These days, virtually anyone outside the political mainstream is called a populist. The term populist is frequently used to denigrate people who vote the 'wrong way'. Frank Furedi argues that in the current climate anti-populism represents a far greater threat to public life than populism.

Frank Furedi is emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent, UK. Over the past thirty years, he has gained a position as a social commentator, traveling the world to give lectures and has published books on parenting children, food, new technologies and terrorism.

In 2018 Furedi published Populism and the European Culture Wars. In this book, he defends the right of Hungarian and Polish citizens, inhabitants of two countries members of the European Union, to be nationalistic. Furedi’s analysis is that we can only explain the current populist tendencies in Eastern Europe, by looking into the roots and history of the societies. This book was met with controversy, given Furedi’s status as a left wing, and atheist sociologist.