“Populism” is a striking and highly controversial concept and topic. Relative researches mainly follow three approaches: first , historical comparative approach that traces the origin of its conceptual representations, with explanations of its origins and historical development; second, a typological approach that examines the uses of the idea of populism and the diversity of related ideological movements; third, the approach of comparative politics that corrects the over-generalization in the use of the concept, with a focus on hidden similarities and differences between cases and on theoretical construction.Given that comparative politics emphasizes the “contextuality” and “complexity” of concepts, this paper attempts to extract the core meaning (defining attributes) of contemporary populism taking Sartori’s classical classification method as a departure point. According to Dutch scholar Mathias Ruduin’s research, the “minimal definition” of contemporary populism looks at it as a political polarization movement centered on “the people” that arises in the context of economic globalization when a certain country or region declares the existence of a “crisis”, mobilizing a homogeneous notion of “the people” against elitism.The rise of contemporary populism has three foundational roots: the structural imbalance of modern democratic system constitutes the institutional basis for the transformation of “democracy” into “populism”; the failure of public deliberation mechanisms and technological obfuscation form the social basis for its opposing “elites” with the “masses”; and adjustments in international order and the failure of global governance provide the strategic basis for leveraging “circumstances” to amplify a sense of crisis.

　　Editor: Zhong Yao  Deng Panyi

　　From: World Socialism Studies. 2025.No.1.