How Fascism Works
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As the child of refugees of World War II Europe and a renowned philosopher and scholar of propaganda, Jason Stanley has a deep understanding of how democratic societies can be vulnerable to fascism: Nations don’t have to be fascist to suffer from fascist politics. In fact, fascism’s roots have been present in the United States for more than a century. Alarmed by the pervasive rise of fascist tactics both at home and around the globe, Stanley focuses here on the structures that unite them, laying out and analyzing the ten pillars of fascist politics—the language and beliefs that separate people into an “us” and a “them.” He knits together reflections on history, philosophy, sociology, and critical race theory with stories from contemporary Hungary, Poland, India, Myanmar, and the United States, among other nations. He makes clear the immense danger of underestimating the cumulative power of these tactics, which include exploiting a mythic version of a nation’s past; propaganda that twists the language of democratic ideals against themselves; anti-intellectualism directed against universities and experts; law and order politics predicated on the assumption that members of minority groups are criminals; and fierce attacks on labor groups and welfare. These mechanisms all build on one another, creating and reinforcing divisions and shaping a society
By uncovering disturbing patterns that are as prevalent today as ever, Stanley reveals that the stuff of politics—charged by rhetoric and myth—can quickly become policy and reality. Only by recognizing fascists politics, he argues, may we resist its most harmful effects and return to democratic ideals.
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Do you believe in an elusive, difficult to describe past when things were “great” and heroes roamed the landscape, when men-were-men and women-women and children never disobeyed? That the Nation was built by great people who were, at least, more right than they were wrong, and that we would be better off going back to how things were? That we should make the Nation great again?
Do you believe that your Group (defined by nation/race/gender/religion) is the greatest, is without flaw (or at least more right than wrong, usually), and that your national identity (and the Nation itself) are defined by its people being members of the Group? Do you feel that your Group is the target of blame and that the culture at large hates your group, aiming to suppress and do away with it, thus destroying the Nation?
Do you believe that so-called “experts,” who claim to use facts and data to promote their ideas are simply mouthpieces for agendas designed to topple the Nation's history and standing, and the Group associated with it, and that public universities and schools are dens of liberal indoctrination, best to be avoided by those who make up the Group?
Do you believe that certain people are just more deserving of things like comfort, success, happiness, and resources than others are, whether it be because of how they act or where they come from? That crimes should be dealt with quickly and mercilessly, and that the Nation should maintain law and order primarily through fear of punishment? Do you believe that lazy people just don't deserve things as much, and that hard-work solves and covers a multitude of sins? That success means wealth and wealth means freedom?
Are stay-at-home dads or men who cry emasculated and weak? Are women who work instead of taking care of the house rebellious against the natural hierarchy? Are homosexuals and trans people trying to destroy the Nation and corrupt the Group's children? Do you believe that cities are dens of immorality and liberality, designed from the bottom up to destroy the traditional values of the Nation and Group?
The above are all parts of fascism: the notion that life operates best when it is racially, ethnically, ideologically, and culturally pure; where the world operates in simple top-down structures (the father rules over the family, the CEO over the business, the Leader over the nation ) that put people in their place; and where people who suffer poverty probably deserve it, because only a person bankrupt of moral character (ie: lazy) could ever become poor or need the help of the State. Also the State is distinct from the Nation: the State is that liberal hive that wants people to push against tradition, where all people have value for no reason other than that they are alive (and not because they add anything to society); the Nation is that core collection of Ideas, perhaps enshrined in a religious or philosophical notion, but embodied by the Group, explaining the successes of the Nation as a result of favor (either from natural-order or God himself), while explaining the failures of the Nation as the result of deviance (from the Ideas).
When the State does something, it is government overreach, an act of Big Government. When the Nation does something, it is a desperate act to maintain the Nation and the Group and the Ideas. The State coddles its citizens like children, whereas the Nation makes them productive members of the Group.
I will end with two quotes from the book. The first describes fascism and how it relates to social Darwinism (survival of the fittest); the second regards the legacy of fascist thought.
Fascist movements share with social Darwinism the idea that life is a competition for power, acording to which the division of society's resources should be left up to pure free market competition. Fascist movements share its ideals of hard work, private enterprise, and self-sufficiency. To have a life worthy of value, for the social Darwinist, is to have risen above others by struggle and merit, to have survived a fierce competition for resources. Those who do not compete successfully do not deserve the goods and resources of society. In an ideology that measures worth by productivity, propaganda that represents members of an out-group as lazy is a way to justify placing them on a hierarchy of worth.
Does anyone really want their children's sense of identity to be based on a legacy of marginalization of others?
Addendum:
Republic
1. Elected officials
2. Free, fair, and frequent elections
3. Freedom of expression
4. Alternative sources of information
5. Associational autonomy
6. Inclusive citizenship (“What Political Institutions Does Large-Scale Democracy Require?” Robert A. Dahl, Political Science Quarterly (vol. 120, no. 2, Summer 2005, pp 187-197))
