Servants of which people? Gender, celebrity populism and digital perceptions of Giorgia Meloni and Alice Weidel
Hope Philpott1,2,3
1Leiden University, Netherlands; 2Charles University, Prague; 3Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona
Populism pervades our political and journalistic landscapes. Increasingly, populists on the right and left use ‘celebrity techniques’ - personalisation, privatisation, social media uniquity and engagement with popular culture – to construct and maintain close relationships with their fanlike followers. The concepts of ‘celebrity politics’ and ‘celebrity populism’ inform such analysis. However, gender as an analytical category is muted within the debate, particularly on celebrity populism. This paper seeks to address that. Drawing on Vuković and Carpentier’s social-construction-of-leadership framework, I use qualitative analysis of social media comments on Giorgia Meloni and Alice Weidel’s social media posts. Employing social constructionism, I explore commenters’ constructions of (populist) leadership, and the gendered dimensions of this. Through comparison with social constructions of leadership among contemporaneous male ‘celebrified’ populists, I identify broad similarities in the leadership traits identified in both cases, suggesting some congruity between male and female populists. Where they differ slightly, I argue, is in the degree of personalisation or ‘celebrification’, which is more open to male than to female populists.
PRRPs Influence on Established Parties Regarding Gender-Related Issues: The UK Case
Hazal Dilay Suslu
university of Surrey, United Kingdom
Over the past 15 years, the resurgence of populist radical right parties (PRRPs) in European politics has garnered significant attention from scholars, particularly regarding their impact on party systems and competition structures. Existing literature highlights the structuring of party competition around pivotal issues such as immigration and European integration (Alonso and Claro da Fonseca, 2012; Hobolt, 2016; Downes and Loveless, 2018; Akkerman, 2018; Joppke, 2020). Scholars suggest that PRRPs have the potential to influence the positions of moderate parties (Albertazzi and Vampa, 2021; Mudde, 2014; de Lange, 2012).
This project aims to investigate the extent to which the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) and the Reform Party have influenced the positions of the British Conservative Party and the Labour Party on gender related issues including gender equality, women rights, and LGBTQ+ rights. Employing a mixed-method approach, this study analyzes the political parties’ official social media accounts, specifically Facebook and X (Twitter), by focusing on posts published within six months leading up to the general elections. Additionally, it involves 40 semi-structured elite interviews with figures from the Conservative Party and the Labour Party, including MPs and advisors.
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