Author: Matthew Armstrong
Armstrong, Matthew, 2022 Democratic sovereigntist and revolutionary internationalist approaches to foreign policy: identifying the two types of approaches to foreign policy adopted by European left-wing populist parties, Flinders University, College of Business, Government and Law
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This thesis addresses the problem of identifying the different types of foreign policy approaches adopted by European left-wing populist parties. An ideational approach to populism is taken, defining populism as a ‘thin’ ideology not substantive enough to address a broad set of societal issues. Due to the limited ambition of and scope of populism as a ‘thin’ ideology it attaches itself to more substantive ‘full’ ideologies. Although populism is a ‘thin’ ideology it does possess core concepts. Two of these core concepts are the existence of the ‘people’ and the ‘elite’ as two homogenous units of analysis and that there exists an antagonistic relationship between the ‘people’ and the ‘elite’. Populism is predicated on this antagonistic relationship. Left-wing populism is a brand of politics that exhibits the central feature of populist ‘thin’ ideology of the ‘people’ pitted against the ‘elite’ in combination with the inclusiveness of left-wing ideological thought. Left-wing populism distinguishes itself from right-wing populism by having an inclusive conception of the people in contrast to right-wing populism’s exclusive conception of the ‘people’. It separates itself from mainstream centre-left politics through its rejection of neoliberal hegemony in its attempt to protect the social democratic ‘heartland’ that mainstream centre-left politics has abandoned. The foreign policy approaches of six European left-wing populist parties are analysed in this thesis. They are differentiated and placed in a typology based on how close they resemble an ideal type of left-wing populist approach to foreign policy offered by this thesis. The ideal type of left-wing populist approach to foreign policy offered by this thesis is an approach to foreign policy predicated on a populist conception of an antagonistic relationship between the ‘people’ and the ‘elite’ in combination with the inclusivity of left-wing ideological thought. These two core components are the exhibition of the first two core concepts of populist ‘thin’ ideology combined with ‘full’ left-wing ideological thought based on the dimensions of inclusivity. Two types of foreign policy approaches adopted by European left-wing populist parties are identified. These two types are the democratic sovereigntist and revolutionary internationalist approaches. The main distinguishing differences between these two types of foreign policy approaches are the exhibition of core concepts of ‘thin’ populist ideology and the advocation of national sovereignty. The democratic sovereigntist approach to foreign policy exhibits both core components of the ideal type of left-wing populist approach to foreign policy in that it exhibits both a populist conception of an antagonistic relationship between the ‘people’ and the ‘elite’ and the inclusiveness of ‘full’ left-wing ideological thought. The revolutionary internationalist approach to foreign policy only exhibits the second core component of the ideal type of left-wing populist approach to foreign policy, that being the inclusiveness of ‘full’ left-wing ideological thought. The democratic sovereigntist approach to foreign policy also advocates for national sovereignty in order to protect social democracy from global neoliberalism and correlates its populism with the advocation of national sovereignty. National sovereignty has no role in the revolutionary internationalist approach to foreign policy.
Keywords: populism, left-wing populism, European populist political parties, foreign policy, populism and foreign policy, democratic sovereigntism, revolutionary internationalism
Subject: International Relations thesis
Thesis type: Masters
Completed: 2022
School: College of Business, Government and Law
Supervisor: Associate Professor Rob Manwaring