- Kenneth Johansson
- 4.X.2025
- A brilliant essay about Fascism, by Wayne Allensworth:
What is “Fascism”? (Fascism, Real and Imagined)
By Wayne Allensworth | October 1, 2025
https://www.american-remnant.com/what-is-fascism-fascism-real-and-imagined/
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- Not brilliant:
"Fascism, especially its Nazi form, rejected Christian morality as weakening the folk, preventing the fascists from purifying the nation."
Change this to "Nazism rejected ..." and put it out of an essay on Fascism and into an essay on Nazism, where it belongs.
Not accurate:
"Fascism is not a reactionary, much less a conservative, ideology. The fascists of the 1920s and 30s saw themselves as revolutionaries displacing a stagnant bourgeois order."
No Fascism saw itself as simply Conservative (neither did Chesterton, and I mean the Catholic, not the Mosleyist), but some (and so did Chesterton) saw themselves as Reactionary. Bourgeoisie is a product of English Reformation over Whig Revolters to Glorious Revolution, and in France of the French Revolution as much as of the Bourbons.
José Antonio Primo de Rivera polemised against Rousseau, and against the Revolutions. René de La Tour du Pin and Charles Maurras, granddad and dad of French Fascism, were Monarchists and against the French Revolution.
- Kenneth Johansson
- Hans-Georg Lundahl; I agree that the first quotation should be about Nazism, as Mussolini was skeptical of Hitler's ideas about race. (But I still think that, on the whole, the essay is brilliant.)
When it comes to Fascism being reactionary or conservative, I agree with Allensworth.
Fascism wasn't a significant movement outside of Italy (counting Nazism as a separate entity here). It was almost all about Italy and Mussolini, and he wasn't much of a reactionary. You could probably find many followers who were; but Mussolini ruled, and Fascism basically began and ended with him.
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- "Fascism wasn't a significant movement outside of Italy"
Spain, like Falange and first years after 1939?
Brazil, like Integralismo (the youth affiliation of Dom Helder)
Portugal is a bit more complicated, since Estado Novo by Salazar was modelled on Estado Novo by a Brazilian guy who wasn't best friends with Integralists.
France, like Action Française and Pétain (obviously, my support for him wavers with 1942 and the Laval government).
- Kenneth Johansson
- Hans-Georg Lundahl; the Falange had very limited support, and Franco was very much in charge after the Spanish Civil War.
Was Salazar a Fascist? I see him more as a traditional authoritarian leader, like Franco.
What made Mussolini unusual was his enthusiasm for war. He attacked Ethiopia in 1935, Albania in 1939, declared war on France and the United Kingdom -- and invaded Greece -- in 1940, and joined Germany in invading the Soviet Union in 1941. Most right-wing leaders were more careful.
There were large movements in Brazil and France, which were somewhat significant in those countries, but they didn't matter much on the global stage. France was broken after the defeat, and Pétain didn't have much to say. Hitler rarely respected his allies, and kept them in a short leash. I suspect that he had respect for Mannerheim, but he had real power, and was never a puppet.
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- "Was Salazar a Fascist? I see him more as a traditional authoritarian leader, like Franco."
Insofar as they had some degree of Corporativism, they have been counted as Fascists.
1939 to 1975 Franco was in charge, but the first years were more Fascist, the time from 1960 is called "tecncracía" ... more focussed on getting riches for Spain than on equal distribution. That said, Franco's Spain was a wellfare state, he did invest in making cheap flats available.
"What made Mussolini unusual was his enthusiasm for war."
Thanks for unusual. Dollfuss and Schuschnigg didn't share it (also Schuschnigg commented later that "Austro-Fascist" was more of a nickname than a good description, but it did involve a Unitary Worker's Syndicate, so Corporatism).
Mannerheim was unfortunately into Eugenics, like Wendell Holmes, like Lenin, like Hitler, like the Social Democrats of Sweden, Norway and Denmark.
Pétain had more to say 1940 to 42 than afterwards, like Mussolini between 1922 and 1943 (42?). I'm not judging them on Laval II or Salò Republic.
- Kenneth Johansson
- Hans-Georg Lundahl; yes, it's always difficult to draw the lines regarding Fascism, as it has become a slur for the Left. The Communists used to call Social Democrats "social fascists"! 🙂
I like to treat Nazism and Fascism as two different movements -- even if the connections can't be ignored. Furthermore, I see a clear difference between Mussolini and the other leaders you mentioned. So I prefer to keep "Fascism" as a designation for the Italian movement. I see on Wikipedia that the Catholic Church favored bottom-up corporatism, while Mussolini preferred a top-down model; do you agree with this?
Eugenics was, unfortunately, popular all over Northern Europe and the United States. Protestant churches were, usually, much weaker than the Catholics regarding this, and didn't offer much resistance. But I don't know anything about Mannerheim's views -- your information is new to me.
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- "The Communists used to call Social Democrats "social fascists"!"
In Sweden, not totally untrue. "Saltsjöbadsandan" was introduced by one member of both Social Democrats and Nysvenskarne, as Per Engdahl, the founder of Nysvenskarne, i e Swedish Fascism, says in Fribytare i Folkhemmet.
His models were Carta del Lavoro and Perón's politics.
"I see on Wikipedia that the Catholic Church favored bottom-up corporatism, while Mussolini preferred a top-down model; do you agree with this?"
The real difference is, while Catholicism favours both bottom-up and top-down corporativism, Catholicism doesn't think membership in a Corporation should be mandatary as prerequisite of doing your work (either as employee or employer). Mussolini made it mandatory, Pius XI didn't totally condemn him, but remarked "there are more than one way to Corporatism" (meaning Mussolini's wasn't totally to his taste).
"Eugenics was, unfortunately, popular all over Northern Europe and the United States."
Not all the states, but too many. UK was also exempt from actually practising it, probably due to a bigger minority of Catholics at the time.
When Albanus Schachleiter OSB, who was a personal friend of Hitler and got in trouble with the bishop of Munich for it, remarked that National Socialism risked getting too Protestant, I think this (as well as compulsory camps for loafers) was what he was talking about.
I'm not sure how much it has to do with Mannerheim's personal views, it so happens it started in Finland while he was President. He didn't stop it. However, I think the victims were fewer in Finland.
- Kenneth Johansson
- Hans-Georg Lundahl; I think the idea about Social Democracy being a variant of fascism came from Moscow in the 1920s. Stalin said this, in 1924: "Fascism is not only a military-technical category. Fascism is the bourgeoisie’s fighting organisation that relies on the active support of Social-Democracy. Social-Democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism."*
On the other hand, I believe that the Social Democratic Party of Germany viewed Stalinists as fascists! 🙂
* Source: J. V. Stalin
Concerning the International Situation
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1924/09/20.htm
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- Well, in 1924, SD and Fascists were both pretty pro-property and pro-syndicates.
Mussolini and (while he lived) Matteotti clashed over electoral technicalities, not over economics.
- Hans-Georg Lundahl
- "Eugenics was, unfortunately, popular all over Northern Europe and the United States."
I forgot to mention, Catholic Fascisms (except possibly Pétain) were an honourable exception.
Even Mussolini wasn't for Eugenics back when Chesterton asked!
_________________
In the following, I have shortened the name of HGr, since I don't know him or how willing he is to appear in person on my blog, and in the interest of symmetry, Kenneth Johansson to KJ, myself to HGL.
- HGr
- I think this was a rather lazy take on the subject, blaming "ungodliness" as the main issue.
- KJ
- HGr; I agree that the loss of religion was a complicated matter, leading to all sorts of knock-on effects -- and I would also argue that culture is strongly connected to biology.
Nordic history is another complicated issue. Absence of war was important, IMO, but also absence of colonies (with a few exceptions). France and the United Kingdom struggled to cope with losing their empires, while we focused on improving our economies without such baggage.
Japan became peaceful after WWII, but they didn't have much choice after getting thoroughly destroyed. It was the same thing in Germany. People didn't have much faith in the old religions, but were sick of the new ones as well, so they put their energy into producing cars, et cetera.
Regarding Hitler: I don't see how things could have ended much differently. His ambitions were so extreme, and he was so delusional, that I think America and the Russians would have defeated him sooner or later. Had he been more successful with Operation Barbarossa, the Russians could have retreated further east, behind the Ural Mountains.
- HGL
- HGr "Ungodly western societies like here in the Nordics remained civilized on pretty much all points long after God left the picture."
Eugenics?
- HGr
- HGL Are you inferring that we in the Nordics practiced eugenics? We didn't. For a few decades in the mid 20th century Sweden had a set of very basic laws on parents that had kids and were deemed anti-social, meaning they were not capable of caring for their kids and they were sterilized after the second child. Doesn't strike me as a crime against humanity or even any kind of Nazism. Minorites and Swedes faced the same consideration.
- HGL
- "and they were sterilized"
Exactly. Eugenics.
And that is exactly what Nazis did from basically "day one" or more precisely February 1934.
It's also what Pope Pius XI condemned in Casti Connubii, in 1931. As this was before 1933, he wasn't looking primarily at Nazis, but at for instance Nordics or some US and Canadian states.
As to "deemed anti-social" the definitions weren't directly race based (neither was the one used in 1934 by NS Germany), but criteria for anti-social targetted Gipsies, Tatters and Lapps disproportionately often (or Greenlanders in Denmark).
"Doesn't strike me as a crime against humanity"
It certainly doesn't strike me as civilised to give doctors or social workers arbitrary and very oppressive powers over citizens. With abortion, Nordics have at least by now passed the line to crime against humanity. But already back then, when aborting trisomic babies was recommended.
