There is an interesting argument that populist right-wing governments, led by likes of Trump and Johnson, are no longer seriously interested in public policy that improves the well-being of society. Their politics is instead performative. They sustain themselves through...

rhetoric that is emotionally charged and which capitalises on attitudinal fault lines in society. It can certainly help to explain the seemingly irrational impulses of such politicians. They simply have to amplify prejudices shared by a significant segment of society to win...

elections. The problem is once setting along that path the stakes have to be repeatedly raised, like a junkie who requires ever bigger shots to get the same high. The ultimate metaphor for where it leads is Hitler's bunker in 1945, with German society collapsing all around him.