A Network Based Approach to Characterize Twenty-First-Century Populism in Colombia

TL;DR

This paper models Colombian political networks to analyze the influence of populist leader Alvaro Uribe, revealing his central role in alliances but not in state machinery, demonstrating a novel quantitative approach to populism studies.

Contribution

It introduces a network-based methodology to quantify and analyze populist influence in Colombian politics, offering a new quantitative perspective on populist regimes.

Findings

Uribe is a central hub in political alliance networks

Uribe is not the most central in state machinery

Network analysis reveals structural influence patterns

Abstract

Populism is a political phenomenon of democratic illiberalism centered on the figure of a strong leader. By modeling person/node connections of prominent figures of the recent Colombian political landscape we map, quantify, and analyze the position and influence of Alvaro Uribe as a populist leader. We found that Uribe is a central hub in the political alliances networks, cutting through traditional party alliances, . but is not the most central figure in the state machinery. The article first presents the framing of the problem, followed by the historical context of the case in study, the methodology employed and data collection, analysis, conclusions and further research paths. This study has implications for offering a new way of applying quantitative methods to the studies of populist regimes