What is Fascism?

[Peter1469]

"Fascism should rightly be called Corporatism, as it is the merger of corporate and government power"
- Benito Mussolini

I would disagree with Mussolini- I would say that under corporatism, the corporations have as much or more power than the government (at least in what it is interested in); under fascism, the State is in almost total control. Corporations that don't play along are crushed.

[Chris]

I would disagree with Mussolini- I would say that under corporatism, the corporations have as much or more power than the government (at least in what it is interested in); under fascism, the State is in almost total control. Corporations that don't play along are crushed.

Power--a monopoly on force--is something only government have. Since power corrupts, it is easily bribed to do the bidding of business.

I would agree that Mussolini probably didn't mean in in exactly the same way we do today.

[Mister D]

I would disagree with Mussolini- I would say that under corporatism, the corporations have as much or more power than the government (at least in what it is interested in); under fascism, the State is in almost total control. Corporations that don't play along are crushed.

I don't think he meant corporations in the sense of Exxon-Mobil. He meant it in the sense of social groups. Industrial or urban labor, small farmers, large landholders, small business owners etc. Medieval France, for example, was a corporate society.

[IMPress Polly]

Well if you define fascism as corporatism then we can't necessarily count Nazi Germany as having been fascist, for example. (The ethos of corporatism is that of Marx's "dictatorship of the proletariat" in reverse: rule of society by corporations. Hitler, in contrast, embraced the idea that society should be ruled by a particular race.) Now that (fascism = corporatism) may have in fact been the way that Mussolini himself saw it, but it's not really the verdict of history on what fascism is.

[Mister D]

Racialism was as common in Soviet Russia as it was in Hitler's Germany especially after the CCCP purged itself of Jews. The stories African Marxists tell of their training in Russia are actually kind of funny. In a $#@!ed up kind of way...

[Chris]

Against individualism, the Fascist conception is for the State; and it is for the individual in so far as he coincides with the State, which is the conscience and universal will of man in his historical existence. It is opposed to classical Liberalism, which arose from the necessity of reacting against absolutism, and which brought its historical purpose to an end when the State was transformed into the conscience and will of the people. Liberalism denied the State in the interests of the particular individual; Fascism reaffirms the State as the true reality of the individual. And if liberty is to be the attribute of the real man, and not of that abstract puppet envisaged by individualistic Liberalism, Fascism is for liberty. And for the only liberty which can be a real thing, the liberty of the State and of the individual within the State. Therefore, for the Fascist, everything is in the State, and nothing human or spiritual exists, much less has value,-outside the State. In this sense Fascism is totalitarian, and the Fascist State, the synthesis and unity of all values, interprets, develops and gives strength to the whole life of the people.

Benito Mussolini @ The Doctrine of Fascism

That is pure Hegel who, though he borrowed heavily from that Statist known as Plato, first envisioned the State as God.

[Peter1469]

Power--a monopoly on force--is something only government have. Since power corrupts, it is easily bribed to do the bidding of business.

I would agree that Mussolini probably didn't mean in in exactly the same way we do today.

He was likely just being political about it.

[Chris]

Well if you define fascism as corporatism than we can't necessarily count Nazi Germany as having been fascist, for example. (The ethos of corporatism is that of Marx's "dictatorship of the proletariat" in reverse: rule of society by corporations. Hitler, in contrast, embraced the idea that society should be ruled by a particular race.) Now that (fascism = corporatism) may have in fact been the way that Mussolini himself saw it, but it's not really the verdict of history on what fascism is.

That is not the definition of corporatism, polly, corporatism is the collusion of government and business. Period.

For further elucidation of what Mussolini meant, see above.

[Peter1469]

Well if you define fascism as corporatism then we can't necessarily count Nazi Germany as having been fascist, for example. (The ethos of corporatism is that of Marx's "dictatorship of the proletariat" in reverse: rule of society by corporations. Hitler, in contrast, embraced the idea that society should be ruled by a particular race.) Now that (fascism = corporatism) may have in fact been the way that Mussolini himself saw it, but it's not really the verdict of history on what fascism is.

I try to use the capital F when describing Mussolini's Fascism, and the little f when discussing the others. But then I can confuse myself if the sentence starts with fascism....

[IMPress Polly]

I somewhat agree with you (Chris) on Mussolini having obviously been influenced by Hegel. But Hegel's views could be expounded upon in a number of different directions. While Mussolini expounded on it to rationalize a capitalist dictatorship, Marx expounded on it to advocate the opposite kind of dictatorship: a socialist dictatorship. I don't know that one can conclude that much here hence save for that Hegel's views didn't tend to promote very much individualism (i.e. liberalism).