A demagogue /ˈdɛməɡɒɡ/ (from Greek δημαγωγός, a popular leader, a leader of a mob, from δῆμος, people, populace, the commons + ἀγωγός leading, leader) or rabble-rouser is a leader who gains popularity in a democracy by exploiting emotions, prejudice, and ignorance to arouse the common people against elites, whipping up the passions of the crowd and shutting down reasoned deliberation. Demagogues overturn established norms of political conduct, or promise or threaten to do so.
Historian Reinhard Luthin defined demagogue thus: "What is a demagogue? He is a politician skilled in oratory, flattery and invective; evasive in discussing vital issues; promising everything to everybody; appealing to the passions rather than the reason of the public; and arousing racial, religious, and class prejudices—a man whose lust for power without recourse to principle leads him to seek to become a master of the masses. He has for centuries practiced his profession of 'man of the people'. He is a product of a political tradition nearly as old as western civilization itself."
Demagogues have appeared in democracies since ancient Athens. They exploit a fundamental weakness in democracy: because ultimate power is held by the people, it is possible for the people to give that power to someone who appeals to the lowest common denominator of a large segment of the population. Demagogues usually advocate immediate, forceful action to address a crisis while accusing moderate and thoughtful opponents of weakness or disloyalty. If elected to high executive office, demagogues typically unravel limits on executive power and attempt to convert their democracy to dictatorship.
Historian Reinhard Luthin defined demagogue thus: "What is a demagogue? He is a politician skilled in oratory, flattery and invective; evasive in discussing vital issues; promising everything to everybody; appealing to the passions rather than the reason of the public; and arousing racial, religious, and class prejudices—a man whose lust for power without recourse to principle leads him to seek to become a master of the masses. He has for centuries practiced his profession of 'man of the people'. He is a product of a political tradition nearly as old as western civilization itself."
Demagogues have appeared in democracies since ancient Athens. They exploit a fundamental weakness in democracy: because ultimate power is held by the people, it is possible for the people to give that power to someone who appeals to the lowest common denominator of a large segment of the population. Demagogues usually advocate immediate, forceful action to address a crisis while accusing moderate and thoughtful opponents of weakness or disloyalty. If elected to high executive office, demagogues typically unravel limits on executive power and attempt to convert their democracy to dictatorship.
History and definition of the word
A demagogue, in the strict signification of the word, is a 'leader of the rabble'.
— James Fenimore Cooper, "On Demagogues"
The word demagogue, originally meaning a leader of the common people, was first coined in ancient Greece with no negative connotation, but eventually came to mean a troublesome kind of leader who occasionally arose in Athenian democracy.
Even though democracy gave power to the common people, elections still
tended to favor the aristocratic class, which favored deliberation and
decorum. Demagogues were a new kind of leader who emerged from the lower
classes. Demagogues relentlessly advocated action, usually
violent—immediately and without deliberation. Demagogues appealed directly to the emotions
of the poor and uninformed, pursuing power, telling lies to stir up
hysteria, exploiting crises to intensify popular support for their calls
to immediate action and increased authority, and accusing moderate
opponents of weakness or disloyalty to the nation.
Throughout its history, people have often used the word demagogue carelessly, as an "attack word" to disparage any leader whom the speaker thinks manipulative, pernicious, or bigoted.
While there can be no precise delineation between demagogues and
non-demagogues, since democratic leaders exist on a continuum from less
to more demagogic, what distinguishes a demagogue can be defined
independently of whether the speaker favors or opposes a certain
political leader. What distinguishes a demagogue is how
he or she gains or holds democratic power: by exciting the passions of
the lower classes and less-educated people in a democracy toward rash or
violent action, breaking established democratic institutions such as
the rule of law. James Fenimore Cooper in 1838 identified four fundamental characteristics of demagogues:
- They present themselves as a man or woman of the common people, opposed to the elites.
- Their politics depends on a visceral connection with the people, which greatly exceeds ordinary political popularity.
- They manipulate this connection, and the raging popularity it affords, for their own benefit and ambition.
- They threaten or outright break established rules of conduct, institutions, and even the law.
The central feature of demagoguery is persuasion by means of passion,
shutting down reasoned deliberation and consideration of alternatives.
While many politicians in a democracy make occasional small sacrifices
of truth, subtlety, or long-term concerns to maintain popular support,
demagogues do these things relentlessly and without self-restraint. Demagogues "pander to passion, prejudice, bigotry, and ignorance, rather than reason."
The enduring character of demagogues
In every age the vilest specimens of human nature are to be found among demagogues.
— Thomas Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James II (1849)
Demagogues have arisen in democracies from Athens to the present day.
Though most demagogues have unique, colorful personalities, their
psychological tactics have remained the same throughout history (see below). Often considered the first demagogue, Cleon of Athens
is remembered mainly for the brutality of his rule and his near
destruction of Athenian democracy, resulting from his "common-man"
appeal to disregard the moderate customs of the aristocratic elite. Modern demagogues include Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Huey Long, Father Coughlin, and Joseph McCarthy,
all of whom built mass followings the same way that Cleon did: by
exciting the passions of the mob against the moderate, thoughtful
customs of the aristocratic elites of their times.
All, ancient and modern, meet Cooper's four criteria above: claiming
to represent the common people, inciting intense passions among them,
exploiting those reactions to take power, and breaking or at least
threatening established rules of political conduct, though each in
different ways.
Demagogues exploit a perennial weakness of democracies: the
greater numbers, and hence votes, of the lower classes and less-educated
people—the people most prone to be whipped up into a fury and led to
catastrophic action by an orator skilled at fanning that kind of flame.
Democracies are instituted to ensure freedom for all and popular control
over government authority. Demagogues turn power deriving from popular
support into a force that undermines the very freedoms and rule of law
that democracies are made to protect. The Greek historian Polybius
thought that democracies are inevitably undone by demagogues. He said
that every democracy eventually decays into "a government of violence
and the strong hand," leading to "tumultuous assemblies, massacres,
banishments."
Whereas conventional wisdom sets up democracy and fascism as
opposites, to ancient political theorists democracy had an innate
tendency to lead to extreme populist government, and provided
unscrupulous demagogues with the ideal opportunity to seize power.
Indeed, Ivo Mosley argued that totalitarian regimes may well be the logical outcome of unfettered mass democracy.
Methods
Below
are described a number of methods by which demagogues have manipulated
and incited crowds throughout history. Not all demagogues use all of
these methods, and no two demagogues use exactly the same methods to
gain popularity and loyalty. Even ordinary politicians use some of these
techniques from time to time; a politician who failed to stir emotions
at all would have little hope of being elected. What these techniques
have in common, and what distinguishes demagogues' use of them, is their
consistent use to shut down reasoned deliberation by stirring up
overwhelming passion.
Sometimes, a statesman, the kind of politician genuinely
concerned with good policy, may need to resort to demagogic tactics in
order to thwart a real demagogue—to "fight fire with fire". A real
demagogue uses these tactics without restraint; a statesman, only to
avert greater harm to the nation. In contrast to a demagogue, a
statesman's ordinary rhetoric seeks "to calm rather than excite, to
conciliate rather than divide, and to instruct rather than flatter."
Scapegoating
The most fundamental demagogic technique is scapegoating: blaming the in-group's troubles on an out-group, usually of a different ethnicity, religion, or social class. For example, McCarthy claimed that all of the problems of the U.S. resulted from "communist subversion." Denis Kearney blamed all the problems of laborers in California on Chinese immigrants. Hitler blamed Jews for Germany's defeat in World War I
as well as the economic troubles that came afterward. This was central
to his appeal: many people said that the only reason they liked Hitler
was because he was against the Jews. Fixing blame on the Jews gave
Hitler a way to intensify nationalism and unity.
The claims made about the scapegoated class are mostly the same
regardless of the demagogue and regardless of the scapegoated class or
the nature of the crisis that the demagogue is exploiting. "We" are the
"true" Americans/Germans/Christians/etc., and "they", the
Jews/bankers/communists/capitalists/unions/foreigners/elites/etc., have
cheated "us" plain folk and are living in decadent luxury off riches
that rightfully belong to "us". "They" are plotting to take over, are
now rapidly taking power, or are already secretly running the country.
"They" are subhuman, sexual perverts who will seduce or rape "our"
daughters, and if "we" don't expel or exterminate "them" right away,
doom is just around the corner.
Fearmongering
Many demagogues have risen to power by evoking fear in their audiences, to stir them to action and prevent deliberation. Fear of rape, for example, is easily evoked. "Pitchfork Ben" Tillman's rhetoric
was most vivid when he was describing imaginary scenes in which white
women were raped by black men lurking by the side of the road. He
depicted black men as having an innate "character weakness" consisting
of a fondness for raping white women. Tillman was elected governor of South Carolina in 1890, and elected senator repeatedly from 1895–1918.
Lying
While any
politician needs to point out dangers to the people and criticize
opponents' policies, demagogues choose their words for their effect on
their audience's emotions, usually without regard for factual truth or
the real severity of the danger.
Some demagogues are opportunistic, monitoring the people and saying
whatever currently will generate the most "heat". Other demagogues may
themselves be so ignorant or prejudiced that they sincerely believe the
falsehoods they tell.
When one lie doesn't work, the demagogue quickly moves on to more
lies. Joe McCarthy first claimed to have "here in my hand" a list of
205 members of the Communist Party working in the State Department.
Soon this became 57 "card-carrying Communists". When pressed to provide
their names, McCarthy then said that while the records are not
available to him, he knew "absolutely" that "approximately" 300
Communists were certified to the Secretary of State for discharge but
only "approximately" 80 were actually discharged. When called on that
bluff, he said that he had a list of 81, which he would use in the
following weeks. McCarthy never turned up even one Communist in the
State Department.
Emotional oratory and personal charisma
Many
demagogues have demonstrated remarkable skill at moving audiences to
great emotional depths and heights during a speech. Sometimes this is
due to exceptional verbal eloquence, sometimes personal charisma, and
sometimes both. Hitler demonstrated both. His eyes had a hypnotic effect
on many people, seeming to immobilize and overwhelm whomever he glared
at. Hitler usually began his speeches by speaking slowly, in a low,
resonant voice, telling of his life in poverty after serving in World
War I, suffering in the chaos and humiliation of postwar Germany, and
resolving to reawaken the Fatherland. Gradually he would escalate the
tone and tempo of his speech, ending in a climax in which he shrieked
his hatred of Bolsheviks, Jews, Czechs, Poles, or whatever group he
currently perceived as standing in his way—mocking them, ridiculing
them, insulting them, and threatening them with destruction. Normally
reasonable people became caught up in the peculiar rapport that Hitler
established with his audience, believing even the most obvious lies and
nonsense while under his spell. Hitler was not born with these vocal and
oratorical skills; he acquired them through long and deliberate
practice.
A more ordinary silver-tongued demagogue was the Negro-baiter James Kimble Vardaman
(Governor of Mississippi 1904–1908, Senator 1913–1919), admired even by
his opponents for his oratorical gifts and colorful language. An
example, responding to Theodore Roosevelt's having invited black people
to a reception at the White House: "Let Teddy take coons to the White
House. I should not care if the walls of the ancient edifice should
become so saturated with the effluvia from the rancid carcasses that a
Chinch bug would have to crawl upon the dome to avoid asphyxiation."
Vardaman's speeches tended to have little content; he spoke in a
ceremonial style even in deliberative settings. His speeches served
mostly as a vehicle for his personal magnetism, charming voice, and
graceful delivery.
The demagogues' charisma and emotional oratory many times enabled them to win elections despite opposition from the press. The news media
informs voters, and often the information is damaging to demagogues.
Demagogic oratory distracts, entertains, and enthralls, steering
followers' attention away from the demagogue's usual history of lies,
abuses of power, and broken promises. The advent of radio enabled many 20th-century demagogues' skill with the spoken word to drown out the written word of newspapers.
Accusing opponents of weakness and disloyalty
Cleon,
like many demagogues who came after him, constantly advocated brutality
in order to demonstrate strength, and argued that compassion was a sign
of weakness that would only be exploited by enemies. "It is a general
rule of human nature that people despise those who treat them well and
look up to those who make no concessions." At the Mytilenian Debate
over whether to recall the ships he had sent the previous day to
slaughter and enslave the entire population of Mytilene, he opposed the
very idea of debate, characterizing it as an idle, weak, intellectual
pleasure: "To feel pity, to be carried away by the pleasure of hearing a
clever argument, to listen to the claims of decency are three things
that are entirely against the interests of an imperial power."
Distracting from his lack of evidence for his claims, Joe
McCarthy persistently insinuated that anyone who opposed him was a
communist sympathizer. G.M. Gilbert summarized this rhetoric as "I'm
agin' Communism; you're agin' me; therefore you must be a communist."
Promising the impossible
Another
fundamental demagogic technique is making promises only for their
emotional effect on audiences, without regard for how they might be
accomplished or without intending to honor them once in office.
Demagogues express these empty promises simply and theatrically, but
remain extremely hazy about how they will achieve them because usually
they are impossible. For example, Huey Long
promised that if he were elected president, every family would have a
home, an automobile, a radio, and $2,000 yearly. He was vague about how
he would make that happen, but people still joined his Share-the-Wealth
clubs. Another kind of empty demagogic promise is to make everyone wealthy or "solve all the problems". The Polish demagogue Stanisław Tymiński,
running as an unknown "maverick" on the basis of his prior success as a
businessman in Canada, promised "immediate prosperity"—exploiting the
economic difficulties of laborers, especially miners and steelworkers.
Tymiński forced a runoff in the 1990 presidential election, nearly
defeating Lech Wałęsa.
Violence and physical intimidation
Demagogues
have often encouraged their supporters to violently intimidate
opponents, both to solidify loyalty among their supporters and to
discourage or physically prevent people from speaking out or voting
against them. "Pitchfork Ben" Tillman was repeatedly re-elected to the
U.S. Senate largely through violence and intimidation. He spoke in
support of lynch mobs, and he disenfranchised most black voters with the
South Carolina constitution of 1895. Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf
that physical intimidation was an effective way to move the masses.
Hitler intentionally provoked hecklers at his rallies so that his
supporters would become enraged by their remarks and assault them.
Personal insults and ridicule
Many
demagogues have found that ridiculing or insulting opponents is a
simple way to shut down reasoned deliberation of competing ideas,
especially with an unsophisticated audience. "Pitchfork Ben" Tillman,
for example, was a master of the personal insult. He got his nickname
from a speech in which he called President Grover Cleveland "an old bag of beef" and resolved to bring a pitchfork to Washington to "poke him in his old fat ribs." James Kimble Vardaman consistently referred to President Theodore Roosevelt as a "coon-flavored miscegenationist"
and once posted an ad in a newspaper for "sixteen big, fat, mellow,
rancid coons" to sleep with Roosevelt during a trip to Mississippi.
A common demagogic technique is to pin an insulting epithet
on an opponent, by saying it repeatedly, in speech after speech, when
saying the opponent's name or in place of it. For example, James Curley referred to Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., his Republican opponent for Senator, as "Little Boy Blue". William Hale Thompson called Anton Cermak, his opponent for mayor of Chicago, "Tony Baloney". Huey Long called Joseph E. Ransdell, his elderly opponent for Senator, "Old Feather Duster". Joe McCarthy liked to call Secretary of State Dean Acheson
"The Red Dean of Fashion". The use of epithets and other humorous
invective diverts followers' attention from soberly considering how to
address the important public issues of the time, scoring easy laughs
instead.
Vulgarity and outrageous behavior
Legislative
bodies usually have sober standards of decorum that are intended to
quiet passions and favor reasoned deliberation. Many demagogues violate
standards of decorum outrageously, to show clearly that they are
thumbing their noses at the established order and the genteel ways of
the upper class, or simply because they enjoy the attention that it
brings. The common people might find the demagogue disgusting, but the
demagogue can use the upper class's contempt for him to show that he
won't be shamed or intimidated by the powerful.
For example, Huey Long famously wore pajamas to highly dignified occasions where others were dressed at the height of formality. He once stood "bukk nekkid" at his hotel suite when laying down the law to a meeting of political fuglemen.
Long was "intensely and solely interested in himself. He had to
dominate every scene he was in and every person around him. He craved
attention and would go to almost any length to get it. He knew that an
audacious action, although it was harsh and even barbarous, could shock
people into a state where they could be manipulated."
"He displayed no … restraint, proving so shameless in his pursuit of
publicity, and so adept at getting press coverage, that he was soon
attracting more attention from the press and the galleries than most of
the rest of his colleagues combined."
Aristotle
pointed out the bad manners of Cleon more than 2,000 years ago:
"[Cleon] was the first who shouted on the public platform, who used
abusive language and who spoke with his cloak girt about him, while all
the others used to speak in proper dress and manner."
Folksy posturing
Most
demagogues have made a show of appearing to be down-to-Earth, ordinary
citizens just like the people whose votes they sought. In the United
States, many took folksy nicknames: William H. Murray (1869–1956) was "Alfalfa Bill"; James M. Curley (1874–1958) of Boston was "Our Jim"; Ellison D. Smith (1864–1944) was "Cotton Ed"; the husband-and-wife demagogue team of Miriam and James E. Ferguson went by "Ma and Pa"; Texas governor W. Lee O'Daniel (1890–1969) was "Pappy-Pass-the-Biscuits".
Georgia governor Eugene Talmadge
(1884–1946) put a barn and a henhouse on the Executive Mansion
grounds, loudly explaining that he couldn't sleep nights unless he heard
the bellowing of livestock and the cackling of poultry.
When in the presence of farmers, he chewed tobacco and faked a rural
accent—though he himself was college-educated—railing against "frills"
and "nigger-lovin' furriners". He defined furriner as "Anyone who
attempts to impose ideas that are contrary to the established
traditions of Georgia." His grammar and vocabulary became more refined
when speaking before a city audience. Talmadge was famous for wearing gaudy red galluses, which he snapped for emphasis during his speeches. On his desk, he kept three books, which he loudly proclaimed to visitors were all that a governor needed: a bible, the state financial report, and a Sears–Roebuck catalog.
Huey Long displayed his common-people roots by such methods as calling himself "The Kingfish" and gulping down pot likker when visiting northern Louisiana; he once issued a press release demanding that his name be removed from the Washington Social Register.
"Alfalfa Bill" made sure to remind people of his rural background by
talking in the terminology of farming: "I will plow straight furrows and
blast all the stumps. The common people and I can lick the whole lousy
gang."
Gross oversimplification
Demagogues
commonly treat complex problems, which require patient reasoning and
analysis, as if they result from one simple cause or can be solved by
one simple cure. For example, Huey Long claimed that all of the U.S.'s
economic problems could be solved just by "sharing the wealth". Hitler claimed that Germany had lost World War I only because of a "Stab in the Back". Scapegoating (above) is one form of gross oversimplification.
Attacking the news media
Since
information from the press can undermine a demagogue's spell over his
or her followers, modern demagogues have often attacked it
intemperately, calling for violence against newspapers who opposed them,
claiming that the press was secretly in the service of moneyed
interests or foreign powers, or claiming that leading newspapers were
simply personally out to get them. Huey Long accused the New Orleans Times–Picayune and Item of being "bought", and had his bodyguards rough up their reporters. Oklahoma governor "Alfalfa Bill" Murray (1869–1956) once called for a bomb to be dropped on the offices of the Daily Oklahoman. Joe McCarthy accused The Christian Science Monitor, the New York Post, The New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, The Washington Post, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and other leading American newspapers of being "Communist smear sheets" under the control of the Kremlin.
Demagogues in power
The shortest way to ruin a country is to give power to demagogues.
— Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Antiquities of Rome, VI (20 BC)
Establishing one-man rule, subverting the rule of law
Once elected to executive office, most demagogues have moved quickly to expand their power, both de jure and de facto:
by getting legislation passed to officially expand their authority, and
by building up networks of corruption and informal pressure to ensure
that their dictates are followed regardless of constitutional authority.
For example, within two months of being appointed chancellor, Hitler unraveled all constitutional limitations on his power.
He achieved this through near-daily acts of chaos, destabilizing the
state and providing ever stronger reasons to justify taking more power.
Hitler was appointed on January 30, 1933; on February 1, the Reichstag was dissolved; on February 27, the Reichstag building burned; on February 28, the Reichstag Fire Decree gave Hitler gave emergency powers and suspended civil liberties; on March 5, new general elections were held; on March 22, the first concentration camp opened, taking political prisoners. On March 24, the Enabling Act
was passed, giving Hitler full legislative powers, thus ending all
constitutional restraint and making Hitler absolute dictator.
Consolidation of power continued even after that; see Early timeline of Nazism.
Even local demagogues have established one-man rule, or a near approximation of it, over their constituencies. "Alfalfa Bill" Murray, a demagogue who was elected governor of Oklahoma by appealing to poor rural animosity toward "craven wolves of plutocracy", promised to "make an open season on millionaires."
Despite having presided over Oklahoma's constitutional convention,
Murray routinely violated the constitution, ruling by executive order
whenever the legislature or the courts got in his way. When federal
courts ruled against him, he prevailed by relying on the National Guard,
even donning a military hat and pistol and personally commanding the
troops—and seeing to it that the confrontation was filmed by movie
cameras.
Murray attempted to expand gubernatorial powers with a set of four
initiatives, replacing existing income-tax law with his own, giving him
power to appoint all members of the board of education, acquiring
corporation-owned land, and giving him extraordinary power over the
budget, but these were defeated.
Huey Long, governor and de facto dictator of Louisiana
In 1928, before Huey Long
was sworn in as governor of Louisiana, he was already supervising
political appointments to ensure a loyal majority for all his
initiatives. As governor, he ousted public officers not personally loyal
to him and took control away from state commissions to ensure that all
contracts would be awarded to people in his political machine.
In a confrontation over natural gas with managers of the Public Service
Corporation, he told them, truthfully, "A deck has 52 cards and in
Baton Rouge I hold all 52 of them and I can shuffle and deal as I
please. I can have bills passed or I can kill them. I'll give you until
Saturday to decide." They yielded to Long—and became part of his
ever-expanding machine.
When Long became a senator in 1932, his enemy, the lieutenant governor Paul N. Cyr,
was sworn in as governor. Long, without authority, ordered state
troopers to surround the executive mansion and arrest Cyr as an
imposter. Long installed his ally Alvin O. King as governor, later replaced by O.K. Allen,
serving as stooges for Long. Thus even in Washington, with no official
authority, Long retained dictatorial control over Louisiana. When the
Mayor of New Orleans, T. Semmes Walmsley,
began to oppose Long's extraordinary power over the state, Long
exploited a subservient judge to justify making an armed attack on the
basis of cracking down on racketeering. At Long's order, Governor Allen
declared martial law and dispatched National Guardsmen to seize the
Registrar of Voters, allegedly "to prevent election frauds." Then, by
stuffing ballot boxes, Long ensured victory for his candidates to
Congress. Long's own racketeering operation then grew. With his "trained
seal" legislature, armed militias, taxation used as a political weapon,
control over elections, and weakened court authority to limit his
power, Huey Long maintained control in Louisiana comparable to that of
Hitler in Germany or Stalin in the Soviet Union.
Appointing unqualified lackeys to high office; corruption
As
the preceding section illustrates, demagogues typically appoint people
to high office based on personal loyalty without regard to competence
for the office—opening up extraordinary avenues for graft and
corruption. During "Alfalfa Bill" Murray's campaign for governor, he
promised to crack down on corruption and favoritism for the rich, to
abolish half the clerk jobs at the State House, to appoint no family
members, to reduce the number of state-owned cars from 800 to 200, never
to use convict labor to compete with commercial labor, and not to abuse
the power of pardon. Once in office, he appointed wealthy patrons and
20 of his relatives to high office, purchased more cars, used prisoners
to make ice for sale and clean the capitol building, and violated all
the other promises. When the State Auditor pointed out that 1,050 new
employees had been added to the state payroll, Murray simply said, "Just
damned lies." For each abuse of power, Murray claimed a mandate from
"the sovereign will of the people".
Famous demagogues
Ancient
Cleon
The Athenian leader Cleon is known as a notorious demagogue mainly because of three events described in the writings of Thucydides and Aristophanes.
First, after the failed revolt by the city of Mytilene,
Cleon persuaded the Athenians to slaughter not just the Mytilenean
prisoners, but every man in the city, and to sell their wives and
children as slaves. The Athenians rescinded the resolution the following
day when they came to their senses.
Second, after Athens had completely defeated the Peloponnesian fleet in the Battle of Sphacteria and Sparta could only beg for peace on almost any terms, Cleon persuaded the Athenians to reject the peace offer.
Third, he taunted the Athenian generals over their failure to
bring the war in Sphacteria to a rapid close, accusing them of
cowardice, and declared that he could finish the job himself in twenty
days, despite having no military knowledge. They gave him the job,
expecting him to fail. Cleon shrank at being called to make good on his
boast, and tried to get out of it, but he was forced to take the
command. In fact, he succeeded—by getting the general Demosthenes
to do it, now treating him with respect after previously slandering him
behind his back. Three years later, Cleon and his Spartan counterpart Brasidas were killed at the Battle of Amphipolis, enabling a restoration of peace that lasted until the outbreak of the Second Peloponnesian War.
Modern commentators suspect that Thucydides and Aristophanes
exaggerated the vileness of Cleon's real character. Both had personal
conflicts with Cleon, and The Knights
is a satirical, allegorical comedy that doesn't even mention Cleon by
name. Cleon was a tradesman—a leather-tanner. Thucydides and
Aristophanes came from the upper classes, predisposed to look down on
the commercial classes. Nevertheless, their portrayals define the
archetypal example of the "demagogue" or "rabble-rouser."
Alcibiades
Alcibiades convinced the people of Athens to attempt to conquer Sicily during the Peloponnesian War, with disastrous results. He led the Athenian assembly
to support making him commander by claiming victory would come easily,
appealing to Athenian vanity, and appealing to action and courage over
deliberation. Alcibiades's expedition might have succeeded if he had not
been denied command by the political maneuvers of his rivals.
Gaius Flaminius
Gaius Flaminius was a Roman consul most known for being defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene during the second Punic war. Hannibal
was able to make pivotal decisions during this battle because he
understood his opponent. Flaminius was described as a demagogue by Polybius, in his book the Rise of the Roman Empire. "...Flaminius possessed a rare talent for the arts of demagogy..." Because Flaminius was thus ill-suited, he lost 15,000 Roman lives, his own included, in the battle.
Modern
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler in 1927, rehearsing his oratorical gestures; photo by Heinrich Hoffmann, Bundesarchiv
The most famous demagogue of modern history, Adolf Hitler, first attempted to overthrow the Bavarian government not with popular support but by force in a failed putsch in 1923. While in prison, Hitler chose a new strategy: to overthrow the government democratically, by cultivating a mass movement. Even before the putsch, Hitler had rewritten the Nazi party's
platform to consciously target the lower classes of Germany, appealing
to their resentment of wealthier classes and calling for German unity
and increased central power. Hitler was delighted by the instant increase in popularity.
While Hitler was in prison, the Nazi party vote had fallen to one
million, and it continued to fall after Hitler was released in 1924 and
began rejuvenating the party. For the next several years, Hitler and
the Nazi party were generally regarded as a laughingstock in Germany, no
longer taken seriously as a threat to the country. Despite Hitler's
oratorical gift for stirring up the passions of a crowd (see below),
he was unable to stop the decline of the Nazi party. The prime minister
of Bavaria lifted the region's ban on the party, saying, "The wild
beast is checked. We can afford to loosen the chain."
In 1929, with the start of the Great Depression, Hitler's populism
started to become effective. Hitler updated the Nazi party's platform
to exploit the economic distress of ordinary Germans: repudiating the Versailles Treaty,
promising to eliminate corruption, and pledging to provide every German
with a job. In 1930, the Nazi party went from 200,000 votes to 6.4
million, making it the second-largest party in Parliament. By 1932, the
Nazi party had become the largest in Parliament. In early 1933, Hitler
was appointed Chancellor. He then exploited the Reichstag fire
to arrest his political opponents and consolidate his control of the
army. Within a few years, exploiting democratic support of the masses,
Hitler took Germany from a democracy to a total dictatorship.
Joseph McCarthy
Senator Joseph McCarthy, an American demagogue
Joseph McCarthy was a U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 to 1957. Though a poor orator,
McCarthy rose to national prominence during the early 1950s by
proclaiming that high places in the United States federal government and
military were "infested" with communists, contributing to the second "Red Scare". Ultimately his inability to provide proof for his claims, as well as his public attacks on the United States Army, led to the Army–McCarthy hearings in 1954, which in turn led to his censure by the Senate and fall from popularity.
