The eccentric far-right populist Javier Milei has failed to win the first round of Argentina’s presidential election, with the centrist finance minister Sergio Massa unexpectedly beating his radical challenger.
Supporters of Milei, a potty-mouthed political outsider described as an Argentinian mashup of Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro and Boris Johnson, had hoped he was heading for a sensational outright victory similar to Bolsonaro’s shock triumph in Brazil in 2018.
Comparing Milei to Trump or Bolsonaro is very, very misleading.
Milei is has radical capitalist / free market ideology, but is far removed from social conservatism.
Just to give you an idea, he wants to close the argentinian central bank and kill the national currency or let it kill itself with a free floating exchange rate.
Such a move is the opposite of what alt-right / fascism would do which seeks governmental control of media, industrial and financial institutions.
If anything, the current ruling party “Union for the motherland” (Union por la patria) openly advocates and defends Peronism which is a sort of decaf fascist ideology heavy in nationalism and populism thinly clothed in laborist rethoric to make it seem left wing. Current ruling party which btw has lead the country to over 300% inflation (if you take the free exchange rate as a reference since the official exchange rate is manipulated and it is illegal for argentines to freely buy foreign currency except for a small token amount).
Just to make it easier to understand. If you’re familiar with the political compass:
- Current ruling party leans top left
- Milei is solidly bottom right
- Trump is top right.
These are three very very different quadrants.
but is far removed from social conservatism.
Whats His opinion on abortion and crime?
On abortion it looks like he opposes it outside of cases where the mother’s life is in danger. On crime his wiki is pretty vague just that he wants to ‘crack down’ on crime and prohibit migrants with a criminal history from entry.
Let me put it better for you, he wants to ban abortion and he wants to let people form vigilante mobs to take care of crime and bring back the dictatorship, which he is keen on whitewashing
The lame thing is if that wasn’t his main social policies I would understand his voters a lot more.
So he’s a social conservative?
Milei probably has a small resemblance with DT. Maybe just a small percentage, but that is enough to call him a Full DT by the press in the rest of world. It is just cheap press.
The guy has a lot of cons and pros. But he is not a DT. He is mainly an economist. Not a businessman.
Argentina as always is a sinking ship with a lot of holes. Every year there are more holes. They still have not found a party that can close those holes. And there were only 3 big parties.
Perhaps a new party (like the one from Milei) manages to start closing some of those holes. Perhaps they keep opening holes like the current party. Even if you put the best party ever made, it would take 15-30 years maybe more to recover. You have a lot of adults that never worked (legally) and live from the state. It takes time to educate the new generations letting them know that money is not always a free thing that comes without working. (And you cannot tell them “now you have to find a job” in the short term otherwise the country will go violent. Therefore no matter how far right the party is. It always end up adapting to a situation to control the masses that requires socialism).
Time will tell about what will happen if the same party (probably was the worst government in the past 30 years) wins the election. But nowadays the country is at worst since I was born. 40% poverty (oficial, real is perhaps higher ), 100+% annual inflation (not even the old 20-30% annual). It is probable that the current government will never leave and will stay on power just like it happens in many other countries, like Venezuela. (While it is still a totally different country, we always compare to Venezuela because the current party always liked Venezuela as a role model to follow).
I hope not! But with 40+% poverty… soon there will not be enough tax payers to cover the costs but maybe hyperinflation puts a stop to the excess of public spending (printing ARS money) to solve any problem.
Well, I’d say it’s just their straightforwardness and their “showmanlike” attitude
Are there even politicians in Argentina that aren’t socially conservative? He is by default
Yes, I was very confused by the “far-right populist” descriptor. Those are two very opposite words.
I disagree with your assessment that far right and populist descriptors are opposites. Admittedly, there’s a degree of subjectivity in definitions here, but my understanding is that conventional scholarship has coalesced around a definition of Populism that is agnostic of the left/right spectrum.
For example, this journal article from 2012 defines it as “a thin-centered ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogeneous and antagonistic groups, the ‘pure people’ versus the ‘corrupt elite’, and which argues that politics should be an expression of the general will of the people”.
If you care to read a little more, the authors break down their definition into it’s constituent pieces and provide context, but the important piece is that you can see how populism can come from both the left and the right.
As examples, we can look at, say, the Occupy Wall Street movement from a while back. Very much spawned from left leaning ideology, but it’s defining feature was casting the “corrupt elite” (in this case, the fabulously wealthy) against the general people (i.e. the 99%). On the other side of the coin we can look at Donald Trump’s MAGA movement. The image he wants to cultivate is that of an outsider, someone not tainted by the corruption of the Washington elite. That resonates with a sunset of the population.
Both of these movements have radically different goals and politics, but the framework of those arguments follows the same general template.
I apologize for the US-centric examples, but that’s what I know. As consolation, the article I linked to is specifically a comparative study of European vs Latin American populism.
The poor and middle-class, you know, the majority of the population, have been beaten down by the “corrupt elite” for centuries. The problem with using a term like “far-right populist” is that the far-right are always on the side of corporate interests, additional corruption of government to weaken its power, and anything that would further promote the already fucked wealth gap we have between the rich and the poor. They are the corrupt elite!
Just using your example of Trump’s MAGA movement, Trump is just a grifter trying to promote an image of an outsider, but he very much isn’t one. Calling somebody a “far-right populist” is lying about what their true goals are. It is an oxymoron.
People from the Occupy Wall Street movement, even as misguided and directionless as that movement was, were trying to reduce the power of corporations through their protests. They weren’t lying about being populists.
A better example would be somebody like Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren, whose actions and voting record are consistent with ones who are trying to take power from corporations and give it back to the rest of the public.
Far-right is when I don’t like, idiot
the fucking gall of calling massa centrist. shit-tier journalism.
I’m not familiar with Argentinian politics. What would you call him?
Most things I read the last few days called him left wing. But things get fuzzy calling people/parties left/right, especially across different continents.
Wait, if you were speaking about Massa… Oh boy, that is a hell of ride. He is center right. Peronism is kind of a mix of different pokitical ideologies mashed into one that works because tries to keep extremism to a minimum. And because they are very good user of demagogia and political oportunism. They’re not leftist. Some would say they are similar to US Democrats.
A POS? Okay, maybe that just my marxism speaking, but he is a right winger. Socially conservative, economically ultraliberal. And that is usually not a really good combination. Add to that that his party is filled with Plan Condor denialists and apologists and you have quite a cocktail to drink there. For us leftist, he’s like Videla all over again (but without the power ofc)
Since I’m rather uninformed on the topic, what would you consider him instead?
Watching Americans become interested in Argentine politics for the first time in my life feels wild, like, they have no fucking clue but they care so much. I’m enjoying it ngl.
Massa a new phase? I think he meant a new face.
He’s running against a guy that is part of the current government as financial minister none the less, that is leaving 50% poor, 140% inflation. That has devalued the coin by 750% so far
The guy says we should cut down spending. And now he’s Hitler.
