Was Arendt Populist? A Reassessment from Margaret Canovan

Few scholars know that before becoming a world-renowned theorist of populism, Margaret Canovan was foremost a leading expert on Hannah Arendt. Yet the last article she wrote about her, in 2002, develops an original theory: Arendt was a populist. Coming from a keen observer of right-wing populism, this reading was unusual, as it applied to an anti-authoritarian thinker. Yet, it did not spark any debate in either populism studies or Arendt studies . This article seeks to fill this void by examining what Canovan’s theory of populism owes to her long association with Arendt, while showing that labelling her as “populist” obscures her political thought more than it reveals hidden dimensions. Thereby, this analysis contributes to a contextual history of political thought, showing that Canovan’s reading of “Arendtian populism” dates back to 1978, and consequently reflects the entire intellectual evolution of the “doyenne” of populism studies

Close reading · Criticism · Political philosophy · Politics · Populism · Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy · Political Theology and Sovereignty · Populism, Right-Wing Movements