The project analyses the relationship between populism and foreign policy. Across the globe, politicians, parties and movements have emerged that claim to represent ‘the people’ and pit them against corrupt and out-of-touch elites. Though this apparent global rise of populism has drawn increasing scholarly, policy, and media attention lately, its international dimensions remain largely unexplored in the populism and International Relations (IR) literature. The prominent role of foreign policy issues in Trump’s election campaign, however, indicates that
populism is not limited to domestic politics and can potentially have far-reaching implications for international cooperation, institutions and agreements. Undertaking a comparative study on the role of populism in different contexts, the project examines how foreign policy and international relations can be used for populist mobilisation as well as how populism impacts on foreign policy and the international order.