This book describes the global spread of nationalist-populism by rightwing and racist political parties; their impact on political, economic, and sociocultural globalization; and the corrosive impact of this ideology on the global liberal order that emerged after World War II under United States leadership. The global liberal order is a system of norms including peace and security, democracy, human rights, free trade, financial stability and support for a broad range of international governmental organizations and treaties fostering interstate and transnational cooperation to advance those norms and resolve collective problems. Examples of these organizations are the United Nations, European Union, NATO, World Health Organization, World Trade Organization, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and the Paris Climate Accord. Suitable for interested scholars and general readers as well as a classroom text.

Populism and globalization are shorthand for the temper of our times. Populism is usually cast as globalization’s nemesis, a backlash against worldwide connectivity, while globalization is often said to be in retreat or even demise. This book takes issue with both interpretations, claiming instead that while populism of all shades tends to be anti-globalist, the globalism it is pitted against has changed dramatically in recent years and is increasingly decentred, destabilized, contingent, multipolar, and multidirectional. Axford paints a picture of this new globalization and dissects the strains of postmodern populism that both contest it and are its expression. Attention to the current surge of populism also affords purchase on an axial feature of our turbulent and globalized world—the imbrication or antithesis of local and global, of difference and sameness. This is an interdisciplinary examination of populism as a factor in global change, drawing on international politics, sociology, and global studies.

This volume illustrates the diversity of populism globally. When seeking power, populists politicize issues, and point to problems that need to be addressed such as inequalities, the loss of national sovereignty to globalization, or the rule of unresponsive political elites. Yet their solutions tend to be problematic, simplistic, and in most instances, instead of leading to better forms of democracy, their outcomes are authoritarian. Populists use a playbook of concentrating power in the hands of the president, using the legal system instrumentally to punish critics, and attacking the media and civil society. Despite promising to empower the people, populists lead to processes of democratic erosion and even transform malfunctioning democracies into hybrid regimes. The Routledge Handbook of Global Populism provides instructors, students, and researchers with a thorough and systematic overview of the history and development of populism and analyzes the main debates. It is divided into sections on the theories of populism, on political and social theory and populism, on how populists politicize inequalities and differences, on the media and populism, on its ambiguous relationships with democratization and authoritarianism, and on the distinct regional manifestations of populism. Leading international academics from history, political science, media studies, and sociology map innovative ideas and areas of theoretical and empirical research to understand the phenomenon of global populism.

Rather than reaching the “end of ideology” predicted only three decades ago, we find ourselves in the throes of an intensifying ideological struggle over the meaning and direction of globalization. Noted scholar Manfred B. Steger introduces readers to the clashing political belief systems of our time: market globalism, justice globalism, and religious globalism. He shows how these “globalisms” have developed and how their competing ideas articulate and legitimize particular political agendas. He focuses especially on the ways this battle of ideas has been extended through the unexpectedly powerful surge of antiglobalist populism, an ideological contender that stands in tension to pluralist values of liberal democracy. Explaining the origins, impacts, and consequences of the recent populist challenge, Steger considers the future prospects for the established globalisms in what promises to be a tumultuous decade—as global problems such as climate change, pandemics, transnational terrorism, financial crises, and cyber-warfare threaten humanity’s collective future.

Around the world, populism has weaponized anxieties over globalization and other forms of cultural, social, and economic change. Many populist leaders have succeeded in conflating trade concerns with apprehensions over immigration, thereby creating potent campaigns to overturn existing trade agreements and the multilateral cooperation they embody. In the United States, avowed protectionist Donald Trump set out not only to raise tariffs, but to dismantle the system of global trade embodied in the World Trade Organization. In the UK, the Brexit referendum resulted in that country's withdrawal from the European Union, ending its commitment to trade integration with the continent. Populism and Trade explores the impact of populist regimes on protectionism and the damage they have inflicted on global trade and trade policy institutions. Focusing on the disruption caused by the Trump administration and the Brexit referendum, the book traces the influence of populism on trade policy today. Kent Jones shows how these methods will continue to damage global cooperation--something that is essential when faced with international crises like a deadly pandemic--until the sources of populist anger can be addressed. He argues that economic and institutional reforms, along with better education and adjustment policies, will be necessary to break the populist fever. In an age of global populism, open trade policy has become a victim of anti-globalization and economic nationalism. Populism and Trade traces the impact of these divisive political tactics to explain the fragile nature of global trade institutions and the steps needed to save them.

Deftly navigating the tensions among globalization, national sovereignty, and democracy, Straight Talk on Trade presents an indispensable commentary on today's world economy and its dilemmas, and offers a visionary framework at a critical time when it is most needed.

“A hugely valuable contribution. . . . In setting out a defence of the best in economics, Rodrik has also provided a goal for the discipline as a whole.” —Martin Sandbu, Financial Times In the wake of the financial crisis and the Great Recession, economics seems anything but a science. In this sharp, masterfully argued book, Dani Rodrik, a leading critic from within, takes a close look at economics to examine when it falls short and when it works, to give a surprisingly upbeat account of the discipline. Drawing on the history of the field and his deep experience as a practitioner, Rodrik argues that economics can be a powerful tool that improves the world—but only when economists abandon universal theories and focus on getting the context right. Economics Rules argues that the discipline's much-derided mathematical models are its true strength. Models are the tools that make economics a science. Too often, however, economists mistake a model for the model that applies everywhere and at all times. In six chapters that trace his discipline from Adam Smith to present-day work on globalization, Rodrik shows how diverse situations call for different models. Each model tells a partial story about how the world works. These stories offer wide-ranging, and sometimes contradictory, lessons—just as children’s fables offer diverse morals. Whether the question concerns the rise of global inequality, the consequences of free trade, or the value of deficit spending, Rodrik explains how using the right models can deliver valuable new insights about social reality and public policy. Beyond the science, economics requires the craft to apply suitable models to the context. The 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers challenged many economists' deepest assumptions about free markets. Rodrik reveals that economists' model toolkit is much richer than these free-market models. With pragmatic model selection, economists can develop successful antipoverty programs in Mexico, growth strategies in Africa, and intelligent remedies for domestic inequality. At once a forceful critique and defense of the discipline, Economics Rules charts a path toward a more humble but more effective science.