ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the conception of politics within the ideological approach to populism has been underemphasised. It introduces the idea of populism having a focus on what is conceptualised as ‘unpolitics’ that refers to three tropes of populism that display different ways of thinking that are unpolitical. First, war, which explains the tendency to portray conflicts as binary and to downplay rights discourses; second, the parallels to religion, with tendencies to emphasise charismatic leadership, to celebrate the virtue of the people and to evangelise; third, the tendency to use conspiracy theories as explanations of politics. The tendency of populism to display these tropes is indicative of a celebration of ‘unpolitics’ over politics.
