Krisis 39 (1):37-45 (
2019)
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Abstract
This essay critically analyzes two dominant narratives that explain and lament the rise of Donald Trump in the United States. First, I extend Jill Locke’s concept of “The Lament that Shame is Dead" to show the limitations of criticizing Trump in terms of the “death of shame.” I then turn my attention to the problems inerent in recent characterizations of Trump as a petulant child. Drawing from Locke on shame and Freud and Lee Edelman on the politics of “the child,” I argue that characterizing Trump as shameless, childish, or as a shameless child only affirms, rather than deposes, Trump’s right-wing populist strategy and keeps the focus on him as a personality rather than on the broader social and political context in which he emerged. I argue this has implications for the rise of right-wing populism in the West, more broadly.