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Populists in the opposition can be quite seductive. In the eyes of many citizens, they offer a good show. They bring the debate to a close, they love the great staging and sometimes the simple jitters. For a while they can enrich the policy, at least if they stay away from racist racial throats.
Populists in the government are another matter. There they regularly cause enormous damage. And that has system.
As a political style, populism is expensive and dangerous because it focuses entirely on the momentary effect and ignores longer-term side effects and repercussions. But at some point the costs and risks inevitably come to light. Then populist leaders seek out guilty people, behave aggressively and sometimes disgustingly. They can poison whole societies and international relations with them.
There are plenty of examples right now. Unfortunately.
The Boris factor
AP
Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson: The economy is slipping into recession
Boris Johnson has told the British for years that the EU exit would be a walk. You just have to put enough pressure on the EU. Free from Brussels shackles, raise the standard of living on the islands, improve the health system, renew the infrastructure.
With this story, Johnson became prime minister. But now a Brexit without a contract threatens, with bad consequences for the United Kingdom and Europe as a whole. This has long been visible: Companies have been holding back investments for a long time. The economy as a whole is currently in a recession, possibly a severe one. Not to mention the geopolitical consequences.
Logical that Johnson blames others. The EU should finally move. Parliamentarians in the London House of Commons, the majority of which want to prevent a Brexit without a contract, undermined his negotiating strategy with the EU, he says. The blame game is in full swing. Now he sends the parliament in compulsory break to undisturbed Brexit on stage to be able to bring - and risked a constitutional crisis (watch from Tuesday on the developments in the lower house). The economic, social, political and constitutional damages will be gigantic.
Saul Loeb / AFP
US President Donald Trump: threats, ultimatums, negotiations, backsliding
Johnson is just beginning. Donald Trump, on the other hand, has already passed two and a half years of US presidency. Since the beginning of 2018 he has been leading the political drama of trade war: threats, ultimatums, negotiations, backsliding. That's how it works on a weekly basis. And he could be sure of the approval of his followers. Does not one finally show one to the Chinese (the Mexicans, the Europeans) where to go?
So far, the vast majority of Americans have not felt the negative consequences. But soon the escalating trade conflicts threaten to accelerate the global downturn. A bad world recession would hit the US in the middle of the 2020 presidential campaign.
The blame for this is Trump ever prophylactic US Federal Reserve: With increasing frequency and more and more rude words he attacks the Fed and its Chairman Jay Powell. Unprecedented attacks that undermine the credibility and independence of the central bank. The institutional fabric of the US threatens to take permanent damage.
The disgusting search for the culprits
Italy is not one step further after almost one and a half years of five-star Lega government. On the contrary. Now, a new coalition, without Matteo Salvini's right-wing Lega troop, is trying to get the country afloat, while Salivini's opposition out of it will set the mood.
Eraldo Peres / AP
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro: Blame Game in Brazilian
Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro has spoken only clearing of the Amazon rainforest to gain agricultural land. Since forest fires went out of control, he claimed that others were to blame: eco-activists or indigenous peoples living in the Amazon. They would have put the fires to harm him. Blame Game in Brazilian.
Meanwhile, in neighboring Argentina, the Peronists are returning to power in the upcoming presidential elections. Their leftist nationalist ideology has helped ruin one of the world's richest countries.
In Germany, there are populists so far only in the opposition. But after this Sunday, the situation could change: the state elections in Saxony and Brandenburg could catapult the AfD in the state policy in key roles. Your anti-immigration course will hurt the East long term. There, the population is already shrinking threatening. Wilting landscapes are in urgent need of immigrants. But currently the AfD can politically benefit from a mood that has fueled her own.
Today the blue promise from the sky and tomorrow, if the sky collapses just because of that, blaming anyone else - it's always the same pattern.
But populists can be quite harmless. Silvio Berlusconi, one of the founding fathers of modern Euro-populism, harmed Italy in the 1990s and 1990s, mainly by doing nothing: instead of pushing for necessary - and short-term unpopular - reforms, he interpreted his role as extravagant - as a disgusting entertainer. Italy still suffers from its omissions.
Serious politics are boring - that's a problem
Politics, especially economic and financial policy, can be understood as a struggle between short and long term. What can be beneficial in the short term causes costs in the long run - and vice versa.
Structural reforms may be painful today, but will help in subsequent years. Anyone who spends more money today than he can make voters happy, but in the future, higher debts. Low interest rates can spark a boom that leads to a crash. Switching to renewable energies more rapidly will cause costs in the present, but lower costs and better climate in the future.
Reputable politics means finding compromises between short and long term, between current demands and sustainable stability, between the desirable and the necessary - between costs and returns that fall apart in time.
The debates about such compromises are typically complex, time-consuming and difficult to understand. Boring! Populists, on the other hand, have the better stories. They are simple, exciting and easy to understand.
Exalted leaders such as Johnson, Trump or Salvini fascinate the public: some because they upset all the insanity, the others because they would like to behave so crazy.
No question, in the fast, noisy news business, populists have a competitive advantage over serious-looking political leaders. That's one of the reasons for the populist wave that has seized the West. But the longer it rolls, the more the damage it inflicts. Bad enough. But they now clearly reveal their programmatic imperfections.
And there is, after all, a piece of hope.
The main economic events of the upcoming week
Monday
Berlin / Dresden / Potsdam - The consequences of plucking - After the elections in Saxony and Brandenburg: state and federal politicians try to interpret the election results of Sunday.
Tuesday
London - Parliament locked out - After almost six weeks summer break, the British House of Commons comes together. But Premier Johnson wants to send parliamentarians back home so they do not get in the way of his plans for a Brexit with or without a deal on October 31st. A showdown is imminent.
Sydney - Aussies on Dive Station? - Meeting of the Australian Central Bank. Down Under, interest rates continue to fall.
Wednesday
Saarbrücken - Show Run - First of 23 planned SPD Regional Conferences: The candidates and candidate duos face the party members in a kind of speed dating, which should then choose a new top.
Bonn - With and away - start of the criminal process in the Cum-Ex-scandal. Stock traders are accused of having arranged financial transactions at the expense of the public purse.
Berlin - Technical everyday life - News for the domestic technology at the first media day of the fair IFA.
Thursday
Munich - No light flares - For Osram shareholders ends the period until which they can accept a purchase offer from the financial investors Bain Capital and Carlyle. If the number remains below the expectations of potential buyers, the takeover should be canceled.
Frankfurt / M. - Hope and anxiety - New figures for new orders in mechanical engineering. In recent months, Germany's flagship industry has suffered badly from the global slowdown.
Friday
Luxembourg - Europe's prosperity - Eurostat publishes details of EU and euro area economic developments in the second quarter.