Split Thread What authoritarian regimes in history could be described as Fascist?

[theprestige]

I would go so far as to say that if it hadn't been for the Hitlerite perversion and all that resulted from it, fascism would be seen in a much more positive light today. Hitler did for fascism what Stalin should have done for communism, but somehow didn't.

Anyway, fascism by any other name... There's a lot of appetite even today for what amounts to statist totalitarianism, across the political spectrum. Complete with the merger of government and industry, thought police, etc. The points of dispute between the totalitarians of the left and of the right is whether politicians or corporations will have the upper hand with industry, and which thoughts will be policed.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I would go so far as to say that if it hadn't been for the Hitlerite perversion and all that resulted from it, fascism would be seen in a much more positive light today. Hitler did for fascism what Stalin should have done for communism, but somehow didn't.

That's not even something we have to debate. It's historical FACT. Especially Italian fascism was insanely popular abroad in the '20s and '30s. And remember, Italian fascism had been an ALLY of Britain and France in WW1.

 

[theprestige]

That's not even something we have to debate. It's historical FACT. Especially Italian fascism was insanely popular abroad in the '20s and '30s. And remember, Italian fascism had been an ALLY of Britain and France in WW1.

It's a fact that I think a lot of people overlook, when they condemn "fascism". What they mean is they condemn Hitler's National Socialism, the Holocaust, et al. And I think a lot of the people who condemn "fascism" are actually in favor of statist totalitarianism, but don't realize they have proto-fascist tendencies.

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Regarding the thread title, I'd say that only industrial and post-industrial regimes are eligible for consideration as "fascist". Both the unification of the state with the means of production, and the manufacturing of a national identity in the modern age of communication, are necessary ingredients.

British Imperialism, while reaching its height in the industrial era, was the apotheosis of a national identity that had evolved more or less organically over centuries. Other forms of late-stage imperialism likewise.

One thing that stops America from being fascist is the resistance of the American population to manufactured national identity. Doesn't stop the two main political parties from trying their damndest to make it work, though.

So I'd describe the Soviet Union as fascist for sure. And I'd describe our current Russian regime as fascist. I might even describe the current Chinese regime as fascist.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Kinda... sorta...

It's not that simple. As always when politics are involved.

The USSR was definitely Marxist, not fascist for example, in that it still emphasized its crowd as being the proletariat and peasants, in opposition to the bourgeoisie. And that identity definitely wasn't the national borders of the USSR (see the International Socialist movement.) They explicitly rejected the national or ethnic borders. That's Marxist, not Fascist.

If you want more fascist, in fact even Nazi, as you say, look at the CURRENT Russia and its Russkii Mir (Russian World) concept, trying to define its crowd as the Slav ethnic identity.

 

[ahhell]

But, to conclude that long wall of text, here we come to the actual question for most people: how do you know if someone is actually selling his compatriots a fascist ideology?

Turns out it's quite easy, really: when they tell you that everything you should want or do, should be in the interest of achieving the greatness of your nation or ethnic group. Like, don't watch the man behind the curtain, don't mind the elites bending you over a barrel and yanking your pants down, just think you're all in it together to achieve the greatness of the nation or ethnicity.

In fact, there is a quote from a speech that IMHO best encapsulates the core idea of Italian fascism. It's not from WW2. It reads, "Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country." Yeah, THAT was the essence of everything Mussolini was trying to get across

I'd argue, along with others, that is why, fascism isn't strictly left or right. Its right in that it is reactionary to socialism and marxism but its left in that it is a kind of socialism, despite folks denying that. It's a very specific and usualyl ethnocentric socialism. Socialism for us but not you. Mussolini more or less created it as a synthesis of Marxism and Nationalism. I'm pretty sure he even used the phrase third way.

Anyrate, I think you could say N. Korea is essentially a fascist state regardelss of what they call themselves, you could call modern China a fascist state, or even the USSR during and after WWII. They are all basically National socialist governments. NAZI Germany had all sorts of sociallisty stuff as long as you were Ayrian enough.

 

[ahhell]

Kinda... sorta...

It's not that simple. As always when politics are involved.

The USSR was definitely Marxist, not fascist for example, in that it still emphasized its crowd as being the proletariat and peasants, in opposition to the bourgeoisie. And that identity definitely wasn't the national borders of the USSR (see the International Socialist movement.) They explicitly rejected the national or ethnic borders. That's Marxist, not Fascist.

If you want more fascist, in fact even Nazi, as you say, look at the CURRENT Russia and its Russkii Mir (Russian World) concept, trying to define its crowd as the Slav ethnic identity.

Sure but they also went full on nationalist and tried very hard to russify everyone under there control. So, not exactly fascism but not exactly marxism as marx would have thought.

ETA, Granted, marx didn't call it marxism, IIRC, he called it scientific socialism which was more solipsism or sophism than scientific.

 

[theprestige]

Kinda... sorta...

It's not that simple. As always when politics are involved.

The USSR was definitely Marxist, not fascist for example, in that it still emphasized its crowd as being the proletariat and peasants, in opposition to the bourgeoisie. And that identity definitely wasn't the national borders of the USSR (see the International Socialist movement.) They explicitly rejected the national or ethnic borders. That's Marxist, not Fascist.

If you want more fascist, in fact even Nazi, as you say, look at the CURRENT Russia and its Russkii Mir (Russian World) concept, trying to define its crowd as the Slav ethnic identity.

The USSR was Marxist-Leninist, which was already a perversion of Marxism. Later it became Stalinist. And always it was fascist in the sense that I mean: Statist totalitarianism.

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But honestly this aspect of the question doesn't interest me very much - semantic quibbling about whether this or that historical regime was fascist according to each individual's subjective opinion.

What interests me more is how the question can prompt us to think a little more about what we mean by fascism, and what our actual tolerance for (the right kind of) statist totalitarianism might be.

 

[ahhell]

The distinction between Marxism and Fascism is a false dichotomy if you account for marxism in reality. Find a "marxist" state that didn't embrace some form of nationalism over internationalism eventually. Il Duce was right about that at least. workers generally didn't much care about workers elsewhere.

Funny, not many of the lefties in here?

 

[Darat]

I'd argue, along with others, that is why, fascism isn't strictly left or right. Its right in that it is reactionary to socialism and marxism but its left in that it is a kind of socialism, despite folks denying that. It's a very specific and usualyl ethnocentric socialism. Socialism for us but not you. Mussolini more or less created it as a synthesis of Marxism and Nationalism. I'm pretty sure he even used the phrase third way.

Anyrate, I think you could say N. Korea is essentially a fascist state regardelss of what they call themselves, you could call modern China a fascist state, or even the USSR during and after WWII. They are all basically National socialist governments. NAZI Germany had all sorts of sociallisty stuff as long as you were Ayrian enough.

North Korea is a kingdom in the old fashion meaning, it doesn’t have politics. I agree with you that China is a practical example of a fascist state, everything is subsumed to support “the state”,individuals matter little, companies only matter in how they feed the “the state”.

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

In history though?
I'd say not many.

Maybe you could make a case for Robespierre France, but that's only the secret police / terror part. The whole controlling all industry just was not possible, nor the total control over the media needed. Fascism is an excess of Nationalism, and that's not actually all that old.

 

[ahhell]

North Korea is a kingdom in the old fashion meaning, it doesn’t have politics. I agree with you that China is a practical example of a fascist state, everything is subsumed to support “the state”,individuals matter little, companies only matter in how they feed the “the state”.

Not wrong, politically, a Monarchy. Economically, weird? As close to fascism or even NAZIism on account of the racism as to communism though.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

The distinction between Marxism and Fascism is a false dichotomy if you account for marxism in reality. Find a "marxist" state that didn't embrace some form of nationalism over internationalism eventually. Il Duce was right about that at least. workers generally didn't much care about workers elsewhere.

That a "REAL" 100% pure fascist or socialist state ever existed, is irrelevant to what the ideology was. Of course there was no state where 100% of the population believed one ideology. Like, even if I made my ideology be something like "chocolate cakes with whipped cream are tasty", I can assure you I wouldn't get 100% of the population to agree on that, nor get a state actually centred around that any time soon.

Nevertheless, deconstructing which was their crowd and the idea they tried to sell that crowd, there are significant differences.

Funny, not many of the lefties in here?

I'm one. Well, European Social-Democrat, whatever that translates to in US vernacular. Doesn't matter though. Either you make a valid counter-point or not. What I am, whether it's left, right, up, down, backwards or 4'th dimension, doesn't matter.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Not wrong, politically, a Monarchy. Economically, weird? As close to fascism or even NAZIism on account of the racism as to communism though.

That's literally as silly as if I said there's no difference between Himmler and Billie Elish, because they're both well dressed

Try to focus on the actual ideology, rather than on spurious associations, really

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

But honestly this aspect of the question doesn't interest me very much - semantic quibbling about whether this or that historical regime was fascist according to each individual's subjective opinion.

What interests me more is how the question can prompt us to think a little more about what we mean by fascism, and what our actual tolerance for (the right kind of) statist totalitarianism might be.

Well, the funny part about people proclaiming themeselves above and against "semantics squabbling" is that "semantics" is all about MEANING. As in, what meaning they CONVEY, which is the only point in having any exchange in the first place. I.e., you're just telling me you're gonna use some words and not care about what they actually MEAN.

I mean I can see a point in railing about, say, lexical/dictionary complaints. Like, if you mis-typed "fascist" as, dunno, say, "facsist" and someone made a fuss about that, I'd give you a pass. Obviously a typo doesn't invalidate what you meant to say. Or if you wrote a sentence Yoda style, that would be a syntax violation, and I'd even give a pass to that, if one can do a best effort to decode the actual message you meant. But railing against semantics is just railing against what words actually mean.

Quoth Shania Twain, "That Don't Impress Me Much"

Come back when you can actually convey a coherent message via those words. NOT when you just want to say those words, 'cause they're cool or make you align with the cool kids.

 

[ahhell]

Then, there has only ever been one fascist state, Italy under Mussolini, everything else was not quite fascism.

 

[Wudang]

Isn't an aspect of Fascism the cult of the leader? Hitler, Mussolini. By that measure would Franco's Spain count? By that metric Putin's Russia would count and maybe Stalin's USSR, I believe on his deathbed Lenin turned against Stalin and worried he'd go for a personality cult.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Then, there has only ever been one fascist state, Italy under Mussolini, everything else was not quite fascism.

There is actually a good point to be made about that.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Isn't an aspect of Fascism the cult of the leader? Hitler, Mussolini. By that measure would Franco's Spain count? By that metric Putin's Russia would count and maybe Stalin's USSR, I believe on his deathbed Lenin turned against Stalin and worried he'd go for a personality cult.

Kinda, sorta, but the point I was trying to make is that it's not just totalitarianism, it's not just cult of personality, it's a specific flavour where all your interests and actions and whatnot should all be under the category of "what can I do for the glory of STATE?" Not because of stuff like "we're the proletariat". not because anything else, but just because we're all ethnicity or country X.

Stalin's USSR? No, not really, even he never defined his crowd that way.

Putin's "Russkiy mir" ideas... yeah, I could be persuaded that that's Nazism.

 

[ahhell]

There is actually a good point to be made about that.

I agree.

 

[ahhell]

Kinda, sorta, but the point I was trying to make is that it's not just totalitarianism, it's not just cult of personality, it's a specific flavour where all your interests and actions and whatnot should all be under the category of "what can I do for the glory of STATE?" Not because of stuff like "we're the proletariat". not because anything else, but just because we're all ethnicity or country X.

Stalin's USSR? No, not really, even he never defined his crowd that way.

Putin's "Russkiy mir" ideas... yeah, I could be persuaded that that's Nazism.

Don't buy it. What's the State in a communist country? What's the State in the USSR, China, or N. Korea? If you swap "the people" for "the State" is there functionally a difference. I get that you are more interested in the theory of what makes fascism but I don't think that matters as much as the functional reality of various statist systems. Its what makes it so hard to decide what counts as fascism. If its all about theory, then it is only Italy in 1940.