The bad kind of populism is when an elite says they speak for the masses without actually consulting them. The public at large in such populism is a passive entity. The masses become a strawman used to pretend a majority support the autocrat's actions even if you cant find any particular person who does.

The sort of "populism" without a leader discussed in this article is nothing like that. But there are political powers that wish to ignore that a lot of people can be legitimately angry at the same time.