Long before becoming a question of warring ideologies, of left and right, and of capitalism versus socialism, politics at its heart was about patrons and clients: rival camps vying for power to protect their interests. This politics of Ancient Rome remains the quintessential incarnation of that patronage aspect of politics, where personal networks and ambitions trump the ideological differences between the optimates and the populares. The emergence of mass democracy somewhat overshadowed this core feature of politics, especially in western democracies. The emergence of socialism in the 19th century and the formation of political parties (that dwarfed the small elitist “clubs” of old mass media) all contributed to the perception of politics not only as a battle for positions, but also as a bat-tle of ideas. Yet this transformation from clientelist politics to ideological politics was not always suc-cessful. Many emerging democracies divided among ethnic or religious lines struggle to build political parties that would not simply be the representative for their ethnic or reli-gious brethren.  Latin America is a particularly interesting case with politics being hyper-personalised around one or two ideologically amorphous figures. Peronism in Argentina remains to this day, even to Argentines, a headache to pin down politically. Across the continent, political parties are often a vehicle for one man’s ambitions rather than promoting consistent ideological posi-tions. At times they even take the initials of their leader: take “Peruvianos por el Kambio”, the party of the former Peruvian president Pedro Pablo Kuczynski. But even Europe, the cradle of modern ideological democratic politics, has caught up with the trend of hollow ideology. French President Emmanuel Macron followed the Latin Ameri-can trend of giving one’s initials to his party by creating En Marche, which critics deem an ideologically flexible structure to back its leader’s ambitions. Macron himself has shown himself to be remarkably ideologically flexible, evolving from a centre-left minister in a so-cialist government - who argued that Angela Merkel had saved Europe’s dignity by welcom-ing one million refugees in the 2015 refugee crisis -  to a centre-right president whose rhet-oric on immigration and economic policies have sparked leftie uproar. The election in Hungary provided another example of ideological politics taking the backseat. The opposition to Viktor Orban has little in common: it is a motley crew, a coali-tion made of socialists, liberals, conservatives and post-fascists united by a desire to topple the longest-serving prime minister in Hungarian politics. Orban has so far narrowly avoided the fate of Benyamin Netanyahou, the longest serving prime minister in Israel, who was ousted by a similarly patchworked alliance that included centrist liberals, conservatives, na-tionalists, socialists and catch-all Islamists. Filipino politics have been similarly dominated by one ideologically flexible politician over nearly a decade. Outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte, a self-described socialist, has made international headlines for his brutal repression of illegal drugs, but also holds progressive views on healthcare and LGBTQ+ rights.  This is not to say that ideological oppositions are dead. Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil remains pow-erfully divided along political lines. Bolsonaro’s appeal cannot be understood in isolation with the strong rejection of the Workers party. Polarisation and violence in Brazilian politics have become staples of Brazil’s political life. Horrifyingly, Bolsonaro himself was nearly murdered during his 2018 campaign. Staunch ideological oppositions can be full of vitriol. Ideologues are often accused of citing hatred, but the blurring of ideological lines does not necessarily pacify a society. Under Don-ald Trump, who shunned many of the traditional pieties of the Republicans, the American right has dabbled into areas historically associated with the left, namely on protectionism and through its Keynesian deficit spending during the pandemic. Nevertheless, the polarisa-tion between Democrats and Republicans has never been stronger, largely because Ameri-can politics has become so tribal. According to the Pew Research Center, the US ranks first on the political conflict chart, with 90 per cent of Americans believing that there are strong or very strong conflicts between people who support different political parties in stark con-trast with the global median of 50 per cent. The November midterms will likely illustrate America’s political tribalisation further. In France, Macron has not managed to shield him-self from the wrath of the gilets jaunes, leading many political commentators to argue that the fury that some parts of the French electorate feel towards Macron is unprecedented. The modern politico should be careful not to attach too much importance to the apparent ideological differences between the premiership candidate...