Vol.:(0123456789) Acta Politica https://doi.org/10.1057/s41269-024-00360-8 ORIGINAL ARTICLE (MIS)Perceptions of populism: do populists and anti‑populists know what populism is? Andrea Wagner 1  · Anna Brigevich 2  · Dorian Kroqi 3 Accepted: 26 July 2024 © Crown 2024 Abstract While populism has recently garnered much scholarly attention and media scrutiny, we know little about what citizens think of this phenomenon. We conducted sur- veys in Canada, the United States, France, and Italy to probe how citizens perceive populism and whether they self-identify as populists or anti-populists. Surprisingly, many respondents do not comprehend the term, equating populism with “being pop- ular” or the “population.” Only a small proportion put forth definitions of populism advanced by academics and associate the term with people-centrism or anti-elitism. The ideational approach and populism’s “thin-centered” nature is lost on the aver- age citizen. Both supporters and critics of populism frequently link it to charismatic leaders, suggesting that defining populism with a focus on leadership resonates more with the public’s perception. Those that self-identify as populists typically equate it with community, democracy, equality, hope, leadership, and giving a voice to the people. However, anti-populists are more critical, likening populism to demagogu- ery and extremism, and describing populist supporters in derisive terms. Keywords Populism · Populist attitudes · Anti-populists · Demagoguery · Charismatic leadership * Andrea Wagner wagnera27@macewan.ca Anna Brigevich anna.brigevich@ntnu.no Dorian Kroqi dkroqi@connect.carleton.ca 1 MacEwan University, 7-368E, City Centre Campus, 10700 – 104 Avenue, Edmonton, AB, Canada 2 Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Bygg 11, 11560 Trondheim, Dragvoll, Norway 3 Carleton University, Ottawa, 1125 Colonel By Dr, K1S 5B6, Ontario, Canada