The difference? It is simply a question of competency – having the attention span to make it to the end of a briefing memo; an ability to negotiate corridors of power; a sufficient grasp of reality to appreciate the labyrinthine difficulties of enacting legislation in modern, bipolar, democratic contexts.

Italy is, as ever, ahead of the curve (in the worst possible sense). If the Romans created the first effective state apparatus – the Renaissance emerged from Florence, Mussolini invented Fascism and, more recently, the 1990s’ Silvio Berlusconi wrote the first populist playbook – once again Italy is a vanguard of the most depressing sort.

The frontrunner for next prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, is a populist. She is archetypical of the next iteration – those who exhibit populist characteristics (a consistent ability to blame your own problems on someone or something else, effective use of social media, complete inability to come up with solutions or govern) yet combine them with a calmer, more poisonous, more controlled, more electorally palatable competency.

What we have here is Populism 2.0. Where will it lead us? 

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First, we should consider the political effects of Meloni, DeSantis, Marion Maréchal-Le Pen and the Thatcher-lite Truss. Large-scale changes to enshrined Western Constitutions? No one has ruled it out. Respect for rights and free speech? Under the banner of threats posed by “wokeness” and “cancel culture”, this needs to be reconsidered. They say the “LGBTQ+ lobby” poses a menace to the traditional family unit. Truss attacks Bank of England independence; Meloni the parliamentary democracy of Italy. None has the incapacity to fail.

Second, economically, there are ramifications. Until now, there has not been an economics of populism. Populism has been a countermovement. In power, gasping for the toxic gases of nihilist opposition, populism has traditionally been asphyxiated.

This second wave seems to have advanced the cause, however. Reciting a late 1980s playbook, Truss embodies this move towards low taxes and a weakened state, alongside a flagrant disregard for the necessary ensuing budgetary cuts and sacrifices. It seems naive, and quaintly déjà vu.

Higher debt to GDP and increasingly reluctant attitudes to essential economic structural reforms, of the sort where there are guaranteed to be losers in the short term, are nigh certainties. But is that not politics? To assess priorities and enable those hit by policy change to deal with it with a mix of nationalist hocus pocus and blind optimism. As Bismarck said, effective politics is “the art of the possible”. Such realism ill-fits a populist.

A friend said today’s UK has all the symptoms of Bettino Craxi’s Italy of the 1980s. Latter-day populists embody optimism, promising everything to everyone, without that critical element of which Bismarck was so clear – the crunching reality of trade-offs.

In South Africa, a candidate for Populist 2.0 is Paul Mashatile. No one has a clear idea what he thinks about economic policy; about what should be done or what should not. He cunningly bides his time between various internecine camps of the ANC, keeping his cards concealed. Surely, the smart money post-Ramaphosa is on him? A populist, but a potentially far more effective one than his erstwhile predecessor, who spent his time on ever-expanding families and firepools.

Where to from here? The ridiculous spectacle of vapid political and economic debates of the 2010s, ending catastrophically with a global pandemic and war in Europe, could be about to shift gear. Rather a more deliberate and competent attack on the machinery of the state, the levers of democracy, the essential gravity of market economics. 

We can barely wait to see the outcome. DM168

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R25.