A very telling interview with Czech PM Andrej Babis textbook illustration for (technocratic) populism. hir.harvard.edu/shock-to-the-h…
A shorts thread on technocratic populism using AB quotes to illustrate some relevant aspects of TP. 1/12
Three elements are crucial on TP: 1) combines populist and technocratic appeal; 2) transcends LR politics (but not centrist); 3) strategically combines populist and technocratic discourse (communication) and substance (policies) 2/12.
technocratic governance: "The Czech administration historically lacked rational decision-making and long-term planning; our government, for example, was the first to plan all necessary investments for the next 30 years." 3/12
populists correctly diagnose the core issues:
"I started the ANO movement with one simple goal in mind: to break down the political-economic matrix of corruption, endless mismanagement, and abuse of power that I witnessed during the 1990s and 2000s." 4/12
and propose a cure - unmediated politics
"I offered the Czech citizenry an alternative to traditional political parties (especially the Civic Democratic and Social Democratic Parties) and a different style of management without behind-the-scenes-deals and clientelism." 5/12
for those 'left behind':
"That cannot be done only through marketing or efficient PR. You must be in touch with people, especially with those who were left out by traditional parties." 6/12
AB mixes up 'populist' and 'popular' but makes a good point about perils of populism rising vs. populism in power - overpromising (during campaign) and underdelivering (in power) : 7/12
"Populist politicians are hotshots, they skyrocket in popularity using catchy promises, but the reality of day-to-day decision-making in office makes them highly unpopular and they then fall into oblivion." 8/12
Just as AstraZeneca reduces vaccine delivery to the EU by 73% a private company offers the city of Prague a purchase of 400k AstraZeneca vaccines at EUR 12.89/dose. Prague to contact @AstraZeneca , CZ government & fellow regional governments.
Update, per AstraZeneca CZ: the company is not an authorized re-seller. AZ only makes business with states (for now) and at fixed rates (no profit margins for now). It is not clear if the company ever had the vaccine. Possible fraud. Unrelated attempt detected in Veneto (IT).
Update 3/17 it turns out multiple regional governors were targeted by offers of AstraZeneca vaccines in the past several weeks. What these have in common are an exorbitant price (over EUR 10 per dose) and a shady middle man.