Classifying Wilders: The Ideological Development of Geert Wilders and His Party for Freedom

Abstract

This article deals with the ideological development of Geert Wilders, one of the most important politicians of the Netherlands and one of the figureheads of contemporary populism. In this overview his development will be characterised as a transition from a conservative liberalism to an American-inspired neoconservatism and finally to his own unique version of national populism. A closer study of this ideological development is relevant as Wilders's specific version of national populism, with its strong emphasis on the need to protect Western liberal values against Islam, seems to have the potential to become a new ideological master frame for national populist parties and movements in Europe and the United States.