ABSTRACT
Laclau, an Argentine historian by background, author of important works on political philosophy, always divided between political commitment and academic activity – has dominated the progressive arena since the 1980s, especially in Latin America. Together with Margaret Canovan, Ernesto Laclau is the scholar who in the last few years has contributed more than anybody else to a re-conceptualization of populism. Laclau's work is characterized by an original epistemological and writing style due to the use of categories and arguments which refer to psychoanalysis, structuralism and, obviously, Marxism. Starting from Ferdinand de Saussure's assumption, according to which language is a social fact, Laclau assigned an important role to language in the study of social phenomena. According to Laclau, populism does not have a precise ideological connotation and it can therefore be either left-wing or right-wing, both progressive and reactionary. The "social demand" is the starting point of any populism.
