The Triad People-Elite-Leader: Reflections on the Relationship Between Morality and Populist Discourse

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Elizabeth Villanueva Jurado

Abstract

The core of populist discourse involves simplifying the political landscape to a dichotomous struggle between the people as historical victims and the elite as corrupt and incorrigible. However, despite repeatedly emphasizing this difference in moral terms, little attention has been paid to the implications of using morality as a discursive referent or as an explanatory factor for how populist discourses so efficiently permeate the public space. This article analyzes the human being as a moral animal, retrieving Christian Smith's arguments, which will allow us to elucidate his approach to institutions as morally regulated enterprises, arguing its importance for the analysis of institutions such as democracy or phenomena such as populism. From this, the moral dimensions that interweave the people-elites-populist leader triad are identified, allowing us to understand how individuals receive, adhere to, and internalize the discourse and how this affects their decision-making and political participation.

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How to Cite
Villanueva Jurado, E. (2024). The Triad People-Elite-Leader: Reflections on the Relationship Between Morality and Populist Discourse. Revista Mexicana De Ciencias Políticas Y Sociales, 69(252). https://doi.org/10.22201/fcpys.2448492xe.2024.252.89333

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Author Biography

Elizabeth Villanueva Jurado, FCPyS, UNAM

Elizabeth Villanueva Jurado es licenciada en Relaciones Internacionales por la unam y estudiante de maestría en Estudios Políticos y Sociales en la misma institución. Es miembro fundador del Seminario de Intersecciones de lo Religioso, en el cual coordina el área editorial, y es parte del Grupo de Trabajo clacso “Religiones y sociedad. Tensiones, diversidades y movilizaciones en debate”. Sus líneas de investigación son democracia, moral, identidades y sociología de la religión. Entre sus publicaciones más recientes se encuentran: “Moral, religión y laicidad: un acercamiento teórico” (en prensa) en Mónica Ulloa-Gómez y Erick Paz-González, Entre lo político y lo religioso: Dinámicas asociativas en América Latina y España. CLACSO; “La Guía Ética para la Transformación de México: apuntes sobre la laicidad y la dimensión moral de la democracia” (en prensa) en Adrián Cerón, Mónica Guitián, Mariana Molina y Vanessa Reséndiz, Secularización, laicidad, y sus efectos en el ejercicio de los derechos. IIJ/UNAM.

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