The contemporary dispute of “right-wing populism” and the liberal democratic consensus. Polarisation, conformism and asymmetry of debate

This paper addresses contemporary political debate regarding the dispute over “right-wing populism”, the strong polarisation and cognitive credibility of the conflicting opinions, the controversial nature of its key concepts and intellectual conformism to the dominant climate of opinion. The key point of the entire text concerns the source of cognitive defects in contemporary criticism of “right-wing populism”. It expresses the author’s conviction that they result from the approval of the hegemonic aspirations of the liberal mind. The aim of the article has critical and apologetic aspects. The former refers to the style of polemics used regarding dissenters against the liberal democratic consensus, which discredits it with the stigmatising epithet “populism”. The latter applies to this tradition of understanding the origins and nature of Western freedom (present, for example, in the Tory traditionalists of the “Peterhouse School” also known as the “Salisbury Group”), which emphasises not only the importance but also the vitality of the premodern political legacy. The analyses contained in the article represent an interpretative theoretical approach. The article uses a comparative and historical method. The research procedure here includes, among others, the confrontation not only between different opinions, but also the clash of two historical perspectives, i.e. the contemporary discussion on “right-wing populism” and, in the longer term, debate on democracy and liberalism.