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The Palgrave Handbook of Populism pp 527–541Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Populist Neo-Imperialism: A New Take on Populist Foreign Policy

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Abstract

In this article, we add to the theoretical understanding of populist foreign policy by proposing the model of populist neo-imperialism. Built on an in-depth study of contemporary Turkey, the model postulates that populist right-wing parties in countries with an imperial past pursue a foreign policy with specific shared features. In immigration, trade and regional integration, the policy of populist neo-imperialism defies empirical typologies derived from European right-wing populists. Three empirical case studies (Russia, United Kingdom, France) based on secondary material confirm the model’s transferability while highlighting necessary conditions for populist neo-imperialism to be chosen: economic strength, political dominance and prior elites’ neglect of the imperial past. Moreover, the cases show that populist neo-imperialists are willing to stomach losses to their popularity to establish and maintain their foreign policy, indicating the “thick” ideological motivations that drive them.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Economics and Political Science, University of St. Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland

    Ole Frahm & Dirk Lehmkuhl

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  1. Ole Frahm
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  2. Dirk Lehmkuhl
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Correspondence to Ole Frahm .

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  1. Political Science, University of Passau, Passau, Bayern, Germany

    Michael Oswald

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Frahm, O., Lehmkuhl, D. (2022). Populist Neo-Imperialism: A New Take on Populist Foreign Policy. In: Oswald, M. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Populism. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80803-7_33

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