Walter Benjamin's "Theories of German Fascism" Walter Benjamin was early to note a distinction between the style of fascism that had held power in Italy for almost a decade, and the incipient Nazi regime that seemed poised to take power in Germany when he wrote the article "Theories of German Fascism" in 1930. Whereas the form of fascism developing in Italy seemed largely content with a
jingoist,
dictatorial imperialist posturing, Benjamin notes that in Germany the
utopian (or more properly
dystopian)
eschaton or goal of
Nazism seemed to be indicated as a heavily technologized and scaled form of war, in and of itself and for its own sake, without reference (in its
realpolitik as opposed to its
propaganda) to individual heroics or concretely limited and thus theoretically achievable objectives, prioritizing maximum destruction of human and natural life as its ''
raison d'etat''. The unlimited and prolifically encouraged exploitation of cutting-edge technologies in combination with a conservative,
irredentist,
millenarian aesthetic is the signature of fascist style and technique.
Umberto Eco In his 1995 essay "
Ur-Fascism", cultural theorist
Umberto Eco lists fourteen general properties of fascist ideology. He argues that it is not possible to organise these into a coherent system, but that "it is enough that one of them be present to allow fascism to coagulate around it". He uses the term "Ur-Fascism" as a generic description of different historical forms of fascism.
Emilio Gentile Italian historian of fascism
Emilio Gentile described fascism in 1996 as the "sacralization of politics" through totalitarian methods and argued the following ten constituent elements: • a mass movement with multi-class membership in which prevail, among the leaders and the militants, the middle sectors, in large part new to political activity, organized as a party militia, that bases its identity not on social hierarchy or class origin but on a sense of comradeship, believes itself invested with a mission of national regeneration, considers itself in a state of war against political adversaries and aims at conquering a monopoly of political power by using terror, parliamentary tactics, and deals with leading groups, to create a new regime that destroys parliamentary democracy; • an "anti-ideological" and pragmatic ideology that proclaims itself
anti-materialist,
anti-individualist,
anti-liberal,
antidemocratic,
anti-Marxist,
populist and
anticapitalist, and expresses itself aesthetically more than theoretically by means of a new political style and by myths, rites, and symbols as a lay religion designed to acculturate, socialize, and integrate the faith of the masses with the goal of creating a "new man"; • a culture founded on mystical thought and the tragic and activist sense of life conceived of as the manifestation of the will to power, on the myth of youth as artificer of history, and on the exaltation of the militarization of politics as the model of life and collective activity; • a totalitarian conception of the primacy of politics, conceived of as an integrating experience to carry out the fusion of the individual and the masses in the organic and mystical unity of the nation as an ethnic and moral community, adopting measures of discrimination and persecution against those considered to be outside this community either as enemies of the regime or members of races considered to be inferior or otherwise dangerous for the integrity of the nation; • a civil ethic founded on total dedication to the national community, on discipline, virility, comradeship, and the warrior spirit; • a single state party that has the task of providing for the armed defense of the regime, selecting its directing cadres, and organizing the masses within the state in a process of permanent mobilization of emotion and faith; • a police apparatus that prevents, controls, and represses dissidence and opposition, including through the use of organized terror; • a political system organized by hierarchy of functions named from the top and crowned by the figure of the "leader", invested with a sacred charisma, who commands, directs, and coordinates the activities of the party and the regime; • corporative organization of the economy that suppresses trade union liberty, broadens the sphere of state intervention, and seeks to achieve, by principles of technocracy and solidarity, the collaboration of the "productive sectors" under control of the regime, to achieve its goals of power, yet preserving private property and class divisions; • a foreign policy inspired by the myth of national power and greatness, with the goal of imperialist expansion.
Roger Griffin Historian and political scientist
Roger Griffin's definition of fascism focuses on the populist fascist rhetoric that argues for a "re-birth" of a conflated
nation and ethnic people. According to Griffin, [F]ascism is best defined as a
revolutionary form of nationalism, one that sets out to be a political, social and ethical revolution, welding the "people" into a dynamic national community under new elites infused with heroic values. The core myth that inspires this project is that only a populist, trans-class movement of purifying, cathartic national rebirth (palingenesis) can stem the tide of decadence. Griffin writes that a broad scholarly consensus developed in English-speaking social sciences during the 1990s, around the following definition of fascism: [Fascism is] a genuinely revolutionary, trans-class form of anti-
liberal, and in the last analysis, anti-
conservative nationalism. As such it is an ideology deeply bound up with modernization and modernity, one which has assumed a considerable variety of external forms to adapt itself to the particular historical and national context in which it appears, and has drawn a wide range of cultural and intellectual currents, both left and right, anti-modern and pro-modern, to articulate itself as a body of ideas, slogans, and doctrine. In the inter-war period it manifested itself primarily in the form of an elite-led "armed party" which attempted, mostly unsuccessfully, to generate a populist mass movement through a liturgical style of politics and a programme of radical policies which promised to overcome a threat posed by international socialism, to end the degeneration affecting the nation under liberalism, and to bring about a radical renewal of its social, political and cultural life as part of what was widely imagined to be the new era being inaugurated in Western civilization. The core mobilizing myth of fascism which conditions its ideology, propaganda, style of politics and actions is the vision of the nation's imminent rebirth from decadence. Griffin argues that the above definition can be condensed into one sentence: "Fascism is a political
ideology whose
mythic core in its various
permutations is a
palingenetic form of
populist ultra-
nationalism."
John Lukacs John Lukacs, Hungarian-American historian and Holocaust survivor, argues in
The Hitler of History that there is no such thing as generic fascism, claiming that National Socialism and Italian Fascism were more different than similar and that, alongside communism, they were ultimately radical forms of populism.
John R. McNeill John R. McNeill, "distinguished university professor in the Department of History in the College and the School of Foreign Service" at Georgetown University, and past president of the American Historical Association, defined a numerical rating system for determining how fascist a person is based on a ranking across 11 categories. Within each category McNeill assigns 0 to 4 "Benitos" (4 being the most fascistic) and then tallies the results for an overall fascism score. For each category, McNeill provides a written definition and historical examples. The categories are: In 2020, McNeill expanded his system with eight more categories:
Ludwig von Mises Classical liberal economist and philosopher
Ludwig von Mises, in his 1927 book
Liberalism, argued that fascism was a
nationalist and
militarist reaction against the rise of the
communist Third International, in which the nationalists and militarists came to oppose the principles of
liberal democracy because "Liberalism, they thought, stayed their hand when they desired to strike a blow against the revolutionary parties while it was still possible to do so. If liberalism had not hindered them, they would, so they believe, have bloodily nipped the revolutionary movements in the bud. Revolutionary ideas had been able to take root and flourish only because of the tolerance they had been accorded by their opponents, whose will power had been enfeebled by a regard for liberal principles that, as events subsequently proved, was overscrupulous." He continues by defining fascism as follows:
Ernst Nolte Ernst Nolte, a German historian and
Hegelian philosopher, defined fascism in 1965 as a
reaction against other political movements, especially
Marxism: "Fascism is anti-Marxism which seeks to destroy the enemy by the evolvement of a radically opposed and yet related ideology and by the use of almost identical and yet typically modified methods, always, however, within the unyielding framework of national self-assertion and autonomy." Nolte also argued that fascism functioned at three levels: in the world of politics as a form of opposition to Marxism, at the sociological level in opposition to bourgeois values, and in the "meta political" world as "resistance to transcendence" ("transcendence" in German can be translated as the "spirit of modernity").
Kevin Passmore Kevin Passmore, a history lecturer at
Cardiff University, defines fascism in his 2002 book
Fascism: A Very Short Introduction. His definition is directly descended from the view put forth by
Ernesto Laclau, and is also informed by a desire to adjust for what he believes are shortcomings in Marxist, Weberian and other analyses of fascism: Fascism is a set of ideologies and practices that seeks to place the nation, defined in exclusive biological, cultural, and/or historical terms, above all other sources of loyalty, and to create a mobilized national community. Fascist nationalism is reactionary in that it entails
implacable hostility to socialism and feminism, for they are seen as prioritizing class or gender rather than nation. This is why fascism is a movement of the
extreme right. Fascism is also a movement of the
radical right because the defeat of socialism and feminism and the creation of the mobilized nation are held to depend upon the advent to power of a new elite acting in the name of the people, headed by a charismatic leader, and embodied in a mass, militarized party. Fascists are pushed towards conservatism by common hatred of socialism and feminism, but are prepared to override conservative interests – family, property, religion, the universities, the civil service – where the interests of the nation are considered to require it. Fascist radicalism also derives from a desire to assuage discontent by accepting specific demands of the labour and women's movements, so long as these demands accord with the national priority. Fascists seek to ensure the harmonization of workers' and women's interests with those of the nation by mobilizing them within special sections of the party and/or within a corporate system. Access to these organizations and to the benefits they confer upon members depends on the individual's national, political, and/or racial characteristics. All aspects of fascist policy are suffused with ultranationalism.
Robert Paxton Robert Paxton, a professor emeritus at
Columbia University, defines fascism in his 2004 book
The Anatomy of Fascism as: A form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion. In the same book, Paxton also argues that fascism's foundations lie in a set of "mobilizing passions" rather than an elaborated doctrine. He argues these passions can explain much of the behaviour of fascists: • a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond the reach of any traditional solutions; • the primacy of the group, toward which one has duties superior to every right, whether individual or universal, and the subordination of the individual to it; • the belief that one's group is a victim, a sentiment that justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against its enemies, both internal and external; • dread of the group's decline under the corrosive effects of individualistic liberalism, class conflict, and alien influences; • the need for closer integration of a purer community, by consent if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary; • the need for authority by natural chiefs (always male), culminating in a national chieftain who alone is capable of incarnating the group's historical destiny; • the superiority of the leader's instincts over abstract and universal reason; • the beauty of violence and the efficacy of will, when they are devoted to the group's success; • the right of the chosen people to dominate others without restraint from any kind of human or divine law, right being decided by the sole criterion of the group's prowess within a Darwinian struggle. Paxton at first hesitated in embracing the application of the term fascism to the
Trump movement—initially diagnosing the phenomena as an advanced and fairly unique form of populist
plutocracy. Paxton later recanted his hesitation to use the term to describe
Trumpism, in 2021, revising his opinion to state that—in view of Trump's performance and of his
January 6th denialism—he thinks that Trumpism is a form of
fascism, in summary form, there are three main strands. First, Payne's "fascist negations" refers to such typical policies as anti-communism and anti-liberalism. Second, "fascist goals" include a nationalist dictatorship and an expanded empire. Third, "fascist style", is seen in its emphasis on violence and authoritarianism, and its exultation of men above women, and young above old. • A. Ideology and Goals: • Espousal of an idealist, vitalist, and voluntaristic philosophy, normally involving the attempt to realize a new modern, self-determined, and secular culture • Creation of a new nationalist authoritarian state not based on traditional principles or models • Organization of a new highly regulated, multi-class, integrated national economic structure, whether called national corporatist, national socialist, or national syndicalist • Positive evaluation and use of, or willingness to use, violence and war • The goal of empire, expansion, or a radical change in the nation's relationship with other powers • B. The Fascist Negations: • Antiliberalism •
Anticommunism • Anticonservatism (though with the understanding that fascist groups were willing to undertake temporary alliances with other sectors, more commonly with the right) • C. Style and Organization: • Attempted mass mobilization with militarization of political relationships and style and with the goal of a mass single party militia • Emphasis on aesthetic structure of meetings, symbols, and political liturgy, stressing emotional and mystical aspects • Extreme stress on the masculine principle and male dominance, while espousing a strongly organic view of society • Exaltation of youth above other phases of life, emphasizing the conflict of the generations, at least in effecting the initial political transformation • Specific tendency toward an authoritarian, charismatic, personal style of command, whether or not the command is to some degree initially elective
Jason Stanley In 2020,
National Public Radio interviewed
Jason Stanley, a professor of philosophy at
Yale University, regarding his book
How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them. Stanley defined fascism as "a cult of the leader who promises national restoration in the face of humiliation brought on by supposed communists, Marxists and minorities and immigrants who are supposedly posing a threat to the character and the history of a nation" and further observed that, "The leader proposes that only he can solve it and all of his political opponents are enemies or traitors." In his book,
How Fascism Works, Stanley focuses on
fascist politics in much more detail than
fascist states, as he says the latter vary significantly by time and location and are only loosely characterized by "ultra nationalism of some variety (ethnic, religious, cultural), with the nation represented in the person of an authoritarian leader who speaks on its behalf". However, the specific
political tactics first used to attain power in a democracy are more similar and more easily characterized. These tactics are designed to divide the population into an "Us" (e.g., native-born residents) and a "Them" (e.g., immigrants) and to justify a "targeting of ideological enemies and the freeing of all restraints in combating them". Jason Stanley uses the United States (under
Donald Trump), India (under Modi), Hungary (under Orbán), and Brazil (under Bolsonaro) to illustrate the following tactics typical of fascist politics: • The mythical past—used to invoke a nostalgia for a fictional time when the nation was great as it was not yet sullied by the "Other". • Propaganda—to attack enemies, to justify violence, to justify laws against "Them" and to support the authoritarian leader. • Anti-intellectualism—to attack the media, universities, and scientists when they contradict the strong man's authority. • Unreality—supporting conspiracy theories that tarnish the "Other" along with an outright denial of facts when convenient. • Hierarchy—espousing a "natural order" where the "Us" are hardworking, moral, law-abiding and productive members of society, while the "Other" is not. • Victimhood—casting "Us" as victims of "Them", who are taking resources from "Us" and demanding special rights. • Law and order—using laws to justify violence, oppression, and expulsion of the "Other". • Sexual anxiety—as the "Other" embraces non-traditional approaches to sexuality, • Appeals to the heartland—as rural communities are often more homogeneous and conservative (more "Us") while urban cities are often more diverse, cosmopolitan (more "Them"). • Dismantling of public welfare and unity—by casting aside safety net programs as unfair giveaways to "Them", who are not working, as opposed to "Us", who are.
Zeev Sternhell Zeev Sternhell, a historian and professor of political science, described fascism as a reaction against modernity and a backlash against the changes it had caused to society, as a "rejection of the prevailing systems: liberalism and Marxism, positivism and democracy". At the same time, Sternhell argued that part of what made Fascism unique was that it wanted to retain the benefits of progress and modernism while rejecting the values and social changes that had come with it; Fascism embraced liberal market-based economics and the violent revolutionary rhetoric of Marxism, but rejected their philosophical principles. anti-democratic, anti-socialist, and terrorist ideology, practice, and mode of organization of groups, institutions, and society that is based on the combination of (a) the leadership principle, (b) nationalism, (c) the friend/enemy scheme, and (d) militant patriarchy (the idealization of the soldier, the practice of patriarchy, the subordination of women, war, violence and terror as political means) and the use of terror against constructed enemies, aims at establishing a fascist society that is built on the use of terror and the institutionalization of the four fascist principles in society, tries to mobilize individuals who fear the loss of property, status, power, reputation in light of the antagonisms as its supporters, and plays an ideological role in capitalist and class societies by blaming scapegoats for society’s ills and presenting society’s problems as an antagonism between the nation and foreigners and enemies of the nation so that fascism distracts attention from the systemic roles of class and capitalism in society’s problems and from the class contradiction between capital and labour. Fascism often propagates a one-dimensional, one-sided, and personalizing "anti-capitalism" that constructs the nation as political fetish and an antagonism between the unity of a nation’s capital and labour on the one side and a particular form of capital or economy or production or community on the other side that is presented as destroying the nation’s economic, political, and cultural survival. == By Marxists ==