Many parallels are being drawn between the populisms now resurgent in Europe and those in the US. The similarities are interesting, so is the timing, as is the foreign power – Russia – sometimes suspected of aiding them all. However, the differences in dynamic are also worth underlining.
They might help us understand the dynamics in current Maltese politics better.
For reasons of space and simplicity, let’s look only at the significant differences between Donald Trump’s America and the UK’s Brexit predicament. There are two major ones.
First, there are the respective patterns of conflicts and convergence of interests. You would think that the stark contrast lies between Trump’s evident conflict of interests and the probity of major politicians in the UK.
The latter subject themselves to scrutiny and are under a strict obligation to declare their interests. Trump has refused to disclose his tax records and to divest himself, in any proper sense, of his business interests. His son-in-law, Jared Kushner, faces important questions about his own potential conflicts.
Yet, politically, the experience in each country is the reverse of what you’d expect. It is in Theresa May’s UK that everyone feels that every version of Brexit that is being broached is palatable only to a minority. The idea of a second referendum is also divisive.
You could say that the UK is racked by an irresolvable set of conflicts of interest where every possible solution imaginable is seen to be against the national interest. It either undermines democracy by overriding the decision taken two years ago or else by satisfying only a minority today.
The conflicts of interest are reflected accurately in the House of Commons, where no solution – not the ‘Chequers plan’, nor the no-deal Brexit, nor a customs union, nor anything else – can summon a majority of votes in Parliament.
In the US, Trump has managed to create a convergence of interests between his voters and himself that obscures his own unclear business interests. It’s not that his voters are stupid. It’s that Trump has managed to persuade his voters that what matters is not his interests but the fact that he takes care of theirs.
He assures social conservatives that he will put their ideologues on the Supreme Court (and other courts); the working class that he is ready to pick trade wars on their behalf, never mind the niceties; the rich that he will cut their taxes; the middle class that he will cut back on government regulations that make their cars more expensive and the State more intrusive.
Second, there is the nature of the electorate. In the UK, the Brexit referendum was held at a time when many voters were not motivated to inform themselves properly. As they themselves admit, they never realised that the vote to leave the EU could affect the border with Ireland as well as the ease with which they could travel in Europe with their pets.
It is evident that the project will ruin entire neighbourhoods and cheat ordinary families of time and money they have invested in building a home
Now, however, you could say that the wrangling over Brexit has transformed the electorate into a super-motivated one. All are much clearer about what their respective interests are.
The tragedy for Theresa May is that her premiership has occurred at a time when the electorate is highly motivated to pay attention but there is nothing that seems compelling or in the national interest to pay attention to. Hence the withering scorn with which she is regarded.
The electorate in Trump’s America is more variegated. He won the election thanks to a segment of the voters that was disenchanted, if not demotivated, by Hillary Clinton. It could well also be that that vote was also depressed by fake news, carefully targeted to make voters cynical about the entire process.
Despite the political turmoil in the US right now over the confirmation hearings surrounding Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court, it is not clear that the country has actually shifted in its attitudes from the country that voted in 2016.
True, many Democrats who abstained from voting in the presidential election, because of disenchantment with Hillary Clinton, have now been charged up both by the shift to the left by the Democrats and by what they see as a threat to abortion rights.
But it remains to be seen whether the new activists and highly motivated voters outnumber the segment of the newly disenchanted, who are truly dismayed not just at the shabby behaviour of Trump but also of the mainstream media, the national security apparatus and the uncompromisingly partisan Congress.
The comparison might seem abstract but it helps understand the dynamics of populism in Malta. Comparisons with the UK are uninteresting because the contrast is too great.
Unlike the UK, and like the US, Malta is currently undergoing a period where there are blatant conflicts of interest concerning certain ministers and senior public officials. But Joseph Muscat’s government has so far made such conflicts appear irrelevant to the convergence of interests created by the trickle-down economics of, say, the passport scheme, or the effective dismantling of sustainable development plans.
It is not just in this that we resemble the US much more than the UK. It is also in the nature of the electorate, where to the highly motivated segments of activists there needs to be added the increasingly significant segment of those who have lost faith in it.
How long the situation will last, however, cannot be judged using the US for comparison. Size and scale make the dynamics of change different.
The first sign to watch out for has to be the medium-term impact of the mega project approved for the db Group. What makes this different from other controversial projects pushed by the Muscat government is that, for the first time, it is no longer possible to believe that here is a project that harnesses a convergence of interests.
It is evident that the project will ruin entire neighbourhoods and cheat ordinary families of time and money they have invested in building a home and a neighbourhood. It is also evident that the project has moved some people from the indifferent electorate to the motivated segment.
We still have to see whether the shift will remain regional or whether it will spread. Will the ease and shamelessness with which the project was approved affect other people who think their neighbourhoods too could be next?
I don’t know. But I do know it’s the space to keep watching.
ranierfsadni@europe.com
This is a Times of Malta print opinion piece