Populism in abeyance: the survival of populist repertoires of contention in North Italy

ABSTRACT

Long seen as divergent in nature, the fields of populist studies and social movement analysis have rarely been the focus of cross-disciplinary research. This paper, by encouraging such convergence makes two significant contributions to both the study of populism and social movements. First, by combining a discourse theoretical approach to populism with social movement theories of abeyance and ‘cultural repertoires’, it examines populist discourse as a form of contentious politics. Second, using primary and secondary sources of both a textual and visual nature, it applies this framework to a case study of North Italian populist regionalism and in doing so takes a diachronic approach to populism. This allows for a clearer understanding of not only of the decline of certain populist movements, but also how these movements’ repertoires are transmitted between separate waves of activism.

KEYWORDS:

• Populism
• abeyance
• contentious politics
• repertoires of contention
• social movements
• regionalism

Acknowledgements

This article was first presented at a Politics Research Seminar at the University of Bath on 28 April 2020. I would like to thank the seminar convenor Jack Copley and my colleagues at this seminar for their helpful comments and feedback. Big thanks also go to Dr Aurelien Mondon, Professor Anna Cento Bull and the anonymous reviewers of this paper for their invaluable comments on earlier drafts.

Funder details

No funding has been received for this paper.

Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Primary sources at the following locations:Archivio di Stato di Torino Fasc.Movimento per l’Autonomia Regionale Piemontese, vol.1, Cat.A3A,; Istituto Bergamasco per la Storia della Resistenza e dell’età contemporanea (ISREC); Biblioteca Angelo Mai, Bergamo; Biblioteca Nazionale di Roma

Additional information

Notes on contributors

George Newth

George Newth holds a PhD in Politics, Languages and International Studies from University of Bath where he is Lecturer in Italian Politics. His research focuses on the links between regionalism, nationalism and populism with a particular interest in the history of the Lega Nord.