“Top-Down”and“Bottom-Up”Populisms: Comparing the Populist Politics in Indonesia, the Philippines and Taiwan

“Top-Down”and“Bottom-Up”Populisms: Comparing the Populist Politics in Indonesia, the Philippines and Taiwan

Democracy is in decline in Southeast Asia, where hybrid regimes use elections as façade of authoritarianism and where politicians use populist strategies to secure power. Even in countries considered more democratically consolidated such as the Philippines and Indonesia, populist leaders use inflammatory rhetoric to invoke anti-elite sentiments to mobilize votes. Beyond the elections, some populist leaders continue to issue policies which created rifts in society. In the Philippines, the 2016 presidential election’s campaign promise of law and order led to extrajudicial killings which harvested criticisms from international and domestic human rights organizations. In Indonesia, although the populist presidential candidate lost in the 2019 election, his anti-China rhetoric was precarious as it could inflame anti-Chinese Indonesian sentiments. This shows how populism in Southeast Asia has challenged democracy. Taiwan, like the above Southeast Asian countries, also have populist politicians. However, the fact that Taiwan’s democracy continues to be robust and stable since its transition in 1990s shows that its populism has not hampered democracy. What is the difference between Southeast Asia’s and Taiwan’s populism? Some scholars have pointed at the“bottom-up”origins of some Taiwan’s populist leaders, which is different from Southeast Asia’s“top-down”populism. Yet do all Taiwan’s populists have“bottom-up”origins? The article seeks to understand the different kinds of populism in three countries and see their influence to democracy.