‘Taking back control’ through alternative truths : Populism as a Technology of Governmentality

Higham, Jenna and Consterdine, Erica and Geyer, Robert (2026) ‘Taking back control’ through alternative truths : Populism as a Technology of Governmentality. PhD thesis, Lancaster University.

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Abstract

Populism con4nues to receive significant a9en4on in both the media and public discourse, as well as in the academic literature across a number of fields. Though recent work has endeavoured to establish some form of consensus regarding the central elements of populism, there remain a number of inconsistencies and tensions as to how best to conceptualise the term. In par4cular, there are s4ll ques4ons to be considered in rela4on to the central no4on of ‘the people’ and how this group is internally and externally created, and it is to this issue that this thesis is directed toward. Using Foucault’s work on power to examine populism offers us new insights into the role of knowledge and truth in the process of subjec4va4on, and so this thesis draws on literature from a number of disciplines to set out an alterna4ve theory of populism. Populism is posi4oned as a technology of governmentality, in which ‘the people’ as a poli4cal subject emerges through the process of subjec4va4on made possible by the produc4on of knowledge and the crea4on of an alterna4ve regime of truth. A shared recogni4on of this truth helps bind together ‘the people’, who can then be mobilised to achieve a range of poli4cal goals. This reconceptualiza4on priori4ses the processes through which ‘the people’ as a subject is made and sustained, to try and get to the heart of what populism itself is and the way in which it operates. The first half of the thesis sets out the theore4cal basis for this new approach, before turning to a case study analysis of the 2016 referendum on EU membership to examine three strands of knowledge that were produced. Ul4mately, the thesis advances a new and original theory of populism alongside contribu4ons to populism studies, governmentality studies, and Bri4sh poli4cs.