Abstract

Although populism and technocracy increasingly appear as the two organ- ising poles of politics in contemporary Western democracies, the exact nature of their relationship has not been the focus of systematic attention. This arti- cle argues that whilst these two terms – and the political realities they refer to – are usually assumed to be irreducibly opposed to one another, there is also an important element of complementarity between them. This complementar- ity consists in the fact that both populism and technocracy are predicated upon an implicit critique of a specific political form, referred to in this article as ‘party democracy’. This is defined as a political regime based on two key features: the mediation of political conflicts through the institution of politi- cal parties and a procedural conception of political legitimacy according to which political outcomes are legitimate to the extent that they are the product of a set of democratic procedures revolving around the principles of parlia- mentary deliberation and electoral competition. This argument is made through a close analysis of works by Ernesto Laclau and Pierre Rosanvallon, chosen as exemplary manifestations of the contemporary cases for populism and technocracy, respectively.