Conference Agenda

This paper maps the evolution of fascist ideology throughout various periods of Italy's history, beginning with Mussolini’s foundation of the original Fasci in 1919 and concluding with the end of the ‘First Republic’ in 1994. By employing a conceptual morphology approach to ideology, the study aims to identify the key elements in the definition and relative importance of central concepts—such as the nation, the state, and the people—in the political language of historical fascist actors in Italy. While recognizing the concept of generic fascism, this study focuses on the distinctive characteristics of Italian fascism, offering empirically and historically grounded insights into its defining elements.

The ideology of Italian fascism will be examined across its various stages: the movement phase (1919-22), the regime phase (1922-43), the ‘Social Republic’ phase (1943-45), and the ‘neo-fascist’ post-war phase (1945-94). This analysis will focus on the ideological tenets of the Fasci and of the National Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista – PNF), as well as of their successors, the Fascist Republican Party (Partito Fascista Repubblicano – PFR) and the Italian Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Italiano – MSI), based on the political and intellectual contributions of their key figures.

This study is part of a larger project that examines both the historical and contemporary aspects of fascism. The results of this historical analysis will be used as a benchmark to evaluate whether elements of fascism still exist within the ideology of Italy’s current leading governing party, the ‘post-fascist’ Fratelli d’Italia (FdI – Brothers of Italy), which is a direct successor to the historical parties of Italian fascism. Comparing the political language of actors from the past and the present, while accounting for the significant contextual changes that have shaped Western societies after the end of World War II, represents an original contribution to the field of fascism studies.

In conclusion, this paper underscores the importance of recognizing fascism as a central political ideology throughout modern political history, not merely confined to the interwar period. A dynamic and synthesizing approach, focused on reconstructing the conceptual morphology of its historical and country-specific manifestations, is essential for understanding the increasing threat posed by 21st-century proponents of fascism, irrespective of their self-identification.

This paper delves into Hungarian public attitudes toward the EU, and public perceptions of EU policies in Hungary. The analysis digs deeper than the standard “remain or leave” question concerning the EU, trying to get a more nuanced picture of how Hungarians perceive the policy balance of EU membership and their country’s place within the EU, two decades after EU accession. We present what the EU means to Hungarians, what they consider to be the main advantages and disadvantages of EU membership, and how they assess the economic balance of EU membership. This paper focuses especially on the question of how much Europe Hungarians actually want: How strong is domestic support for deeper integration on the one hand, and how strong is the support for a policy of national sovereignty on the other? With these questions in mind, we examine the public policy areas in which Hungarians would like to see the EU as the competent decision-making level, and the issues that they would prefer to remain exclusively within national competence. Building on this, we use a typology based on support for EU membership and national/EU competences to classify domestic attitudes towards the role of the EU. By examining the interplay between public opinion and policy decisions, this paper offers valuable insights into the broader implications of Euroscepticism in Hungary.

Recent decades have faced political scientists with the challenge to make sense of populist politics. Despite growing research on populism, we know little about the relation between widespread discontent, rising populist politics, and how citizens actually engage with constructions of the people. Yet in such collective constructions lies precisely the key to evaluating the meaning and potential of popular discontent. To grasp the identities behind identity politics, I propose an interpretive turn is necessary to shift the focus from populism to peoplehood, and from top-down survey research to bottom-up qualitative research.

This has materialised as a comparative research project on Spain and Portugal, where I conducted fieldwork with discontent citizens (approximately 90 interviews). In this paper, I focus on understanding the nature of populism as a social reality: What are citizens discontent about? How does discontent develop into populism? What are the identities behind it? And what are the implications for potential political change?

Building on my analysis, I propose a series of key findings that enrich and contest both the ideational and Essex theories in populism studies. First, I propose populism takes shape as a discourse aimed not so much at “corrupt” elites, but at structural factors that determine the process of representation. Chiefly, I show discontent citizens critically problematise parties as institutions of representation. Second, I argue populism expresses not a vertical vindication of the “pure” people against the elites, but a horizontal anxiety at the (im)possibility of constructing/experiencing a viable “We” among fellow citizens.

Overall, I propose we make sense of populism not as a moral or agonistic discourse, but as an epistemic one that emerges from perceived failures in communication and representation. Applying these insights to my comparative case study helps to understand why Spanish citizens are more prone to (populist) participation than Portuguese citizens.