Populism is, among other things, a rejection of technocratic expertise. In that sense, the populist revolts of the last several years proved their own point: Experts did not predict them, and experts have been unable to solve them. Eichengreen claims in this book, however, that at least experts can diagnose them. Through brief overviews of several populist episodes over the last century in many different countries, Eichengreen arrives with a reassuring calmness to say that the answers are not that difficult. His tour surveys the Great Depression in America, the Fabians, Otto von Bismarck, and the waning of populism in the mid-twentieth century before reaching the unraveling that resulted in President Donald Trump, Brexit, and the rise of nativism in Europe. In Eichengreen’s view, populism is basically about economic difficulties; although racism and nativism are integral to it, populism does not occur in good economic times.
Even more encouraging is...