What is fascism and how do we know we have it?

[a completely inoffensive name]

Fascism is the greatest dirty word in politics imo. It will never lose its power like typical swear words because it has the power of the Nazis behind it. You can call a million different things fascist and people will still take it seriously as if you just dropped some serious knowledge on them just because you injected that single word into your complaint. But what is fascism and how do we know if we actually have it?

Here is a short (23 pages) pdf, The Five Stages of Fascism by Robert Paxton that attempts to define and single out what fascism and fascist policies might actually be. http://w3.salemstate.edu/~cmauriello...of Fascism.pdf It's a good read imo, but my first question to everyone is if he got anything wrong.

A second, much more simplified attempt at knowing if there is fascism within our countries politics is a one page article called the Fourteen Characteristics of Fascism by Lawrence Britt. http://www.secularhumanism.org/libra...britt_23_2.htm

This second page is a lot easier to digest, but my second question for you guys is to look at the general accuracy of the second article after reading the first and say whether or not the characteristics are indeed a good guideline to calling out fascism, or if they are the kind of general vague kind of descriptions that allow anyone to be targeted as the next Hitler.

I ask this because I see the second article float around a lot among other forums I go on (particularly the left ones) and everyone loves having big circle jerks about it, picking out so and so politician for being 10 out of 14 or 11 out of 14 and etc.

[SwordsMaster]

If you wonder if you have it, you probably do.

[a completely inoffensive name]

If you wonder if you have it, you probably do.

I disagree with this. People in general are stupid and as I have said above, they like to throw that word around everywhere. People in Arizona will wonder if there is fascism running around because the state government put red light cameras at intersections to prevent speeding. Whether or not this is a good policy is besides the point. It certainly ain't fascism, despite the tea party "wondering" out loud if it is so.

[SwordsMaster]

One day you have speed cameras, the next you're invading Poland. Say it ain't so.

[Rhyfelwyr]

"Fascism" is unfortunately one of those words that now has a lot of different meanings which are seen as legitimate.

You can use it to describe authoritarian policies nowadays, or you can use it to describe a political movement (or maybe more accurately a series of political movements) that came about in the twentieth century.

For the latter, what regimes count as fascist really depends on how strict you are with the definition of it. If you just go along with the rampant nationalism part, then Franco's Spain and Salazar's Portugal come under it. But then if you look at the attitudes that it supposedly takes towards modernisation and embracing industrialisation, then they don't. Nazi Germany's obsession with racial purity was unique. Mussolini wasn't particularly antisemitic.

I also don't agree with the first article in that fascist movements isolate themselves and don't attempt to export their models to other countries. Oswald Mosley was a big fan of creating a EU-style fascist superstate.

If I had to define fascism I would say that it was a 'third way' between capitalism and communism. Most fascist movements had a working-class/lower middle-class core, and so it shoudln't be surprising that they took a very left-leaning, socialist approach to the economy (at least in their theory in the early days, before necessity took them down another route). What made them different from the left was that they combined this with the nationalism of the right.

Remember what Mussolini said he didn't like about the left was that it was too materialistic... fascism was basically leftism with a bunch of emotional/abstract social values added on.

[Ronin]

a slight burning sensation when going to the bathroom is normally the first indication. :P

the term is hard to define.....for example here in Portugal we normal refer to Salazar's regime as fascist even if it does not meet every single bullet point........it felt fascist enough for the people sent to jail for thought crimes and maybe that's enough of a definition.

[Fragony]

Facism is force, it can come from all directions, left, right, green or brown it doesn't really matter where it's comming from. It's the murder of individualism

[a completely inoffensive name]

and of course, it just so happened that every fascist leader has appeared on the "most evil human" list.

[PanzerJaeger]

and of course, it just so happened that every fascist leader has appeared on the "most evil human" list.

I've never seen that list, but I'm sure most communist leaders also made it. Such dopey lists are usually written by Western historians, so self-affirming results shouldn't be too surprising.