Taming the People: Comparing Protests and Populism in Arab and American Politics

The rise of populism has been an uncontested global reality in recent years. However, it is unclear exactly how culturally distinct populist movements imitate or mirror each other, especially given the different rhetorical, political, ideological, and cultural contexts within which they operate. This article addresses this issue by comparing recent manifestations of populism across contemporary Arab and American contexts, with a special focus on former United States President Donald Trump’s response to the George Floyd protests and Egyptian President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s handling of demonstrations in his country. We argue that each leader deployed common rhetorical tactics as a populist strategy to undermine the protestors’ attempts to articulate the people’s will. At the same time, our analysis shows how the different contexts in which Trump and Sisi operate also impact their ability to successfully translate their populism into political effectiveness. By conducting this analysis, our article shows how similar populist tactics across different cultural contexts may lead to divergent outcomes, revealing the importance of institutional as well as popular bases of support for would-be populist politicians.

Court Cases, Gay Rights, and Legislative Response

Few issues in American politics, sexual or otherwise, inspire as much passion as the struggle over civil rights for members of the LGBTQ community. The passion associated with this issue stems from a clash of values and social movements. The undeniable passion that suffuses the issue is apparent to anyone who has witnessed a public debate or read a court transcript on the subject. This chapter will focus on court cases that have played a role in creating rights for members of the LGBTQ community and subsequent legislative actions.

Disgusting Democrats and Repulsive Republicans: Members of Political Outgroups Are Considered Physically Gross

The status of disgust as a sociomoral emotion is debated. We conducted a stringent test of whether social stimuli (specifically, political outgroup members) can elicit physical disgust, as distinct from moral or metaphorical disgust. We employed stimuli (male faces) matched on baseline disgustingness, provided other ways for participants to express negativity toward outgroup members, and used concrete self-report measures of disgust, as well as a nonverbal measure (participants’ facial expressions). Across three preregistered studies (total N = 915), we found that political outgroup members are judged to be “disgusting,” although this effect is generally weaker for concrete self-report measures and absent for the nonverbal measure. This suggests that social stimuli are capable of eliciting genuine physical disgust, although it is not always outwardly expressed, and the strength of this result depends on the measures employed. We discuss implications of these results for research on sociomoral emotions and American politics.

Stage Left and Right: Modeling Civil Discourse in the Classroom Through Fictional Presidential Debates Between FDR and Reagan

Franklin Roosevelt—the arch liberal president of the twentieth century—and Ronald Reagan—the face of modern conservatism—remain two of the most influential presidents in American politics. Both impacted policy and politics for decades and in ways that continue to reverberate today. In an attempt to examine the influence of FDR and Reagan in ways that are accessible to our students, we twice taught a class titled FDR and Reagan: What the Greatest Presidential Debate in History Can Teach Us About American Politics ... and How We Can All Get Along. This class asked students to perform fictional presidential debates between the two presidents on foreign, economic, and social policies. The emphasis on role-playing and debate allowed students to conduct deep background research while also encouraging them to inhabit the character of each president. Thus, they were able to immerse themselves in each one’s vision for the nation. Most importantly, this method allowed them to explore how it is both possible and necessary to have rational and respectful political discourse: FDR and Reagan came from opposite ends of the political spectrum and yet, by the end of the course, our students could appreciate that they were both transformative and effective leaders. Both were great communicators able to articulate their visions for the United States. Exploring the meanings of liberalism and conservatism through these methods encouraged greater empathy for opposing political viewpoints in our students. By analyzing the methods and outcomes of our course in this paper, we hope that history teachers might consider similar models to help our students bridge the current political divides which afflict the nation.

E Pluribus Unum

Polarization is a critical problem confronting American politics and society today. The history of the Netherlands serves as both a warning and an opportunity for the United States in its quest to solve pernicious partisanship. The eighteenth-century Dutch Republic demonstrates how continued division without compromise can easily lead to revolution and civil war. In contrast, the nineteenth and twentieth centuries of the Netherlands show how a pluralist political culture created a society of compromise and tolerance. This article suggests several ways in which the United States can start to create a similar society of E pluribus unum and mitigate some of the effects of polarization in contemporary American politics.