The problematic part about these discussions is defining what 'democracy' and 'populism' really is.

Democracy is essentially shared, representative decision making based on a set of shared values and rules which every participant subscribes to.

It's perfectly valid to promote your ideas and policies to your constituency with respect to the governing framework which is democracy. The mechanics may seem 'populist' e.g. campaigning, advertising, interviews,... but the fundamentals aren't challenged.

Populism, however, does challenge those fundamentals. And it does so by using the governing rules and values within a democratic framework to challenge that framework itself. Examples of that is relentlessly attacking press and journalism itself, or antagonizing political adversaries, rather then challenging ideas and policies in a respectful public debate. The really insidious part are leveraging tactics that veil these as paramount to the sustainability of democracy.

In that regard, democracy is innately flawed. It doesn't nor can't stop the rise of populists who push democracy out of the door. Ultimately, it's a social construct which people actually have to subscribe to. And if environmental circumstances change - e.g. economic recessions, social inequalities, existential threats,... - a critical mass within a population can grow which no longer is willing to subscribe to that construct.

Or, worse, assumes that the alternative they subscribe to is democratic by nature when it is anything but democratic. History has an abundance of autocratic states who use 'democratic' or 'people' in their own naming e.g. the German Democratic Republic.

Democracy is always at odds with the social-economic dynamics and the formation of cultural and economic elites which hold de facto power and have plenty incentives to leverage political power in order to retain a status quo. Democracy doesn't overcome that, and never will.

However, what democracy does have going for itself is that it enshrines and protects an important set of fundamental freedoms and rights which apply to everyone regardless of their position in society.

I really like your analysis. I think the fundamental reason why is democracy so vulnerable is that in practice, there is a lot of socioeconomic inequality in societies, and that really erodes the core democratic concept that everyone should participate equally in decision-making.

So in very unequal societies with a semblance of democracy, like in South America (and it's slowly coming to USA as well), you get these right and left populist oscillations, as different classes (upper and lower) seek to gain all political power. I don't think anybody has figured out an effective way yet how to dampen these oscillations in a society, and equalize it, so it would return to the ideal democratic mode.

What are some examples of democracies that are keeping populism at bay?

I live in a country that became democratic around when I was born. I don't feel that as a young democracy we're doing a particularly good job at keeping populism at bay; I'd go so far as to say we're failing at it.

I don't get the feeling there's much populism in New Zealand, Finland or Denmark, all of which had Womens Suffrage at least somewhat before 1900.

Sweden has been struggling with it recently, and Australia is pretty bad. Isle of Man does fine.

I think you are confusing a lack of populism with homogeneity of thought/culture. Your examples are all pretty small countries with little cultural divides. Even NZ got pretty populist on immigration when the number of immigrants started to increase, and Denmark literally was the harshest on refugees; they literally sent them all back a few months ago now that they say Syria is safe enough. Sweden is another example where populism went through the roof seemingly out of the blue, considering its historically consensus/trust based democratic system, for reasons similar to almost every other country in Europe. If Sweden went that way, I'd think any country could.

If anything, I think your examples prove why populism is inherent to truky democratic systems. To me, it's actually a sign of a well functioning, diverse society not only demographically but also ideologically. And that's imo pretty healthy - at least much more so than a permanent homogenous consensus.

(And in a democracy if elected politicians don't align with voters under the pretext of not bending to populist demands, someone else will do it. The job of politicians in a democracy is to represent the electorate, not the opposite.)

New Zealand surely has a decidedly non-little cultural divide. It manages to avoid populism despite extraordinary pressures.

> Britain has failed at it

I don't see that (I live here).

The UK has had a two-party system for at least 60 years. The Conservative Party is much the same as it was under Margaret Thatcher: xenophobic, opposed to public expenditure. The Labour Party is currently in the grip of people who admire Tony Blair's policies (interventionism, focus groups, and triangulation).

Labour had a brief phase of mass-movement socialism under Jeremy Corbyn, who might be tagged "populist", but didn't deserve that tag. The current Conservative Party is led by a would-be populist; but the rest of the party doesn't seem to admire him very much. The only real populist much in evidence recently was Nigel Farage, who seems to spend more of his time in US TV studios than on UK TV.

"India is failing, Britain has failed" makes it sound as if UK politics is dominated by pogroms, temple-burnings and riots - as if British society is in a worse state than Indian society. That's far from the truth.

And I should add that for the sake of clarity, in a second comment here, that I don't for a moment believe all of these failures started with Boris; many started with Blair. Not least the pipeline of dark money that flowed into politics with gambling deregulation and policies friendly to Russian oligarchs. Some were worsened under the coalition government, some modestly reversed.

But the acceleration of the problems in just two years of Boris's regime is a failure of democracy to repel populism and the attacks on institutions that populism demands.

> I don't see that (I live here).

I also live here.

Brexit is evidence of a failure of democracy to contain populism. It is absolutely not in our national interest, is already harming us, was almost certainly bankrolled by dark money and foreign influence campaigns, used unlawful tactics and above all was driven by systematic populist xenophobia.

As you live here you will also have received the leaflet that tried to show the threat of Turkey joining the EU (with a map that didn't mark out Turkey but did mark out Iraq and Syria) even though Turkey is no closer to achieving membership now than it ever was -- this was vile populist manipulation.

Boris runs Number 10 as if it is unaccountable to parliament. He flings out bread-and-circuses distractions when his mendacious lying is exposed. He deliberately deployed a populist smear in parliament for which he won't apologise in parliament, and people around him rallied to support it as he doubled down.

We are heading into a criminalisation of dissent and protest that even Maggie wouldn't have tried. We have a government implementing serious voter suppression based on untruths.

And we have a populist leader of a government that is increasingly corrupt, who rode into power on a Brexit wave who does not believe the rules apply to him (and who has evidence to support it, given how many last-last-last-chances he's been given to "shape up") and a ruling party that appears to be swimming in Russian influence money in a manner so severe that our "special relationship" partner has openly rebuked us for it, and so damaging that our prime minister buried a report into it.

Boris is engaging in Trumpian tactics and his party seem unable to do a thing about it; the frog is being boiled just the same way as it (still) is in the USA.

We're in enormous trouble.

(And what is really striking to me is that the bulk of the criticism I have typed above is apolitical; members of his own party have levelled essentially all of these criticisms).

> Brexit is evidence of a failure of democracy to contain populism.

There seems to be a tendency here to contrast "populism" with "democracy".

I don't think either term is well-defined. "Democracy" is usually taken to mean electoral democracy, whether PR of FPTP; "populism" is a vaguer term, commonly used as an insult to hurl at your adversaries. But I take it to refer to the espousing of policies that appeal to ignorant people, but don't make sense.

Those two things are orthogonal; if populists win the most votes in a democratic election, the winner is both democratic and populist.

I completely agree that the PM is a populist, and that his government is corrupt.

For what it's worth, I think it's a good thing that his party has so far been unable to unseat him. He is the Labour Party's greatest asset (especially so, given that Keir Starmer's main spiel is attacking Johnson and his antics and lies).

I'm no admirer of either the Tories or Starmer's centrist Labour. I'm just saying that while I don't think Labour can win under Starmer, I think the Tories can lose, if they don't dump Boris soon. Regrettably, I don't think there's any prospect of Labour dumping Starmer.

> For what it's worth, I think it's a good thing that his party has so far been unable to unseat him. He is the Labour Party's greatest asset (especially so, given that Keir Starmer's main spiel is attacking Johnson and his antics and lies).

I hear this from people a lot, and if you'll allow me to be blunt, I think this position is insane, when the country is heading into exactly the kind of omnicrisis that birthed people like Orbán. The longer we have a prime minister and a cabinet of loyalists who are happy to serve up bigoted, lunatic "red meat" strategies to "Save Big Dog", the less recoverable our situation is.

And the longer he stays around, the greater the chance of the kind of staff turnover that leads to kakistocracy. Why would anyone who is actually good at their job and keen to carry out a public service stay around to take the blame and get even more dirty with scandals not of their making?

It's like Trump didn't happen.

> I think this position is insane

So who do you think is most likely to replace Boris as PM, if he is kicked out? Truss? Sunak?

Frankly, I prefer incompentent corrupt Tory leaders to competent corrupt Tory leaders. Boris is an albatross around the Tories' neck, and if they do remove him, it'll be because they can see that he's a liability. It's good if the Tories are encumbered by a clown.

Sunak is the likely winner isn't he; it's in the ordinary progression of things. But there are competent, non-corrupt people in the party who are in the running, like Tom Tugendhat, who is obviously the stalking horse but has more of a chance if the contest becomes truly divisive. I'd sleep much better if either of them were in the job, but I am more comfortable with the idea of a Tugendhat Cabinet.

It's important to internalise that Boris is not a clown. That is the wrong way to look at him, not least because clowning requires empathy.

> but I am more comfortable with the idea of a Tugendhat Cabinet.

Good luck with that! I don't think he has a snowflake's (and I don't think he'd run). Sunak will bring back austerity and handouts for bankers (Sunak is a banker).

> It's important to internalise that Boris is not a clown.

I agree that he's not so green as he's cabbage-looking. He's not stupid. But he does treat everything as a joke, including his own hair. At any rate, I don't think it's important to internalise anything about Boris; I'm pretty sure he's finished.

Tugendhat has already announced that he will run in that contest.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tom-tugendhat...

As to a snowflake's, as of a week ago when the prospect of a contest really emerged, the betting markets thought his chance was 16/1 and now his odds are between 6/1 and 9/1 depending on where you look. Not far off Truss's odds.

Not a snowflake's -- he's in fourth place and it's more like we need to see whether Jeremy Hunt will run or endorse. Tugendhat has pull in the national party (even if half of the parliamentary party hate him for being a "swot" -- i.e. actual public service instead of a PPE degree and some time at a hedge fund). I think if Hunt decides not to run, there is a good chance he gets to take it to the country.

I would observe that Jeremy Corbyn started out with longer odds in the 2015 Labour leadership campaign.

Boris's hair is not a joke. Nothing about his appearance is a joke. It is carefully crafted to maximise his innate characteristics and play up to a distracting stereotype. He had his flat done up for £100,000 by an exclusive designer, his wife is a smart dresser, and he is surrounded by PR people. Everything about the way Boris looks and acts is planned. Understand that he's a sociopath. And sociopaths do what they do. This will be a rough contest.

P.S. I enjoyed this disagreement; it has helped me assemble my thoughts :-)

> was almost certainly bankrolled by dark money

Look at the bright side of it, now we can spend some of that money on the NHS!