Pioneers of Populism in the 20th Century and the Prevalence of Populist Leaders in the 21st Century

Abstract

The organization of this paper is as follows. First, it will provide a review on the conceptualization of populism. Then, it will describe the emergence of populist pioneers, their ideologies, their political approaches and their outcomes across all abovementioned countries. Second, using the same approach, this paper will describe the emergence of populist leaders in the 21st century and the absence of a populist leader in the case of Colombia. Later, it will look at the idiosyncrasies of Colombia to explain the absence of populism by taking a historical approach. Finally, through an analysis of the populist leaders of the 1900’s, this research will determine possible explanations for the differences in the leadership of these three countries in the 2000’s. Specific attention will be paid to the ideological legacies and institutional footprint related to mass mobilization.

This paper particularly focuses in Venezuela, Argentina and Colombia because the pioneers of populism in these countries represent interesting cases to explore. . . . [From Introduction]