In the age of populist leaders: insights from ideational, strategic and discursive–performative perspectives

Purpose This article argues that political leadership is not a peripheral feature of populism but its constitutive force. It clarifies how contemporary scholarship conceptualizes the role of populist leaders and maps the theoretical and empirical developments that place leadership at the center of populist mobilization across diverse contexts. Design/methodology/approach The study offers a theory-led review of the literature, comparing how three major frameworks – the ideational, strategic and discursive–performative approaches – conceptualize the relationship between populism and leadership. It systematically assesses recent findings on leader traits and follower perceptions, authoritarian attitudes, strategic behavior and institutional opportunity structures and mediated performance (including embodiment and gender), evaluating how these dimensions intersect in the construction of populist authority. Findings Across divergent traditions, a shared recognition emerges: populist leadership is a relational and performative process that reshapes how “the people” are imagined and represented. The ideational approach highlights how leaders activate moral binaries and collective identities in resonance with citizens' worldviews. The strategic approach demonstrates how leaders personalize power and exploit institutional weakness and public disillusionment. The discursive–performative perspective reveals how leaders enact symbolic authority through affective narratives, norm-breaking and embodied representation amplified by contemporary communication ecologies. Together, these insights show that populist leadership is ideologically activated, strategically personalized and symbolically constructed. Originality/value By bridging theoretical divides, the article advances an integrative framework that repositions leadership from a residual variable to the primary site where populism is performed, legitimized and sustained, offering a coherent research agenda that links leaders, followers and institutions.