A History of Fascism, 1914–1945

A History of Fascism: 1914-1945 by Stanley Payne

Please give my Amazon review a helpful vote: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R26PCA3IITSOP6?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp

The last several years have seen a “Brown Scare” of sorts, where college students and sophisticated city dwellers have started seeing “Fascists” everywhere, although, in fact, fascism was eliminated in 1945 in a decisive war, after which it has retreated to the margins. In contrast, Communism was one of the victors in that war and came out of the war with enhanced prestige. Nonetheless, although Communism had the support of powerful nations, the suggestion that there are Communists or Communist-supporters anywhere is met with skepticism.

Of course, the claims that there are fascists is a politically-motivated charge that plays on emotions rather than reason. The people charged with being Fascists are in no way Fascists, but the stigma associated with Fascism is effective in smearing the recipients of the charge.

So what is fascism and how does one know how to identify a fascist if one meets one?

A History of Fascism: 1914-1945 by Stanley Payne may be the definitive book on fascism. Payne dissects the history of Fascism on a country by country basis for the period 1914 through 1945 through a survey of the nations of Europe, South America and Asia. The results of this survey are often surprising; I had thought that most Eastern European countries were Fascist in the 1930s. In fact, those countries were generally able to suppress their fascist movements, until those countries received help from Germany.

The first thing that Payne discusses is the definition of fascism. It turns out that defining fascism is not easy. Fascism did not have a central text or originating philosopher. Payne affirms that fascism did have a philosophical core, although its tenets were eclectic. Often, fascism was defined in negative terms, but its characteristics included ultranationalism, a desire for a national rebirth, and a revolutionary rejection of traditional authority structures. Fascism was generally secular, anti-liberal, anti-Marxist, and anti-conservative. Payne explains:

“Fundamental to fascism was the effort to create a new “civic religion” of the movement and of its structure as a state. This would build a system of all-encompassing myths that would incorporate both the fascist elite and their followers and would bind together the nation in a new common faith and loyalty. Such civic religion would displace preceding structures of belief and relegate supernatural religion to a secondary role, or to none at all.
This orientation has sometimes been called political religion, but, though there were specific examples of religious or would-be “Christian fascists,” fascism basically presupposed a post-Christian, postreligious, secular, and immanent frame of reference. Its own myth of secular transcendance could earn adherents only in the absence or weakness of traditional concepts of spiritual and otherworldly transcendance, for fascism sought to re-create nonrationalist myth structures for those who had lost or rejected a traditional mythic framework. Ideologically and politically, fascism could be successful only to the extent that such a situation existed.”

Fascism emerged out of the left. Mussolini was originally a leftist and fascism grew out of the leftist radical syndicalist movement. Payne explains:

“The nucleus that eventually founded Fascism in Italy did not, however, stem either from the cultural elite or from the right-wing nationalists, but from the transformation of part of the revolutionary left, particularly the sector known as revolutionary syndicalists. Revolutionary syndicalism originated in France early in the 1890s, as a reaction against the weakness and moderation of socialism and the trade union movement. It sought to overcome such limitations through “direct action” or what its proponents termed la manière force (the tactics of force), with the goal of achieving revolution through a grand general strike that would make it possible to restructure society around the syndicates (trade unions). Revolutionary syndicalists detested reformism, compromise, and parliamentary government, or what they called “the superstitious belief in majorities.” They were more influenced than most socialists by the cultural crisis of the fin de siècle, particularly by Social Darwinism, the importance of group conflict, and Sorelian ideas about the moral value of violence. In France their apogee occurred in 1902– 6, after which their influence quickly waned.”

Fascists split from the left over the issue of World War I, which the proto-fascists viewed in a positive light as being restorative of the nation.

In Germany, the Nazis called each other “comrade” and adopted red flags, the color of the left.

Fascism was not inherently racist. German National Socialists were racist, but Italian Fascism was not. Italian Fascism defined “Italian” as including Jews and another group who claimed or participated in Italian culture.

Violence was common to both fascism and communism, with fascism tending to glorify violence in the abstract:

“Equally if not more important was the positive evaluation of violence and struggle in fascist doctrine. All revolutionary mass movements have initiated and practiced violence to a greater or lesser degree, and it is probably impossible to carry violence to greater lengths than have some Leninist regimes, practitioners of, in the words of one Old Bolshevik, “infinite compulsion.” The only unique feature of the fascist relationship to violence was the theoretical evaluation by many fascist movements that violence possessed a certain positive and therapeutic value in and of itself, that a certain amount of continuing violent struggle, along the lines of Sorelianism and extreme Social Darwinism, was necessary for the health of national society.”

In discussing the success of fascism in the European context in the 1930s, Payne noted that democracy was essential to fascism victory. Where Fascism came to power, it came to power through the electoral system rather than through a violent revolution. On the other hand, democracy could block the development of fascism. In discussing the failure of the Arrow Cross movement in Hungary, Payne notes:

“The elections nonetheless produced a stalemate for the Arrow Cross. The government remained fully in control, and Teleki was a prime minister undisposed to experiment with the right radical ploys of Daranyi and Imredy. Governmental power was fully entrenched in most rural areas and small towns as well, while the upper-class Hungarian senate was now given more voice by the government to counter the presence of the national socialists in the lower house. Szalasi himself would remain in prison until the following year, and though there was a certain amount of street disorder in Budapest and the larger cities during 1939– 40, he had set the Arrow Cross on the legal road to power. That road was now effectively blocked by a semiauthoritarian government. In Hungary, as in Austria, Romania, and elsewhere, the lack of political democracy would be decisive in blocking the political success of a large, broad-based, and popular fascist movement, one that in 1939 could rival the Nazi Party of seven years earlier in proportionate popular support. With access effectively controlled by a nondemocratic government, the Arrow Cross would have to await foreign intervention or military defeat to have an opportunity to seize power.”

This an encyclopedic book that captivates and persuades by its details. It is good history and a useful source of information.