The Dangerous Demagogue

"...Most democracies wither by stealth; almost imperceptivity. The despotic leaders do not start by sending in the marines.” Matt Qvortrup, Professor of Political Theory

May 08, 2024

We are in 2024, an election year, a year I call “the Year of the Precipice” for our democracy. To better equip Americans to exercise their civic duty this year, we have begun a series in Democraticus examining important ways of thinking and belief systems, such as those pertaining to leadership, which can have a major impact on our democracy’s future.

Demagoguery at Our Doorstep

It took over two hundred years for the type of demagogic leadership to emerge that scholars of democracy Levitsky and Ziblatt contend “haunted” Hamilton and other founders of this nation.[1] Webster’s definition of a demagogue is simple: “a leader who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power.”[2] It may sound simple, but demagoguery has, over the course of history, been an effective way of gaining power and dissolving democracy.

While we have had earlier iterations of demagoguery with certain presidents and other national political figures, for Americans today it most recently arrived with the Trump presidency. Being as specific as possible, what kind of leadership is demagoguery? Beyond the authoritarian strategies already discussed, what makes demagoguery even more dangerous for our democracy than other forms of authoritarianism, and so difficult for us to deal with?

More than Simply a Monarch

It is more than the “fundamental monarchical” understanding of the presidency that, according to presidential expert Elaine Karmack, Trump certainly possesses[3]. And, while it can be argued that it is autocratic authoritarianism with a fascist bent, as seasoned career diplomats like the late Madelaine Albright contended, it is even more than that. It is a combination of authoritarian leadership styles existing since ancient times, mixed in a uniquely American way along with the twenty first century technological ingredient we call the internet.

Today’s American Demagogic “Recipe”

This recipe is then applied in a societal context with a leader who understands Americans’ political tendencies, understands how to fuel what Brooks calls “the culture of contempt”, and understands how to trigger all of this to his or her benefit. Brooks describes American political predispositions as thinking this way: “…whenever times are tough due to big problems, we need ‘toughness’. Leaders who will shake things up, willing to ‘break a few eggs, maybe even a few heads.”[4]

Some Americans, apparently believing we had “too many big problems creating too tough times”, decided they wanted to “shake things up”. They did this by taking their dissatisfaction with the status quo and intersecting it with demagoguery, oligarchy, and populism in the presidential election of 2016. It has been with us ever since.

The Demagogue and “Easy Answers”

Why is demagoguery so dangerous to democracy and why do we so easily fall prey to it? Phillip Freeman, Professor of Classics at Luther College, answers that question this way:

“The greatest danger to democracy is a struggling population in search of easy answers…”[5] (emphasis mine)

Freeman points to first century B.C. Rome to illustrate our human tendency to embrace the demagogue so readily for “easy answers”. Though we may think of it as a modern phenomenon, demagoguery dates back centuries. The Roman Republic had endured for four centuries, ruling over millions, yet times were difficult, as according to Freeman:

“…Decades of economic downslide, threats from the Middle East, and political infighting had left the Roman people weary of the plodding nature of their government. They were ripe for someone to take the reins of power and shake up the business-as-usual attitude of their senate.”[6]

Along came Julius Caesar, a leader who knew “what the masses wanted to hear”[7], and the rest, as they say, is history.

Ancient Roots of the Term “Demagogue”

While we usually associate a negative connotation with the term “demagogue”, as Melissa Lane explains, its Greek root simply means “leader of the people”.[8] Yet, Lane, a Princeton professor of politics specializing in ancient Greek political theory, delves into the origins and negative evolution of the term:

“The pejorative association (i.e., with the term demagogue) originated in part in a certain kind of elitism. The “demagogue” came…to be seen as someone rising to power with the support of the “common people,” who were looked down upon as the uneducated many by the elite few. Most often, to this opposition of class interests was added an accusation of insincerity: that the demagogue is someone who only pretends to serve the interests of the many (or does so sometimes). Hence the thought that this is his or her real aim is to exploit the common people’s support to advance his or her own interests or those of a small coterie.”[9] (emphasis mine)

Lane adds, “…And to these concerns about overtly partisan populist ends, and to cloaked private ends, was added the accusation that a demagogue relies on fraud or force and hides their real purposes under a cloak of populist purposes.”[10]

When the Demagogue “Plays to the Masses”

Thus, we are brought to a blend of authoritarianism that takes demagoguery and combines it with populism. It is a populism that rests on citizens that are discontent, perceived by some as (if not actually) uneducated or undereducated (or both), as well as being civically illiterate. Pejman Youlsefzadeh, reviewing in The Bulwark Eric A. Posner’s book, The Demagogue’s Playbook, drills down even more harshly on demagoguery when he says:

“It refers to a charismatic, amoral person who obtains the support of the people through dishonesty, emotional manipulation, and the exploitation of social divisions; who targets the political elites, blaming them for everything that has gone wrong; and who tries to destroy institutions- legal, political, religious, social- and other sources of power that stand in their way.”[11] (emphasis mine)

The Demagogue’s “Love of the Poorly Educated”

Small wonder then, that following the Nevada Republican primary in 2016, then presidential candidate Donald Trump said this:

“We won with young. We won with old. We won with highly educated. We won with poorly educated. I love the poorly educated.”[12] (emphasis mine)

According to Jennifer C. Kerr of the Associated Press: “…He should love them (i.e., the poorly educated). Trump overwhelmingly leads his rivals for support among the less educated…In an analysis of voters by education in states where exit or entrance polling is available, nearly half of those with high school diplomas or less schooling said they supported the billionaire…”[13]

Demagogues Depend on Mass Abdication of Civic Responsibility

America’s populism, now more than ever, is focused on the “easy answers” Freeman mentions. With the advent of the internet, easy so-called “answers to any problem” our democracy faces can be found there in one form or the other and then treated as “fact”. One of democracy’s flaws, according to Jason Brennan of Georgetown University, is:

“…most voters have no incentive to be well-informed about politics, or to correct their misinformed opinions. They have no incentive to think rationally about politics or to process information in a reasonable way. They have every incentive to indulge their biases and prejudices…”[14] (emphasis mine)

It is important to note the quote above of Coventry University political theorist Matt Qvortrup about how the demagogue uses his populist attraction to the masses to take power. It is rarely with violence. Democracy’s erosion to the demagogue is slow, almost imperceptible, and over time, power is simply handed to him (or her). It is then that the demagogue goes to work abandoning democracy and consolidating their hold on power.

Yet, the defense of democracy against the demagogue’s takeover falls on its citizens- a real challenge given that many of them desire to abandon their democratic self-government to the demagogue’s rule. Loren Samons J. II, Professor of Classical Studies at Boston University, chalks up demagogues and their relationship to populism as something that “cannot be avoided” saying:

“…Democracies breed demagogues…They are one of the natural products of a form of government that depends on elections. The most one can rationally hope for is that a majority of the (participating) electorate will identify the demagogue AND reject his or her message. But history, again, teaches us that such a reaction is unlikely.”[15] (emphasis mine)

We Have a History of Populism

Americans have not been immune to populism and have endured the waves of its effects in our civic square over the course of our nation’s history. Populism, “…a style of politics that claims to speak for ordinary people and often stirs up distrust has risen up on both sides of the political spectrum throughout U.S. history… is used to mobilize mass movements against ruling powers.”[16]

Eric Posner identifies Andrew Jackson as our earliest presidential practitioner of populist demagogic leadership. By Jackson’s time “…the original constitutional bulwarks against populist demagogues had eroded...and the new populist ideology could justify destruction of the institutions, not just reform, including institutions that constrain, or lie outside of the power of, the executive. Only the president himself was powerful enough to lead this assault…”[17]

Although Jackson came by his demagogue credential as an “outsider” honestly, he was not a career politician like his political rivals, having a military background primarily, and being a bona fide war hero. Jackson “flipped the script” on his opponents “…claiming that his outsider status would provide exactly the kind of housecleaning that the country needed…”.[18] Welding his outsider image very effectively by having his campaign appeal to the “common man”, Jackson invented the “anti-establishment” presidential candidacy.[19]

The Populist Demagogue’s Disconnection from Democracy

One of the greatest dangers of populist demagoguery is its disconnection of the leader from dependence on democratic political institutions for their political power. Instead, for the populist demagogue, their power now comes solely from the people that support him. That justifies the leader’s turning their back on democratic institutions and those that oppose him.[20]

Historian John Meacham calls our attention to the dangers of demagoguery through the work of James Bryce. Bryce was an English historian and statesman, who in the 1880s wrote The American Commonwealth in which he pointed out that for demagogues to succeed, they must have a substantial portion of the people who want them to succeed. According to Meacham, “…Bryce’s view was not that the individual himself from the White House, could overthrow the Constitution. Disaster would come, Bryce believed, at the hands of a demagogic president with an enthusiastic power base.”[21] (emphasis mine)

For that reason, when it comes to us dealing with demagogues, perhaps Walt Kelly’s popular cartoon character Pogo said it best in 1970 when he said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”[22]

Next on Our Leadership Journey

We have been on a journey exploring leadership in our democracy, and how Americans’ record in electing good or great presidential leaders is spotty and inconsistent at best. We are full of contradictions about that leadership. We claim that we love democracy, but when we perceive the times we live in as tumultuous, we become attracted to authoritarianism. We then delved into what it looks like when that American leadership turns authoritarian, as well as the varieties of authoritarian leadership such as fascism and populist demagoguery that are arising today.

Next we will investigate the dangerous twenty first century version of authoritarianism we are facing today when populist demagoguery, oligarchy, and fascism come together with Russian oligarch dark money. Stay tuned…

We will continue exploring topics like this that are not given near enough time and emphasis in our civic education efforts, if they are even taught at all. Democracy is so important. But it’s hard to keep, and it’s easy to lose. It’s up to us, and only us, to protect it. Support democracy, become a Democratist! Spread the word! Please share this Democraticus with others! For more information, go to www.tomthedemocratist.com

[2] Demagogue Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster

[4] Love Your Enemies, by Arthur C. Brooks, pg. 67, Ibid

[5] “What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, Phillip Freeman, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., https://time.com/4375262/history-demagogue-donald-trump/

[6] “What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Don’t Accept Easy Answers”, by Phillip Freeman, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[7]“What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Don’t Accept Easy Answers”, by Phillip Freeman, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[8]“What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Guard Against Elitism”, by Melissa Lane, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[9] What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Guard Against Elitism”, by Melissa Lane, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[10] What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Guard Against Elitism”, by Melissa Lane, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[11] “Demagoguery in America”, by Pejman Yousefzadeh, The Bulwark, August 30, 2020, https://thebulwark.com/demagoguery-in-america and The Demagogue’s Playbook, The Battle for American Democracy, by Eric A. Posner, pp 310, St. Martens Group, McMillan Publishing, Copyright 2020

[12] ‘Trump Overwhelmingly Leads Rivals in Support From Less Educated Americans”, by Jennifer C. Kerr, April 3, 2016, 6:52 PM EDT, Associated Press, PBS News Hour, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-overwhelmingly-leads-rivals-in-support-from-less-educated-americans

[13] ‘Trump Overwhelmingly Leads Rivals in Support From Less Educated Americans”, by Jennifer C. Kerr, April 3, 2016, 6:52 PM EDT, Associated Press, PBS News Hour, Ibid

[14] What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Make Sure Elites and the People Keep Each Other in Check”, by Jason Brennan, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[15]What History Teaches Us About Demagogues Like The Donald”, by Zocalo Public Square, “Very Little- You Can’t Have Democracy Without Demagogues”, by Loren J. Samons II, June 20, 2016, 3:05 PM EDT, Time to Flourish, Time, Inc., Ibid

[16] Populism in the United States: A Timeline, History.com Editors, December 7, 2018, Updated December 14, 2020, https://www.history.com/topics/us-politics/populism-united-states-timeline

[17]“Demagoguery in America”, by Pejman Yousefzadeh, The Bulwark, August 30, 2020, https://thebulwark.com/demagoguery-in-america and The Demagogue’s Playbook, The Battle for American Democracy, by Eric A. Posner, pp 310, Ibid

[18] “How Andrew Jackson Rode a Populist Wave to Become America’s First ‘Outsider’ President”, by Dave Roos, History.com, https://www.history.com/news/andrew-jackson-populism

[19] “How Andrew Jackson Rode a Populist Wave to Become America’s First ‘Outsider’ President”, by Dave Roos, History.com, Ibid

[20]“Demagoguery in America”, by Pejman Yousefzadeh, The Bulwark, August 30, 2020, https://thebulwark.com/demagoguery-in-america and The Demagogue’s Playbook, The Battle for American Democracy, by Eric A. Posner, pp 310, Ibid

[21] The Soul of America, The Battle for Our Better Angels, by Jon Meachum, pg. 271, Ibid

[22] http://bytedaily.blogspot.com/2011/04/quote-walt-kelly-html

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