I sin krönika i Sunday Times i dag konstaterar professor Niall Ferguson att han nu identifierat populismens halveringstid - 12 månader.
Även om Brexit-folkomröstningen och det amerikanska presidentvalet förra året inte är exakt samma sak så dominerades den politiska debatten för ett år sedan av populister.
Take yourself back just a year. Politics in mid-2016 was dominated by populist memes devised by the likes of Dominic Cummings and Steve Bannon. “Take back control”; “We send the EU £350m a week. Let’s fund our NHS instead”; “BeLEAVE in Britain”. The American equivalents were “Make America great again”, “Drain the swamp” and “Lock her up”.
Those slogans really worked. Like genes, which are programmed to reproduce themselves, political memes spread virally through British and US politics. People retweeted them, liked them on Facebook and threw them into their conversations in pubs. And then they voted: for Brexit in June; for Donald Trump in November.
At some point the political sugar rush of voting for the populist option was bound to wear off. The only question was when. The answer seems to be after about a year.
Slagorden som lät så häftiga för ett år sedan har nu minst sin attraktivitet.
