Let’s Own the Term “Elitism”

Michael Magoon suggests that we stop using the term “populism”. He argues that it is ill-defined, incoherent, pejorative and selectively applied — that it is used to attack political opponents without having to engage in a serious discussion, to quietly imply authoritarianism, and to stir up support for limiting free speech and democratic competition.

But one can restate the problem in a different way: The problem with the term is that calling someone a populist comes with no cost. Compare: When you accuse someone of being on the left, it implies that you are on the right. Attacking the right implies that you are on the left. But with “populist” there is no such position-taking. It does not bind you to anything. You insult the other person without opening yourself up to criticism. It’s cheap.

This is what Magoon has in mind:

“Marie Le Pen is a populist.”“Oh, wow. Scary. What can we do to keep her out of the elections?”

But what if we just started to call the anti-populist stance “elitism” instead? How about this?

“Giorgia Meloni is a populist.”“Oh, wow. So you’re an elitist? Do tell me more.”

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Once you start thinking of populism as the antonym to elitism, the term is no longer as vague as it used to be. You can link both populism and elitism to concrete policy preferences.

If you think interest rates should be set by an independent central bank, rather than by elected officials, you are an elitist.

If, on the other hand, you believe the guilt of a defendant should be settled by a randomly selected jury rather than by a professor of jurisprudence, you are a populist.

If you believe that people are overwhelmingly in favor of price controls and have no idea how damaging those are, and that therefore they should not be let anywhere near the ballot box, you are an elitist.

If you think the decision to turn a neighborhood into a pedestrian zone should be made by popular vote rather than by the mayor, you are a populist.

If you believe that constitutional change should require a supermajority, a second chamber and a constitutional court rather than just fifty percent plus one, you are an elitist.

If you believe that a nuclear power plant design should be settled by popular vote rather than decided by nuclear physicists, you are a populist.

If you agree that people should choose names for their babies from a list curated by language experts, you are an elitist.

If you believe the name of a polar research vessel should be settled by internet poll, that it should be called Boaty McBoatface rather than RRS Sir David Attenborough, you are a populist.

In short, as a populist, you prefer a referendum to an elected politician, and an elected politician to an unelected bureaucrat. As an elitist, you prefer a nuclear physicist to an elected politician, and an elected politician to a referendum in which a technical matter is decided by a mass of clueless voters.

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By the way, the distinction is not set up so that one side always comes out on top. There is a coherent argument to be made on each side.

The elitist argument: The world is getting ever more complex. There’s barely a single political decision to be made without facing a lot of technical details. Unintended consequences abound, visible only to experts. More decisions should therefore be made by the people who actually know what they are talking about.

The populist argument: Leaving the populace out of the decision-making process creates resentment. Trust in government goes down, legitimacy collapses. In the US, it is currently at 18%. Experts make better decisions, but deferring to them erodes social consensus. Proceed like this and people start wondering about whether elections are being stolen. Expect a drop in state capacity, people sabotaging the state out of sheer resentment and, eventually, a civil war.

***

Many contemporary political questions make more sense on the populist/elitist axis than on the left/right one: DOGE, Brussels bureaucracy, NIMBY versus YIMBY, building nuclear plants and datacenters, even immigration.

But very much like left/right, populism/elitism is a scale, not a binary distinction. The best solution lies at neither extreme. Neither communists, nor Nazis build successful, happy states. And neither do far-populist, vote-about-everything people or far-elitist social engineers.

What you want, in the end, is a balance. The real discussion happens between center-elitists and center-populists. Let experts decide, by all means, but let a popular vote stop them when they go off the rails. Accept technically inferior decisions on a few salient matters so that the general populace can verify that the democratic safeguards still work.

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Finally: Would politicians accept these labels?

Well, the term “elitism” is approximately as offensive as “populism”, so it balances out. Neither side has cause to feel wronged.

Besides, the actors involved don’t seem all that reluctant to appropriate the terms.

Matteo Salvini: “I am and I will always be a populist, because who listens to the people does his job and his duty?”

There’s a lot of that kind of conditional acceptance, from Trump to Mélenchon. ("Populiste, moi? J'assume!")

On the other side of the barricade, Richard Hanania would, I believe, gladly describe himself as an elitist. Or here’s an article self-describing effective altruism as an elitist movement. Even more so, it puts the elitism at the very core of the ideology: Stop being an elitist and you stop being an effective altruist. When Greta Thunberg says “listen to the scientists,” she’s taking an explicitly elitist stance. Whether she’d own the term is not clear, but in the end, nothing stops the others from applying it to her.

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It often feels like the old left/right spectrum has outlived its usefulness. Stretched to fit current controversies, it no longer resembles its former self. Maybe the populist/elitist spectrum would fit the modern world better. Or, for those attached to the old labels, one can think in terms of a political compass with left/right and populist/elitist axes.