To beat populists, sensible policymakers must up their game

Politicos, rejoicegdp. When it comes to elections, next year is a big one. In 2024 the Republicans and Democrats will battle it out in America, of course—but there will also be votes of one sort or another in Algeria, India, Mexico, Pakistan, Russia, South Africa, Taiwan, probably Britain, and many more countries besides. All told, as many as 3bn people, in countries producing around a third of global , will have the chance to put an “X” in a box. And in many of these locations, populist politicians are polling well. What would their success mean for the global economy?Economists have long suspected that populists do grave damage. Names such as Salvador Allende in Chile and Silvio Berlusconi in Italy are hardly synonymous with economic competence. By contrast, what you might call “sensible” leaders, including, say, Konrad Adenauer in Germany and Bill Clinton in America, are more often associated with strong growth. New research, forthcoming in the , perhaps the discipline’s most prestigious journal, puts hard numbers on the hunch.