Pop-socialism: a new radical left politics? Evaluating the rise and fall of the British and Italian left in the anti-austerity age
Pop-socialism: a new radical left politics? Evaluating the rise and fall of the British and Italian left in the anti-austerity age
This article draws from primary research – including 46 semi-structured interviews – to provide a comparative analysis of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the British Labour Party between 2015 and 2020, and Nichi Vendola’s leadership of the Italian radical left between 2010 and 2015. It is claimed that both cases represent a new form of left politics – which we term pop-socialism – that combines popular-democratic appeals to the ‘people’ with the traditional class-based demands of democratic socialism. This contributes to recent literature on radical left politics and left populism by providing an insight into the underexplored relationship between popular-democratic and class politics. Moreover, the article provides an important empirical account of Corbyn and Vendola’s rapid mobilisation but also their equally abrupt decline.
686-701
Ward, Bradley
335d276e-caaf-4f83-9191-d031f5bb759b
Guglielmo, Marco
094ce2cd-5e7d-411a-a6f0-ff569b4c6650
1 November 2022
Ward, Bradley
335d276e-caaf-4f83-9191-d031f5bb759b
Guglielmo, Marco
094ce2cd-5e7d-411a-a6f0-ff569b4c6650
Ward, Bradley and Guglielmo, Marco
(2022)
Pop-socialism: a new radical left politics? Evaluating the rise and fall of the British and Italian left in the anti-austerity age.
The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 24 (4), .
(doi:10.1177/13691481211044643).
Abstract
This article draws from primary research – including 46 semi-structured interviews – to provide a comparative analysis of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the British Labour Party between 2015 and 2020, and Nichi Vendola’s leadership of the Italian radical left between 2010 and 2015. It is claimed that both cases represent a new form of left politics – which we term pop-socialism – that combines popular-democratic appeals to the ‘people’ with the traditional class-based demands of democratic socialism. This contributes to recent literature on radical left politics and left populism by providing an insight into the underexplored relationship between popular-democratic and class politics. Moreover, the article provides an important empirical account of Corbyn and Vendola’s rapid mobilisation but also their equally abrupt decline.
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ward-guglielmo-2021-pop-socialism-a-new-radical-left-politics-evaluating-the-rise-and-fall-of-the-british-and-italian
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e-pub ahead of print date: 25 September 2021
Published date: 1 November 2022
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Local EPrints ID: 481905
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/481905
ISSN: 1369-1481
PURE UUID: 4e799c3d-32a3-4e39-a2d0-709a1580fb9e
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Date deposited: 12 Sep 2023 17:02
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 04:34
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Author:
Bradley Ward
Author:
Marco Guglielmo
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