The right wing that defends institutions and has no need to shout

Robin Alexander, who trained at Die Taz before moving to Die Welt, co-hosts Machtwechsel with Dagmar Rosenfeld – two weekly episodes in which the pair sift through the daily clamour to identify what really matters and reconstruct the decisions taken in the corridors of power. Der Spiegel describes him as the “nation’s political educator”: a conservative, respected even by the centre-left, capable of presenting the facts calmly without getting drawn into identity-based squabbles. The podcast is his natural medium because it allows him to do what television makes difficult: explain a compromise, reconstruct a meeting, and admit that an opponent is right on at least one point. Alexander’s British counterpart is Rory Stewart. A former Conservative minister and MP, defeated by Boris Johnson in the Tory leadership race, Stewart has created "The Rest Is Politics" with former Labour strategist Alastair Campbell. The title says it all: politics is not the same as cheering on a team. The podcast champions ‘opposing viewpoints’ and ‘civil debate’; it discusses Westminster, geopolitics and the rise of populism, using the motto ‘disagree agreeably’ – disagreeing without cutting ties. Stewart is a conservative in the oldest sense of the word: he is wary of a lone leader and of the idea that the will of the people can do without institutions. He does not offer the thrill of Nigel Farage; he offers something less spectacular and more rare: the possibility that the right might once again embody prudence.

In the United States, the clearest example is Jonah Goldberg. The Remnant blends political history, philosophy, pop culture and irony, with the aim of fostering the conversations excluded from television programmes built on shouting matches. Goldberg left the National Review after twenty-one years and co-founded The Dispatch, a conservative outlet created to avoid becoming subservient to any political party or to Donald Trump. His target is not the left as such, but tribalism: his website presents populism, extreme nationalism and group identity as threats to the institutions that uphold freedom and prosperity. Goldberg retains much of the classic American right – the market, the constitution, pluralism – but rejects the idea that being a conservative means swearing allegiance to a leader. He can move from Plato to The Simpsons because irony is the opposite of the cult of personality: anyone who can laugh at their own camp is already halfway immune to populism.

Andrew Sullivan represents a more unconventional and combative variant. A Briton who has become one of the historic voices of American conservatism – a Catholic, a supporter of marriage equality and a critic of both identity politics and Trumpism – Sullivan has transformed The Weekly Dish and the Dishcast into a subscriber-supported community. His political career has been characterised by a long history of defying the tribes: he supported Barack Obama, clashed with the religious right, denounced Trump and refused to allow conservatism to be reduced to a list of enemies. His tone may be vehement, but he does not promise his audience a sugar-coated view of the world. Sullivan regularly irritates readers ‘from all sides’: a terrible strategy for building a cult, but an excellent one for building a magazine. His lesson is that the opposite of populism is not moderation at all costs. It is the willingness to forgo applause rather than lie to one’s own side.

In Canada, this role is fulfilled – in a less professorial style – by Matt Gurney. He comes from the editorial tradition of the National Post and, together with Jen Gerson, co-founded The Line, an independent publication that produces two weekly podcasts. His manifesto is almost a declaration of war on media populism: no party loyalty, a rejection of automatic alignment with culture wars, candour, humour and financial dependence on readers rather than on the government. Gurney has inside knowledge of the Canadian conservative movement: the free market, order, trade and Western alliances are no longer a given, because a section of the right is sacrificing them to anger and personal loyalty. The Line criticises the Liberals, but it also knows how to tell the Conservatives when they are exuding, to use one of Gurney’s expressions, ‘loser energy’. This is the advantage of a mature right: it does not need its own camp to be perpetually blameless. Alexander, Stewart, Goldberg, Sullivan and Gurney are all different. One recounts the corridors of the Bundestag, one engages in dialogue with a Labour politician, one defends American conservatism against Trumpism, one practises heresy as a method, and one observes from Canada the collapse of the old categories of the right. They are united, however, by one conviction: politics is not a form of group therapy in which the public pays to be told that they are always right. The populist offers consolation, identifies a traitor and closes the case. The non-populist conservative podcaster does the opposite: he complicates, distinguishes, reconstructs and reminds us that governing means choosing between imperfect alternatives.

Perhaps the success of these programmes stems precisely from the medium itself. The podcast does not eliminate polarisation, but it does break free from the constraint of the fifteen-second soundbite. It forces the speaker to lay out their arguments, allows doubts and contradictions to surface, and rewards expertise over posturing. It is a modern technology that restores an ancient virtue to the right: caution. In an age of algorithms that reward outrage, these five demonstrate that it is possible to be conservative without being inflammatory, popular without pandering to the masses, and recognisable without becoming caricatures. That is no small feat. It may well be the beginning of a right wing capable of engaging in debate with the world, rather than merely shouting at it.

From Berlin to Washington, from London to Toronto, there is a small international network of political audio journalists. The profile of Robin Alexander published by Der Spiegel reveals more than just the story of a German journalist who has become famous