
faire capitalism (no matter how much capitalists will continue erroneously to support) but in the
state-supported functions.
No government stands to prosper from allowing unbridled capitalism without ensuring
measures of protecting the working populace from its iniquities. A restive, angry population is
not a formula for stable governance. Smith argued that state-funded education was an antidote
for the moral decay eventuated by industrialism and it was the government’s responsibility to
ensure the laboring classes were proficient first in the most rudimentary subjects such as reading,
writing, science, and geometry.85 By inculcating an appreciation for these subjects in addition to
requiring military and gymnastic activities, Smith believed, a society could retain its civic virtu.
Francis Fukuyama took this argument a step further, noting that education not only prevents the
enervation of a society’s values but that it also strengthens them through realizing a fight to the
death is not necessary for proving one’s worth. “The last man at the end of history,” Fukuyama
wrote, “knows b etter than to risk his life for a cause, because he recognizes that history was full
of pointless battles [...] the loyalties that drove men to desperate acts of courage and sacrifice
were proven by subsequent history to be silly prejudices.”86 Education allows people to realize
the futility of life-or-death struggle, that mutual recognition of a person’s dignity is more salutary
85
86
Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man, 307.
35
than internecine conflict. As one expert notes, “high levels of education, indicating a certain
intellectual or cognitive competence, constitutes a factor of tolerance.”87 Indeed, knowledge and
reasoning skills tend to favor an acceptance of differences and the adoption of more tolerant
attitudes over negative stereotypes. Perhaps when populists learn that lower-priced products
actually increase a person’s income, that the loss of unproductive industries provide new
opportunities for more lucrative enterprises, that the quixotic days of the past are irretrievably
gone, or that the immigrants they denigrate have dignity too, they can jettison whatever prejudice
they hold, and look towards to progress with anticipation and excitement. An equitable education
system, the first step for achieving this equanimity, is very challenging to erect in today’s
circumstances.
Education is not only necessary for understanding the business cycle but also facilitates
the primordial position of a nation’s citizenry by offering a greater range of beneficial ways to
pursue their right to recognition. The overall quality of the US education system – and in other
countries affected by populism – is generally inequitable however, ranked by the Organization
for Economic Cooperation and Development between Argentina and the United Kingdom. 38.88
The percentage of 25-34 year olds in 2017 who had completed a bachelor’s degree was an
average 26 percent, though this is unevenly distributed across regions, with a whopping 43
percent gap between the state with the highest tertiary (associate or bachelor’s degree)
educational attainment and the state with the lowest, a gap seconded only by the Russian
87
Coenders and Scheepers, “The Effect of Education on Nationalism and Ethnic Exclusionism: An International
Comparison,” 315.
88
“Education At A Glance,”
https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/education/data/education-at-a-glance/educational-attainment-and-labour-force-status_
889e8641-en [accessed 17 March 2020].
36
Federation.89 The availability and quality of education in the United States is based heavily on
which state a person lives no less than birth. In West Virginia, a state dependent heavily on the
coal industry, only 17.5 percent of its residents have a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to a
state such as the District of Columbia, with a whopping 50 percent or Maryland and
Massachusetts with 36 and 39 percent respectively.90 The latter two states have some of the
highest gdp per capita in the entire nation, while West Virginia has one of the lowest. With a 31
percent rise in prices for undergraduate tuition, fees, room, and board at public institutions
between 2006 and 2016 and a 26 percent rise for prices at private nonprofit institutions after
adjustment for inflation, many citizens from poorer states and communities cannot afford the
rising costs of education that are needed for capitalism to work.91 If society chooses to push
forward its material acquisitions without enfranchising the losers of capitalism, a new era of
factitious politics will be the inexorable result, an outcome that can further loosen the social
bonds that have connected citizens together previously. Supporters of populist leaders often
resemble the least educated of their peers who, in many cases, cannot afford the costs of tertiary
education.92 As one pundit emphatically noted, “by rewarding already-privileged young people
and then adding to the advantages they enjoy as adults, higher education has become the primary
mechanism of class stratification in the United States.”93 Though academics and economists are
correct when they say capitalism benefits everyone, it ignores the reality that many people have
89
“Overview of the United States,” https://statisticalatlas.com/United-States/Overview [accessed 17 March 2020].
90
“Overview of the United States,” https://statisticalatlas.com/United-States/Overview [accessed 17 March 2020].
91
The National Center for Education Statistics, “Tuition Costs of Colleges and Universities.”
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=76 [accessed 17 March 2020].
92
“NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist Poll National Tables October 1st, 2018,”
http://maristpoll.marist.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/NPR_PBS-NewsHour_Marist-Poll_USA-NOS-and-Tables
_1810021305.pdf#page=3 [accessed 17 March 2020].
93
Scialaba, “How Elite Universities are Hurting America,”
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/2015-03-01/class-and-classroom [accessed 17 March 2020].
37
to work harder than others for the money they make, which disparages their idea of being treated
equally and fair; it is an affront to their dignity.
The Primordial Position and Equality:
If the welfare of a community is predicated on the realization of the individual members’
primordial positions, which sets the aim upon which maximum recognition and esteem can be
conferred, it is of the public interest to establish incentives for this pursuit that is of salutary
effect for all its members. The primordial position, though inherent to all human beings, is
amenable based upon the extent to which the subject thinks the means at his or her disposal for
pursuing optimal recognition are feasible; a criminal bent upon doing harm to the collective
good, for example, can only be dissuaded from committing such pernicious acts if he or she no
longer believes it will solicit the acknowledgement they think it can. The changing nature of
societal approbation is more to credit with decreased criminality than the power of coercion. If
this was not the case, as it certainly was in some societies, the indomitable spirit of our inherent
antagonism – the “will to power” in true Nietzschean fashion – will spurn the most perfidious of
conduct regardless of the deterrents a society can employ. The greater portion of populists today
are the result of the unfortunate (but by no means mistaken or erroneous) idea that their
masochistic acts offer the only conduit for the esteem and privilege their more affluent,
well-gifted peers retain as well. Their acts are as much evil, nefarious, or any other punitive
description people have become too fond of making, as they are emblematic of the society that
(they feel) has wronged them, that has reserved its accolades exclusively for the high-born at the
expense of others who exhibit the same desire but are barred from endeavoring to do similarly.
38
The driving process of the philosophy of history is as of yet difficult to describe let alone
formulate. If we are to take the logic of Hegel’s philosophy of history to its maximum extent, it
would not mean the fulfillment of this recognition necessarily but the uninhibited opportunity to
pursue it, the complete liberation of the individual towards the pursuit of maximum recognition
without any purposeful obstructions. Of course history is full of these obstructions, and any
student of history can recall with little difficulty the intransigent forces of society that have
always stood ready to inhibit the progressive tides that have always overcome them. It must be
that the volte-face of these forces is as a result of the same desire. There is, contrary to what
many people expect, a limit as to how “free” the affluent and well-born are. Though their
pecuniary rewards offer them no shortage of artificial esteem, the insular nature of this group
renders it quite difficult to do anything of real acclaim – there can only be so much money to
accumulate until one feels no less different because of it. In time, their freedoms will appear as
nugatory as the circumstances under which the lower classes are forced to endure, a feeling that
will allow a modicum of compassion hitherto not tolerated for the struggles of the common
people. Therefore, they must search outside the confines of their social strata, to others who have
failed to reach a similar endpoint or were unfairly prevented from doing so. In time, for example,
the low factory worker eventually becomes the hero of the working class, the members of which
are steadily considered valuable members of society. Likewise, the agents of mobilization will
assume a position of greater responsibility and esteem – that is, only if they are allowed to
become the beneficiaries of the system as well.
The lifespan of a particular time of history is based on the extent to which it can provide
new outlets of esteem to its successors. A chasm appears when these possibilities diverge, when
39
traditional notions of societal approbation no longer seem appealing to the majority of its
citizens. This process, if it is not unanimous (which it invariably isn’t), will produce a set of
negative externalities which will form a threat to the pre-existing system, which will fight back
with the same fervor as the ressentiment of the lower classes. If it succeeds, it will only succeed
in the short term and shackle its members to a set of expectations already deemed to be
illegitimate. Regardless of which side of the political spectrum they subscribe to,the proponents
of populist leaders feel themselves no longer able to pursue that which they think worthy of their
respect and acknowledgement. Political malfeasance, or what we call populism, is an attempt to
reconfigure what is socially acceptable. In this light, a clearer understanding of populism can
finally be systematized, which can be defined as: a time when citizens of a community no longer
consider the circumstances that give meaning to the human existence – political standpoints,
income levels, or societal ethics – propitious for furthering optimal recognition which they then
seek in the exclusive idea of “the people.” The only remaining solution to the more pejorative
tendencies of the primordial position and of populist urges is a collective effort by society to
amend the aspirations of its members towards beneficial outcomes. This must not be arbitrary or
left on the whim of capitalist cycles. Rather, circumstances must be such that everyone has the
equal opportunity to pursue that which their inherent dispositions posit, and bear all the
hardships attendant to such aims without any undue or gratuitous obstructions. This is what
Hegel intimated but never fully grasped the significance of when he argued the public authority
as a “middle term between an individual and the universal possibility, afforded by society, of
attaining individual ends.”94 Freedom from excessive physical and financial burdens is the only
94
Hegel, Philosophy of Right, 1 15.
40
way to reinvigorate the “spirit” of society that prevents the “last men” of Nietzsche’s
well-founded fear and embraces the love of struggle the human existence naturally is.
Conclusion: A Way Out?
If populist leaders and their proponents can capture the state apparatus, they could do
irreparable damage to liberal norms and values, a fact many people in both the United States and
Europe are slowly coming to understand. The danger of this circumstance is that populist leaders
seek to perpetuate the conflict between what they perceive to be decadent, corrupt elements of
society that may engender inimical consequences such as economic stagnation, foreign policy
fiascos, or hate crimes. As previous sections of this paper have elucidated, none of this is to say
that proponents of populism are wholly guilty for their ill-conceived beliefs however. If
anything, they need to be educated on the futility of their intransigence, and provided the
opportunity to become better versions of themselves, something extraordinarily difficult in the
United States, a country renowned for its equality under the law but not for its equality of
opportunity. If they do not have this chance, there will be nothing other than society itself they
will see as responsible for their plight and the proper object of their anger and retribution.
An accurate understanding of the human condition is necessary for an equally effective
interpretation of populism. Inherent in each person is a sense of dignity, a form of self-worth that
is reliant on the acknowledgement of other people. However, macro-economic processes are
making that desire harder to achieve for millions of people who feel their concerns have not been
received by traditional political institutions. It is up to the current generation of citizens to
understand the vagaries of economic capitalism and channel the desire for dignity into beneficial
outcomes. People who have been dislocated by globalization require adequate education,
41
training, and preparation to participate in the global economic freedoms only some have
benefitted from. The result will not only be a more equitable prosperity but also a society whose
“spirit” is characterized less by hate and anger and more by brotherhood and camaraderie. What
is required is not immediate mutual recognition for everyone persey, but the opportunity for all
to benefit from the world economy and work f or the recognition they feel they deserve. If people
do not have this opportunity, they will seek more nefarious ways of satisfying this desire, which
this paper has sought to explain the consequences of. It is our goal to actualize the aspirations
that make the human experience meaningful in a way that understands populism’s role in
engendering social change and its ineluctable part of the human story. The choice for this
decision is left to the current generation which possesses just as much the ability to change its
ways as they do the capacity to make this situation worse.

42
Works Cited
Abromeit, John. “A Critical Review of Recent Literature on Populism.” Politics and Governance
(ISSN: 2183–2463) 2017, Volume 5, Issue 4, Pages 177–186 DOI:
10.17645/pag.v5i4.1146.
Ailworth, Erin, Wells, Georgia, and Ian Lovett, “Lost in Life, El Paso Suspect Found a Dark
World Online,” The Wall Street Journal (8 August 2019)
https://www.wsj.com/articles/lost-in-life-el-paso-suspect-found-a-dark-world-online-115
65308783 [accessed 17 March 2020].
Allcock, J. B. "'POPULISM': A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY." Sociology 5, no. 3 (1971): 371-87.
Accessed March 7, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/42851097.
Anti-Defamation League. “Right-Wing Extremism Linked to Every 2018 Extremist Murder in
the U.S., ADL Finds,”
https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/right-wing-extremism-linked-to-every-2018-extr
emist-murder-in-the-us-adl-finds [accessed 17 March 2020].
Blanning, T.C.W. Short Oxford History of Europe: The Nineteenth Century. Oxford, Oxford
University Press, 2000.
Blauner, Robert. Racial Oppression in America. New York: Harper Row, 1972.
Brenan, Megan. “Americans' Trust in Government to Handle Problems at New Low,”
https://news.gallup.com/poll/246371/americans-trust-government-handle-problems-new-l
ow.aspx [accessed 16 March 2020].

43
Burnham, Douglas, and Jesinghausen, Martin. Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra: An
Edinburgh Philosophical Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010. Accessed
March 16, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central.
Coenders, Marcel, and Peer Scheepers. “The Effect of Education on Nationalism and Ethnic
Exclusionism: An International Comparison.” Political Psychology 24, no. 2 (2003):
313–43.
Congressional Budget Office, Cost Estimate: Senate Amendment 1150 to S. 1348, the
Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 (online) 24 May 2007.
https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/110th-congress-2007-2008/costestimate/sa1150ju
ne40.pdf [accessed 16 March 2020].
Clayton, Jonathan, Holland, Hereward, and Tim Gaynor. “Over One Million Sea Arrivals Reach
Europe in 2015,” The UN Refugee Agency, (30 December 2015).
https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/news/latest/2015/12/5683d0b56/million-sea-arrivals-reach-e
urope-2015.html [accessed 16 March 2020].
Dostal Jörg Michael. “The Pegida Movement and German Political Culture: Is Right-Wing
Populism Here to Stay?” The Political Quarterly 86, no. 4 (2015): 523–31.
https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-923X.12204.
Dieng, Adam. “Street by Street: Systematic Dehumanization in Europe,” (2018)
https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/Adama%20Dieng-Systematic%20
Dehumanization%20in%20Europe.pdf [accessed 17 March 2020].
“Education at a glance: Educational attainment and labour-force status,” OECD Education
Statistics (2020),
44
https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/education/data/education-at-a-glance/educational-attainme
nt-and-labour-force-status_889e8641-en [accessed 17 March 2020].
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich. Phenomenology of Spirit t ranslated by A.V. Miller. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1977.
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich. Philosophy of History translated by Leo Rauch. Indianapolis:
Hackett Publishing Company, 1988.
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich. Philosophy of Right t ranslated by S.W. Dyde. New York:
Dover Publications, Inc., 2016.
Federal Bureau of Investigation “Hate Crime Statistics,”
https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/hate-crime [accessed 17 March 2020].
Federal Bureau of Investigation, “2017 Hate Crime Statistics.”
https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2017/topic-pages/incidents-and-offenses [accessed 17
March 2020].
Funke, Manuel, Moritz Schularick, and Christoph Trebesch. “Going to Extremes: Politics After
Financial Crises, 1870-2014.” European Economic Review 88 (2016): 227–60.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2016.03.006.
Fukuyama, Francis. The End of History and the Last Man, New York: Free Press, 1992.
ew York:
Fukuyama, Francis. Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment. N
Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2018.
Gould, Elise, “Decades of Rising Inequality in the US: testimony before the US House of
representatives.”
https://www.epi.org/publication/decades-of-rising-economic-inequality-in-the-u-s-testim
45
ony-before-the-u-s-house-of-representatives-ways-and-means-committee/ [accessed 16
March 2020].
Greenstone, Michael and Adam Looney, “Ten Economic Facts About Immigration,” The
Brookings Institute, Washington D.C. (28 September 2010).
https://www.hamiltonproject.org/papers/ten_economic_facts_about_immigration
Henley, Jon. “Anti Semitism rising sharply across Europe, latest figures show,” The Guardian
(15 February 2019)
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/feb/15/antisemitism-rising-sharply-across-euro
pe-latest-figures-show [accessed 17 March 2020].
Jones, Jeffrey M. “Mentions of Immigration as Top Problem Surpass Record High.” Gallup ( 23
July 2019)
https://news.gallup.com/poll/261500/mentions-immigration-top-problem-surpass-record-
high.aspx [accessed 16 March 2020].
ew York: Hachette Book Group,

Junger, Sebastian. Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging. N
2016.
Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated By Norman Kemp Smith. Palgrave
MacMillan, 2007.
Kant, Immanuel, “Idea of a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Intent,” in Perpetual Peace
and Other Essays translated by Ted Humphrey, 29-41. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing
Company, 1983.
46
Kasprowicz, Dominika, and Agnieszka Hess. “Populism in Poland : Between Demagoguery and
Demophilia.” Środkowoeuropejskie Studia Polityczne = Central European Political
Studies 2 2017, Strony 201-214 (2017).
Kingsely, Patrick. “Anti-Semitism Is Back, From the Left, Right and Islamist Extremes. Why?”
The New York Times (4 April 2019)
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/04/world/europe/antisemitism-europe-united-states.ht
ml [accessed 17 March 2020].
Kojeve, Alexandre. Introduction to the Reading of Hegel: Lectures on the Phenomenology of
Spirit. London: Cornell University Press, 1969.
Lee, Michelle Ye Hee. “Donald Trump’s false comments connecting Mexican immigrants and
crime.” The Washington Post ( 8 July 2015) https://www.washingtonpost.com/ [accessed
16 March 2020].
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/24/opinion/income-inequality-upper-middle-class.htm
l [accessed 16 March 2020].
Leonhardt, and Quealy, “The American Middle Class Is No Longer the World’s Richest,”
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/23/upshot/the-american-middle-class-is-no-longer-the
-worlds-richest.html [accessed 16 March 2020].
Levin, Brian, and John David Reitzel. “Report to the Nation: Hate Crimes Rise in U.S. Cities and
Counties in Time of Division and Foreign Interference,” Center for Victim Research
(2018) https://ncvc.dspacedirect.org/handle/20.500.11990/975 [accessed 16 March 2020].

47
Levin, Brian and Kevin Grisham, “Special Status Report: Hate Crime in the United States,”
California State University Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism ( 2016)
https://www.csusb.edu/sites/default/files/SPECIAL%20STATUS%20REPORT%20Final
%20Draft.pdf [accessed 16 March 2020].
“Overview of the United States,” Statistical Atlas
https://statisticalatlas.com/United-States/Overview [accessed 17 March 2020].
Mian, A.R, A Sufi, and F Trebbi. “Resolving Debt Overhang: Political Constraints in the
Aftermath of Financial Crises.” Working Paper Series 17831, no. 17831 (2012).
“Migration and Migrant Population Statistics.” Eurostat (2019)
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Migration_and_migrant_popu
lation_statistics [accessed 16 March 2020].
“Migration to Europe in Charts,” BBC World News (11 September 2018)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44660699 [accessed 16 March 2020].
Miroff, Nick. “Trump administration to begin sending asylum seekers to Guatemala as soon as
this week.” The Washington Post ( 28 October 2019) https://www.washingtonpost.com/
Mondon A. “Populism, the 'People' and the Illusion of Democracy - the Front National and Ukip
in a Comparative Context.” French Politics 13, no. 2 (2015): 141–56.
https://doi.org/10.1057/fp.2015.6.
The National Center for Education Statistics, “Tuition Costs of Colleges and Universities.”
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=76 [accessed 17 March 2020].

48
Nietzsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morality. CreateSpace Independent Publishing
Platform, 2018.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform,
2018.
Nossiter, “Marine LePen Leads Far Right Fight to make France ‘More French.’” The New York
Times ( 20 April 2017)
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/20/world/europe/france-election-marine-le-pen.html
“NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist Poll National Tables October 1st, 2018,” NPR/PBS NewsHour (
October 2018)
http://maristpoll.marist.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/NPR_PBS-NewsHour_Marist-P
oll_USA-NOS-and-Tables_1810021305.pdf#page=3 [accessed 17 March 2020].
Office of Inspector General (2 July 2019). “Management Alert – DHS Needs to Address
Dangerous Overcrowding and Prolonged Detention of Children and Adults in the Rio
Grande Valley (Redacted),” Department of Homeland Security,
https://www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/assets/2019-07/OIG-19-51-Jul19_.pdf
Ohlheiser, Abby and Ian Shapira, “Gab, the white supremacist sanctuary linked to the Pittsburgh
suspect, goes offline (for now),” The Washington Post ( 29 October 2018)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/10/28/how-gab-became-white-suprem
acist-sanctuary-before-it-was-linked-pittsburgh-suspect/ [accessed 17 March 2020].

49
“Perceptions of Antisemitism,” European Commission (January 2019)
https://ec.europa.eu/commfrontoffice/publicopinion/index.cfm/survey/getsurveydetail/ins
truments/special/surveyky/2220 [accessed 17 March 2020].
Pinker, Steve. The Better Angels of our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined. New York:
Penguin Group, 2011.
Rainie, Lee and Andrew Perrin. “Key Findings about Americans’ Declining Trust in
Government and Each Other.” Pew Research Center, Washington D.C. (22 July 2019)
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/22/key-findings-about-americans-declini
ng-trust-in-government-and-each-other/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
Samer, Emine. “‘It Has Made us Feel Unsafe’: Muslim Women on Fear and Abuse after Boris
Jonson’s Burqa Remarks.” The Guardian (14 August 2018)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/14/unsafe-muslim-women-fear-abuse-bori
s-johnson-burqa [accessed 17 March 2020].
Scialaba, “How Elite Universities are Hurting America,” Foreign Affairs (April 2015)
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/2015-03-01/class-and-classroom [accessed 17
March 2020].
os Angeles, CA: Enhanced Media Publishing,

Smith, Adam. The Theory of Moral Sentiments. L
2016.
Smith, Adam. The Wealth of Nations. New York: Bantam Dell, 2003.
Taylor, Adam. “Swedish school worker killed trying to protect students in racial attack hailed as
hero.” The Washington Post ( 24 October 2015) https://www.washingtonpost.com/

50
Wike, Richard, Fetterolf, Janell, and Moira Fagan, “Europeans Credit EU With Promoting Peace
and Prosperity, but Say Brussels Is Out of Touch With Its Citizens,” Pew Research
ashington D.C. (19 March 2019).

Center W
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/19/europeans-credit-eu-with-promoting-pea
ce-and-prosperity-but-say-brussels-is-out-of-touch-with-its-citizens/ [accessed 16 March
2020].
Wike, Richard, Silver, Laura, and Alexandra Castillo. “Publics satisfied with free speech, ability
to improve living standards; many are critical of institutions, politicians,” Pew Research
ashington D.C. (29 April 2019).

Center, W
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/04/29/publics-satisfied-with-free-speech-abilit
y-to-improve-living-standards-many-are-critical-of-institutions-politicians/ [accessed 16
March 2020].
Wike, Richard, Silver, Laura, and Alexandra Castillo. “Many Across the Globe Are Dissatisfied
ashington D.C. ( 29 April

with How Democracy is Working,” Pew Research Center, W
2019).
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/04/29/many-across-the-globe-are-dissatisfied-
with-how-democracy-is-working/ [accessed 16 March 2020].
US Department of Justice, “Hate Crime Statistics,”
https://www.justice.gov/hatecrimes/hate-crime-statistics [accessed 17 March 2020].

51

William Pawlak

Uploaded by

Copyright:

William Pawlak

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

William Pawlak

Uploaded by

Copyright:

William Pawlak

Honors Seminar Paper

frivolousness, cosmopolitanism, tolerance, pleasantries, law of peoples, and whatever other

– Johann Gottfried Herder, ​Another Philosophy of History​, 14.

uproot the philosophic origins of a process considered by many to be a strictly political

been characterized by.

Kant’s “Unsocial Sociability”:

considerations. Unlike this astounding version of metaphysical knowledge able to be located in a

systematic analysis of human history and its purpose.

To a certain extent, “unsocial sociability” seems remarkably out of place in a philosophy

Hegel and the “Desire for a Desire”:

an infinitesimal framework for human behavior to a universal character that prefigures, he

​ egel argued that the

life, not that of an independent, thinking person.12 To attain self-consciousness, therefore, is to

produce populist urges.

members of a community. “Self-consciousness is not yet mind’s consciousness of itself,” Hegel

neither wishes to “recognize” the other as a self-consciousness (a “being-for-self”). Since such

slave, transforms his servitude into a coequal partnership.

what it was prior.

Nietszche and the “Will to Power”:

improvements in the manufacture of textiles and steel were complemented by monumental

advances in transportation systems which made Europe a productive, interconnected continent by

they should necessarily hope for.

most importantly, recognition of genuine superiority for universal belittlement. Nietzsche’s

for recognition” Nietzsche promulgated as the “will to power,” a collection of unconscious

​ ismissive of any form of

treated equal in every circumstance; the “desire to be recognized as superior to others,” as

brimming with technological improvement and broadening political enfranchisement in

accord to the bellicose reality he thought life on earth was.

Primordial Position and Value as a Consequence of Desire:

other conclusion remaining is a type of recognition that cannot indefinitely be satiated,

desperately needs an Hegelian interpretation adapted to current circumstances, the rational

pursuit of ​maximum r​ ecognition that is as much a consequence of the individual’s ambition as it

that are superficially advertised to all.

“spirit” – either according to radical ideas of future development or anachronistic conceptions of

Part II: Anger and Anomie

from universal suffrage, a monumental achievement considering the plenitude of autocratic

populism has become so prominent today. A concatenation of economic dislocation, political

of history and constrain the choices available to their fellow citizens.

Modern Capitalism and Anomie:

difficult to understand but relatively simple to recognize. The sophistication of a country’s

against the mercantile, monopolistic economies of Europe​. ​Improvements in technology

the process moving forward.

Globalization and automation require a generation of educated, professional, and

corroborate these viewpoints.

as economic inequality continues to ossify political boundaries today.

foreign nationals and migrants.

Considering the economic dilemma globalization engenders, it is unsurprising key

gerrymandering and lobbying, is not fatuous to any extent.

Immigration, Sovereignty, and Identity:

greater federal aid.

stratagem aimed at the displacement and/or replacement of the autochthonous population by

Nowhere has immigration elicited as widespread criticism and opprobrium as it has in

Europe’s population.56 Therefore, it is unsurprising many populist parties and associations

page of disgruntled local citizens (specifically a football league) in southern Germany.57 In

from the United States as well.

unlikely to provide a permanent solution to the increase in worldwide immigration, which is

efforts towards reframing socially acceptable behavior ... and persons.

Violence and Hate crimes: A Worrying Increase

both in the United States and Europe.

“race/ethnicity/ancestry” category (58 percent to be exact), the overall total representing an

degradation of traditional American culture.”73 Whether it be Robert Bower’s contributions to

apparent in Europe as well.

letterbox, prompting an increase in Muslim women to reportedly feel unsafe.77 Most

– Johann Gottfried Herder, Another Philosophy of History, 14.

egel argued that the

ismissive of any form of

pursuit of maximum r ecognition that is as much a consequence of the individual’s ambition as it

against the mercantile, monopolistic economies of Europe. Improvements in technology

World Online,” The Wall Street Journal (8 August 2019)

65308783 [accessed 17 March 2020].

Allcock, J. B. "'POPULISM': A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY." Sociology 5, no. 3 (1971): 371-87.

Accessed March 7, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/42851097.

emist-murder-in-the-us-adl-finds [accessed 17 March 2020].

ow.aspx [accessed 16 March 2020].

Burnham, Douglas, and Jesinghausen, Martin. Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra: An

Edinburgh Philosophical Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010. Accessed

Exclusionism: An International Comparison.” Political Psychology 24, no. 2 (2003):

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 (online) 24 May 2007.

ne40.pdf [accessed 16 March 2020].

Europe in 2015,” The UN Refugee Agency, (30 December 2015).

urope-2015.html [accessed 16 March 2020].

Dehumanization%20in%20Europe.pdf [accessed 17 March 2020].

“Education at a glance: Educational attainment and labour-force status,” OECD Education

nt-and-labour-force-status_889e8641-en [accessed 17 March 2020].

https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/hate-crime [accessed 17 March 2020].

Financial Crises, 1870-2014.” European Economic Review 88 (2016): 227–60.

Brookings Institute, Washington D.C. (28 September 2010).

pe-latest-figures-show [accessed 17 March 2020].

high.aspx [accessed 16 March 2020].

ew York: Hachette Book Group,

Demophilia.” Środkowoeuropejskie Studia Polityczne = Central European Political

Studies 2 2017, Strony 201-214 (2017).

The New York Times (4 April 2019)

ml [accessed 17 March 2020].

Kojeve, Alexandre. Introduction to the Reading of Hegel: Lectures on the Phenomenology of

Spirit. London: Cornell University Press, 1969.

crime.” The Washington Post ( 8 July 2015) https://www.washingtonpost.com/ [accessed

l [accessed 16 March 2020].

-worlds-richest.html [accessed 16 March 2020].

(2018) https://ncvc.dspacedirect.org/handle/20.500.11990/975 [accessed 16 March 2020].

%20Draft.pdf [accessed 16 March 2020].

“Overview of the United States,” Statistical Atlas