ABSTRACT
Chapter 2 explains the connections between Brexit populism and the emergence of irony. The argument presented in this chapter is that the ‘situational irony’ of Brexit – one that both presents and hides neoliberal tendencies – is reinforced by the various ‘textual’ or ‘postmodern ironies’ of this discourse. This is an irony that is formed through discourses on globalisation and through the transformation of cynical irony into ironic populism. The ironies of Brexit populism seek to hide or transform a number of taboo discourses on the ‘other’. The ironic discourses of Brexit populism mobilise a liquid racism that works as an anti-immigrant logic inside the discourse and both presents and hides an othering of the foreigner. Irony manifests in the conspiratorial construction of much populism, which also describes the various ‘others’ of the discourse through nefariousness. The chapter describes trickster tactics as a political strategy that is mobilised in populism, as a politics of ambiguity and a necessary negotiation of the ironies created by the discourse.
