Mainstreaming Populism in the 21st Century

Mainstreaming Populism in the 21^st Century is a research consortium funded by the Academy of Finland. It is based on collaboration between media and communication studies, as well as political science and political theory researchers at the universities of Helsinki, Jyväskylä and Turku.

While the tradition of populism research at the University of Helsinki is already rather long, we decided to launch this website in September 2017 as our consortium started with four-year funding from the Academy.

The research consortium explores different forms of mainstreaming of populism in Europe and the Americas in the 21^st century. The project will analyse how populist parties have become part of the mainstream, how other parties have coloured their policies increasingly with a populist streak and how different mainstreaming forms of populism have transformed public debate, the media and democracy in various polities.

We look forward to collaborating with colleagues, within the University of Helsinki, at our Finnish partner universities and institutions – the Centre for the Study of Contemporary Culture at the University of Jyväskylä and the Centre for Parliamentary Studies at the University of Turku – as well as our international partners and colleagues.

We also welcome you to our forthcoming events, activities and publications. Follow us on Facebook.