Gina Miller outside the High Court in London where three judges have ruled against the Prime Minister's decision to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty and start the UK's exit from the European Union without the prior authority of Parliament.Dominic Lipinski/ Press Association. All rights reserved. The key aspect of populisms as political programs is to be found not in what populist politicians proclaim, particularly not in their campaigning activity, but in how this is translated into an institutionalized form – how they are going about reconfiguring the existing institutions of social and political life.
It is when populisms confront the actual concrete organizational institutions of everyday life that we will perceive their potential real effects.
Perhaps populisms are more comfortable with what might be termed the social institutions of contemporary society – like the family, religions, community (and in the UK, even the monarchy) – than they are with the organized institutions of civic and political life.
