Populisms, popular geopolitics and the politics of belonging in Estonia

Abstract

The current article is focused on the various types of populism in Estonia (e.g. Estonian national populism, hybrid populist discourse, etc.) in which we discuss the complex phenomenon of populism in two contexts: EU political upheavals (the refugee crisis of 2015 which received special attention from populist politics in Europe) and complex Russian-EU relations. For our analysis we interviewed several Estonian politicians and opinion-leaders. We also analyzed Russian language media sources in Estonia, covering a broad spectrum of populist narratives among the Russophone population of Estonia.