Rating: 
Summary: Whose Reich Is It Anyway?
Review: The Marquis de Morés, returning to 1890s Paris after his cattle ranching venture in North Dakota failed, recruited a gang of men from the Parisian cattle yards as muscle for his "national socialism" project -- a term Paxton credits Morés' contemporary Maurice Barres, a French nationalist author, with coining. Morés' project was potent and prophetic: his national socialism was a mixture of anti-capitalism and anti-Semitism. He clothed his men in what must have been the first fascist uniform in Europe -- ten-gallon hats and cowboy garb, frontier clothes he'd taken a shine to in the American West. (Author Paxton suggests the first ever fascist get-up was the KKKs white sheet and pointy hat). Morés killed a French Jewish officer in a duel during the Dreyfus affair and later was killed in the Sahara by his guides during his quest to unite France to Islam to Spain. Morés had earlier proclaimed: "Life is valuable only through action. So much the worse if the action is mortal." Here assembled together are all of the elements of what Paxton would classify as first stage fascism: "the creation of a movement." Most fascist movements stall in this first stage he notes -- think, for instance, of the skinheads, the American Nazi Party and Posse Comitatus. Paxton's other stages are 2) the rooting of the movement in the political system; 3) the seizure of power; 4) the exercise of power; and 5) the duration of power, during which the regime chooses either radicalization or entropy. He notes that although each stage "is a prerequisite for the next, nothing requires a fascist movement to complete all of them, or even to move in only one direction. The five stages permit plausible comparison between movements and regimes at equivalent degrees of development. It helps us see that fascism, far from static, was a succession of processes and choices: seeking a following, forming alliances, bidding for power, then exercising it. That is why the conceptual tools that illuminate one stage may not necessarily work equally well for others." pg. 23. Paxton also tentatively offers a definition of fascism, but only after tracing the rise of various movements from their beginnings in the 19th century through the present day. Other historians and philosophers, he suggests, have written brilliantly on fascism, but have failed to recognize that their analyses apply to only one stage or another. He also notes that often definitions of fascism are based on fascist writings; he maintains that fascist writings while valuable were often written as justification for the seizure of power, or the attempted seizure, and that what fascists actually did and do is more critical to understanding these movements. Indeed, the language of fascism has changed little since the days of the Marquis De Mores. He hesitates in offering both his definition and his analytical stages, saying that he knows by doing so he risks falling into the nominalism of the "bestiary." He demonstrates that this is a common failing of definitions of fascism which are often incomplete or muddled as they typically describe only one or two typically late stages. Other historians, for instance, split fascism into Nazism or Italian fascism, avoiding the problem of understanding their common elements by concentrating on their differences, insisting that they are incommensurable. Finally in the last pages, Paxton offers up this fairly comprehensive and useful definition: "Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."
Paxton is particularly strong in showing how the circumstances in post WWI Germany and Italy -- the demobilized mobs of young soldiers, sent to war by elites who had no conception of the destruction and suffering they had unleashed upon the younger generation -- were ripe for fascism's appeals. For many, liberalism, conservatism and socialism all seemed equally complicit in the crack-up of Europe in the Great War. Fascism, rising from the ashes, employed the socialistic tools of mass marches, the military techniques of terror learned in the war, and as they gained power, the new tools of mass communication and propaganda developed in the US during WWI. Fascists also reacted astutely to public discomfort toward the mass migrations from southern and eastern Europe coming in the wake of political and economic distress in those regions, using that fear to increase their power through scapegoating and its attendant rhetoric of purity. Fascism is both charged and blurry word these days, used by both the left and the right to assail their critics and enemies. The Nazi remains the evildoer par excellence in popular and political culture, invoked for a thrill of fear or the disciplinary scare or emotional incitement. In this masterful synthesis of writings in politics, history, philosophy and sociology, Paxton untangles the vast literature fascism has generated, establishes some essential ground rules for coming to grips with its many expressions, stages, and manifestations, and clears a space for further, better focused research. Although academic in its orientation, it is well and clearly written. Finally, for the reader who is not familiar with modern European history, it is a very useful and informative text as it takes into its scope by necessity much of European and American history over the past one hundred years. Absolutely required reading.
Rating:
Summary: Whose Reich Is It Anyway?
Review: The Marquis de Morés, returning to 1890s Paris after his cattle ranching venture in North Dakota failed, recruited a gang of men from the Parisian cattle yards as muscle for his "national socialism" project -- a term Paxton credits Morés' contemporary Maurice Barres, a French nationalist author, with coining. Morés' project was potent and prophetic: his national socialism was a mixture of anti-capitalism and anti-Semitism. He clothed his men in what must have been the first fascist uniform in Europe -- ten-gallon hats and cowboy garb, frontier clothes he'd taken a shine to in the American West. (Author Paxton suggests the first ever fascist get-up was the KKKs white sheet and pointy hat). Morés killed a French Jewish officer in a duel during the Dreyfus affair and later was killed in the Sahara by his guides during his quest to unite France to Islam to Spain. Morés had earlier proclaimed: "Life is valuable only through action. So much the worse if the action is mortal." Here assembled together are all of the elements of what Paxton would classify as first stage fascism: "the creation of a movement." Most fascist movements stall in this first stage he notes -- think, for instance, of the skinheads, the American Nazi Party and Posse Comitatus. Paxton's other stages are 2) the rooting of the movement in the political system; 3) the seizure of power; 4) the exercise of power; and 5) the duration of power, during which the regime chooses either radicalization or entropy. He notes that although each stage "is a prerequisite for the next, nothing requires a fascist movement to complete all of them, or even to move in only one direction. The five stages permit plausible comparison between movements and regimes at equivalent degrees of development. It helps us see that fascism, far from static, was a succession of processes and choices: seeking a following, forming alliances, bidding for power, then exercising it. That is why the conceptual tools that illuminate one stage may not necessarily work equally well for others." pg. 23. Paxton also tentatively offers a definition of fascism, but only after tracing the rise of various movements from their beginnings in the 19th century through the present day. Other historians and philosophers, he suggests, have written brilliantly on fascism, but have failed to recognize that their analyses apply to only one stage or another. He also notes that often definitions of fascism are based on fascist writings; he maintains that fascist writings while valuable were often written as justification for the seizure of power, or the attempted seizure, and that what fascists actually did and do is more critical to understanding these movements. Indeed, the language of fascism has changed little since the days of the Marquis De Mores. He hesitates in offering both his definition and his analytical stages, saying that he knows by doing so he risks falling into the nominalism of the "bestiary." He demonstrates that this is a common failing of definitions of fascism which are often incomplete or muddled as they typically describe only one or two typically late stages. Other historians, for instance, split fascism into Nazism or Italian fascism, avoiding the problem of understanding their common elements by concentrating on their differences, insisting that they are incommensurable. Finally in the last pages, Paxton offers up this fairly comprehensive and useful definition: "Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."
Paxton is particularly strong in showing how the circumstances in post WWI Germany and Italy -- the demobilized mobs of young soldiers, sent to war by elites who had no conception of the destruction and suffering they had unleashed upon the younger generation -- were ripe for fascism's appeals. For many, liberalism, conservatism and socialism all seemed equally complicit in the crack-up of Europe in the Great War. Fascism, rising from the ashes, employed the socialistic tools of mass marches, the military techniques of terror learned in the war, and as they gained power, the new tools of mass communication and propaganda developed in the US during WWI. Fascists also reacted astutely to public discomfort toward the mass migrations from southern and eastern Europe coming in the wake of political and economic distress in those regions, using that fear to increase their power through scapegoating and its attendant rhetoric of purity. Fascism is both charged and blurry word these days, used by both the left and the right to assail their critics and enemies. The Nazi remains the evildoer par excellence in popular and political culture, invoked for a thrill of fear or the disciplinary scare or emotional incitement. In this masterful synthesis of writings in politics, history, philosophy and sociology, Paxton untangles the vast literature fascism has generated, establishes some essential ground rules for coming to grips with its many expressions, stages, and manifestations, and clears a space for further, better focused research. Although academic in its orientation, it is well and clearly written. Finally, for the reader who is not familiar with modern European history, it is a very useful and informative text as it takes into its scope by necessity much of European and American history over the past one hundred years. Absolutely required reading.
Rating:
Summary: Whose Reich Is It Anyway?
Review: The Marquis de Morés, returning to 1890s Paris after his cattle ranching venture in North Dakota failed, recruited a gang of men from the Parisian cattle yards as muscle for his "national socialism" project -- a term Paxton credits Morés' contemporary Maurice Barres, a French nationalist author, with coining. Morés' project was potent and prophetic: his national socialism was a mixture of anti-capitalism and anti-Semitism. He clothed his men in what must have been the first fascist uniform in Europe -- ten-gallon hats and cowboy garb, frontier clothes he'd taken a shine to in the American West. (Author Paxton suggests the first ever fascist get-up was the KKKs white sheet and pointy hat). Morés killed a French Jewish officer in a duel during the Dreyfus affair and later was killed in the Sahara by his guides during his quest to unite France to Islam to Spain. Morés had earlier proclaimed: "Life is valuable only through action. So much the worse if the action is mortal." Here assembled together are all of the elements of what Paxton would classify as first stage fascism: "the creation of a movement." Most fascist movements stall in this first stage he notes -- think, for instance, of the skinheads, the American Nazi Party and Posse Comitatus. Paxton's other stages are 2) the rooting of the movement in the political system; 3) the seizure of power; 4) the exercise of power; and 5) the duration of power, during which the regime chooses either radicalization or entropy. He notes that although each stage "is a prerequisite for the next, nothing requires a fascist movement to complete all of them, or even to move in only one direction. The five stages permit plausible comparison between movements and regimes at equivalent degrees of development. It helps us see that fascism, far from static, was a succession of processes and choices: seeking a following, forming alliances, bidding for power, then exercising it. That is why the conceptual tools that illuminate one stage may not necessarily work equally well for others." pg. 23. Paxton also tentatively offers a definition of fascism, but only after tracing the rise of various movements from their beginnings in the 19th century through the present day. Other historians and philosophers, he suggests, have written brilliantly on fascism, but have failed to recognize that their analyses apply to only one stage or another. He also notes that often definitions of fascism are based on fascist writings; he maintains that fascist writings while valuable were often written as justification for the seizure of power, or the attempted seizure, and that what fascists actually did and do is more critical to understanding these movements. Indeed, the language of fascism has changed little since the days of the Marquis De Mores. He hesitates in offering both his definition and his analytical stages, saying that he knows by doing so he risks falling into the nominalism of the "bestiary." He demonstrates that this is a common failing of definitions of fascism which are often incomplete or muddled as they typically describe only one or two typically late stages. Other historians, for instance, split fascism into Nazism or Italian fascism, avoiding the problem of understanding their common elements by concentrating on their differences, insisting that they are incommensurable. Finally in the last pages, Paxton offers up this fairly comprehensive and useful definition: "Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."
Paxton is particularly strong in showing how the circumstances in post WWI Germany and Italy -- the demobilized mobs of young soldiers, sent to war by elites who had no conception of the destruction and suffering they had unleashed upon the younger generation -- were ripe for fascism's appeals. For many, liberalism, conservatism and socialism all seemed equally complicit in the crack-up of Europe in the Great War. Fascism, rising from the ashes, employed the socialistic tools of mass marches, the military techniques of terror learned in the war, and as they gained power, the new tools of mass communication and propaganda developed in the US during WWI. Fascists also reacted astutely to public discomfort toward the mass migrations from southern and eastern Europe coming in the wake of political and economic distress in those regions, using that fear to increase their power through scapegoating and its attendant rhetoric of purity. Fascism is both charged and blurry word these days, used by both the left and the right to assail their critics and enemies. The Nazi remains the evildoer par excellence in popular and political culture, invoked for a thrill of fear or the disciplinary scare or emotional incitement. In this masterful synthesis of writings in politics, history, philosophy and sociology, Paxton untangles the vast literature fascism has generated, establishes some essential ground rules for coming to grips with its many expressions, stages, and manifestations, and clears a space for further, better focused research. Although academic in its orientation, it is well and clearly written. Finally, for the reader who is not familiar with modern European history, it is a very useful and informative text as it takes into its scope by necessity much of European and American history over the past one hundred years. Absolutely required reading.
Rating:
Summary: A welcome introduction to fascism
Review: The term "fascist" is used with such abandon that it has really lost all meaning: it is commonly used to describe anyone in a position of any power who the speaker doesn't like. Most people who use the term doesn't even realize that it was once seen by many very intelligent people as being a supremely viable form of government.
This book offers a great deal of food for thought. Mr. Paxton seeks to define "fascism" by looking at the history of the movement, and by examining whether it has any future. He explains why some regimes which are usually termed fascist really were not, and mentions other goverments that probably should be considered such.
This book is rather short and a fairly simple read, making it very accessible to the ordinary reader. It is perfect for anyone who would like a deeper understanding of fascism and fascist movements. I wholeheartedly recomend it to anyone who is interested in the history of the 20th century (political, social, labor, military, or otherwise) or who would like to better unedrstand exactly what fascism is and why it was so powerful.
Rating:
Summary: The ABC of Fascism
Review: This book admirably summarizes a vast literature on Fascism and highlights a few key points which can be kept in mind when the threat of Fascism is imagined or raised.
1. Fascism cannot be understood only from its ideologues, it needs to be looked at in practice.
2. The practice of Fascism, as indeed the rise to power of Fascism, requires collaboration and support from the much older, stronger, and more respectable conservative and establishmentarian foundations of any society.
3. Because Fascism is designed to prevent leftist revolution it is profoundly conservative, but because its means are radical it cannot really remain conservative in practice.
4. Because Fascism is conservative it does not require much in the way of terror, intimidation, or violence to capture the acquiescence and cooperation of large segments of society, particularly of "respectable" society. It does its evil under the cover of the good and the conventional.
5. Therefore Fascism's evil can be hard to discover until it is too late.
Paxton also provides a list of the "mobilizing passions" of Fascism which can be looked for in any society. It is here that one can in contemporary America, for example, analyze the ranting and raving of talk-show hosts, the unconventional and radical goals of foreign policy experts, the manipulation of patriotic appeals, and the apocalyptic appeals of popular religiosity to discover whether Fascism has entered the national life or not. The Fascist label can be used indiscriminately and falsely, but it is possible that at the present time it ought to be used more insightfully. But it ought indeed to be used!
Rating: 
Summary: The Anatomy of Historical Revisionism
Review: This book is a pathetic example of a radical left-wing professor as he rewrites history and political thought before you very eyes. There are numerous errors throughout the book but probably the most egregious is the authors link of Fascism to the right wing. While this may be the political fantasy of any and all true socialists it is far from the truth. But let's get into the debate immediately and see if we can bring some Fact to this work of fiction.
First of all the author incorrectly calls the German Nazi's a fascist party. This is so absurd that it is easily rebuffed here, but first let me give a little history. The term NAZI was a nickname given to the members of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Socialist is the operative word here.) This is of course Hitler's outfit, which formed the core of the Third Reich. National Socialists are just another variation on the theme of Socialism and they acquired their nickname though a cartoon character, "Ignaz", nicknamed "Nazi" who was the stereotypical Jew. Before the horror of the reality set in, it seemed a good joke on the posturing, parading, clearly anti-Semitic national socialists to share a nickname with a Jewish cartoon character. Later, Stalin thought up the switch of the applying the Italian "fascist" designation to German national socialist in order to erase from memory that the Nazis were, in fact, socialist.
Fascist just for you information, refers to members of an Italian political party, founded and led by Benito Mussolini, who was expelled from the Socialist Party of Italy and went on to start his own. The structure was a copy, the concept a variant of other socialist parties. "Fasces," a bundle of twigs with an ax, were carried before consuls of ancient Rome. Mussolini adopted the symbol, hence the name "fascist."
Other popular names of Socialist parties are Bolshevik's and Communists. It is interesting to note that in Hungary alone, the communist party went through four complete name changes during its tenure. It is an integral part of socialist operational methodology to make an instant switch once a label has been tainted with "mistakes" (such as too many atrocities), or when a new compendium of deceptions is about to be announced.
Regardless of the name that a socialist party chooses they all have the same elements in common. They are as follows:
1. Restriction of Individual Freedom
2. A strong central authority
3. The usurpation of legislative and judicial prerogative by the executive branch of the government
4. Some suspension of property rights.
Since Hitler's party and the Mussolini's party both urged the people to go along with all four of the above premises, both the fascist and the Nazi's (National Socialist German Workers Party) was in reality a Socialistic endeavor. To label it conservative is a glaringly illogical deduction.
Since the author's main conclusion are drawn from such falsehoods the whole book is suspect and can be passed by and nothing but a propaganda front for the new-socialist and their continuing ploy to tar the conservatives with the atrocities of their political kin.
Rating: 
Summary: Thoughtful and Thorough Analysis
Review: This very thoughtful book is aimed at understanding the basic features of fascism. Paxton is very concerned with rescuing the term from its present status as a convenient insult. As Paxton points out, though not until relatively late in the book, all modern democracies contain nascent fascist elements. Given the incredibly destructive consequences of successful or even partially successful fascist movements, we should have a good understanding of fascism so as to be able to recognize fascist threats. Paxton departs somewhat from prior literature in that he does not concentrate on fascist ideology. Paxton is careful also to look at a broad spectrum of facsist movements, both successful and unsuccessful, rather than falling into the trap of using Nazism as an archetype. Looking at other features of fascism than ideology makes considerable sense. Fascist movements had important differences in ideology and fascism in general, with its appeal to intense nationalism and exclusionary sense of identity, shouldn't be expected to have a uniform ideology. Italian fascism, at least in its original form, lacked the virulent anti-semitism and social darwinist preoccupations of Nazism, while the fascist movement in Romania was aggessively Christian in ideological content. Paxton provides instead a structural analysis and definition of fascism by pursuing a careful examination of how fascist movements functioned. Some of Paxton's important points are Fascism appears in failed or highly stressed democracies, that fascism involves mass politics, that fascism emerges as a reaction to perceived threats from the socialist threat, that fascism depends on charismatic leadership, and that fascism always contains a cult of violent action. A particularly important point is that the successful fascist movements, Italian Fascism and Nazism, were invited into power by traditional conservative elites seeking to coopt fascist mass mobilization in support of their own ends. In authoritarian societies where the conservative elites were more powerful or confident, such as Spain, Romania, or Hungary, fascist movements were consigned to the sidelines or actually suppressed. Paxton's analysis is thorough, largely convincing, and based on a remarkable knowledge of the huge literature on this topic. This is actually an extended essay, 220 pages of text, but the book contains also a superb annotated bibiography and outstanding footnotes which add considerably to the length of the book.
I disagree with Paxton on some points. He describes fascism as the major political innovation of the 20th century, assigning liberalism, socialism, and conservatism to the 19th century. Perhaps, but I suggest that the Leninist version of Marxism is sufficiently different from 19th century socialism to constitute a new phenomenon in political life. Paxton states that an essential feature of fascism in power is the existence of parallel governmental structures. When fascism came to power in Germany and Italy, it did do in presence of intact state structures and civil institutions. Fascist party organization became a parallel structure of government and way to impose control, often competing with "normative" government. This is true but not unique to fascism. Erection of parallel bureaucracies is a common response of leadership concerned about the reliability of their formal governmental structures. The considerable expansion of American Presidential power over the last century has been accompanied by expansion of the size and power of the White House staff and its allied structures. Similarly, when the Qing conquered Ming China, they governed in parallel through both the traditional scholar-bureaucrats and through a parallel system of officials owing direct loyalty to the Qing emperors. Paxton correctly states that violent action was a necessary component of fascism and that pursuit of war was integral to Nazism and Italian Fascism maintaining their essential momentum and solving internal problems. It is worth noting however, that this is not unique to fascist states. Authoritarian states have commonly used external aggression as a way of addressing internal problems. Think of the invasion of the Falklands by the military dictatorship in Argentina or the similarly reckless and self-defeating attempt by the Greek dictators to annex Cyprus. There is a particularly strong tradition of these types of actions in German history and this was probably one of the causes of the First World War. Paxton errs also, I think, in downplaying (though not disregarding) the convergent features of fascism in power with Marxist-Leninism in power. I think the concept of totalitarianism has more power than he is willing to concede.
Rating:
Summary: Thoughtful and Thorough Analysis
Review: This very thoughtful book is aimed at understanding the basic features of fascism. Paxton is very concerned with rescuing the term from its present status as a convenient insult. As Paxton points out, though not until relatively late in the book, all modern democracies contain nascent fascist elements. Given the incredibly destructive consequences of successful or even partially successful fascist movements, we should have a good understanding of fascism so as to be able to recognize fascist threats. Paxton departs somewhat from prior literature in that he does not concentrate on fascist ideology. Paxton is careful also to look at a broad spectrum of facsist movements, both successful and unsuccessful, rather than falling into the trap of using Nazism as an archetype. Looking at other features of fascism than ideology makes considerable sense. Fascist movements had important differences in ideology and fascism in general, with its appeal to intense nationalism and exclusionary sense of identity, shouldn't be expected to have a uniform ideology. Italian fascism, at least in its original form, lacked the virulent anti-semitism and social darwinist preoccupations of Nazism, while the fascist movement in Romania was aggessively Christian in ideological content. Paxton provides instead a structural analysis and definition of fascism by pursuing a careful examination of how fascist movements functioned. Some of Paxton's important points are Fascism appears in failed or highly stressed democracies, that fascism involves mass politics, that fascism emerges as a reaction to perceived threats from the socialist threat, that fascism depends on charismatic leadership, and that fascism always contains a cult of violent action. A particularly important point is that the successful fascist movements, Italian Fascism and Nazism, were invited into power by traditional conservative elites seeking to coopt fascist mass mobilization in support of their own ends. In authoritarian societies where the conservative elites were more powerful or confident, such as Spain, Romania, or Hungary, fascist movements were consigned to the sidelines or actually suppressed. Paxton's analysis is thorough, largely convincing, and based on a remarkable knowledge of the huge literature on this topic. This is actually an extended essay, 220 pages of text, but the book contains also a superb annotated bibiography and outstanding footnotes which add considerably to the length of the book.
I disagree with Paxton on some points. He describes fascism as the major political innovation of the 20th century, assigning liberalism, socialism, and conservatism to the 19th century. Perhaps, but I suggest that the Leninist version of Marxism is sufficiently different from 19th century socialism to constitute a new phenomenon in political life. Paxton states that an essential feature of fascism in power is the existence of parallel governmental structures. When fascism came to power in Germany and Italy, it did do in presence of intact state structures and civil institutions. Fascist party organization became a parallel structure of government and way to impose control, often competing with "normative" government. This is true but not unique to fascism. Erection of parallel bureaucracies is a common response of leadership concerned about the reliability of their formal governmental structures. The considerable expansion of American Presidential power over the last century has been accompanied by expansion of the size and power of the White House staff and its allied structures. Similarly, when the Qing conquered Ming China, they governed in parallel through both the traditional scholar-bureaucrats and through a parallel system of officials owing direct loyalty to the Qing emperors. Paxton correctly states that violent action was a necessary component of fascism and that pursuit of war was integral to Nazism and Italian Fascism maintaining their essential momentum and solving internal problems. It is worth noting however, that this is not unique to fascist states. Authoritarian states have commonly used external aggression as a way of addressing internal problems. Think of the invasion of the Falklands by the military dictatorship in Argentina or the similarly reckless and self-defeating attempt by the Greek dictators to annex Cyprus. There is a particularly strong tradition of these types of actions in German history and this was probably one of the causes of the First World War. Paxton errs also, I think, in downplaying (though not disregarding) the convergent features of fascism in power with Marxist-Leninism in power. I think the concept of totalitarianism has more power than he is willing to concede.
Rating:
Summary: Eminently sensible
Review: What is fascism? asks Robert Paxton, the renowned historian of Vichy France in this new book. And at the end of the book we get an answer. Aside from obsessions with unity and strong leadership, fascism (a) seeks to mobilize popular support for right-wing causes (b) "in uneasy but effective collaboration" with traditional conservative forces (c) to sweep away democratic restraints and (d) to indulge in redemptive violence free of ethical or legal restraints to engage in foreign expansion. It is a response to the failure of traditional elites to maintain power in a democratic society, who then work with the ferocious populism of fascist parties. Paxton works to this conclusion by comparing Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy as well as by looking at unsuccessful fascisms, various neo-fascisms of the present day, and whether other movements can be properly described as fascism. The result is eminently sensible. One can see this as Paxton succinctly judges other theories of fascism and finds them wanting. It would be wrong to describe its origins as primarliy intellectual, when it was the traumas of the first world war and the Great Depression that led to fascism's triumph. Moreover intellectuals were only important in its early stages before it achieved popular support, while fascism radiated a contempt for coherent thought (Paxton quotes one Italian fascist who declared "The fist is the synthesis of our theory.") Often lurid psychological explanations of fascism cannot explain why sexual repression and misogyny did not lead to fascism in France or Britain. Fascism was not simply a puppet of capitalism, since Henry A. Turner has demonstrated that most German businessmen preferred an authoritarian solution. Yet it cannot be said that fascism was anti-capitalist: its rhetoric was precisely that, and fascism could not have come to power without the support of the conservative establishment. The idea that fascism is the result of atomized "masses," one supported by Hannah Arendt, does not do justice to the fact that pre-1933 Germans joined hundreds of private clubs and associations. Nor is "totalitarian" a useful label, since it does not explain the chaotic, competing and disorganized nature of the Nazi state. Describing it as a "political religion" is not very helpful either. Such a theory implies that fascism is a response to the spiritual crisis caused by secularism (so why in Germany and not in England?) and implies that fascism and Christianity are fundamentally opposed (which does not do justice to their complex, equivocal relationship). Describing fascism as a "Developmental dictatorship" is also not convincing. Italy grew faster before 1914 and after 1945 than it ever did under Mussolini. What we see in fascist states are a conflict between "normative" and "prerogative" sectors, one governed by rules the other increasingly by the dictator's desires. Paxton goes on to discuss the tug of war (a useful metaphor) between fascists and conservatives, the leader and the party, and the party and the state. If this is fascism, then what isn't? Paxton makes the provocative, and to my mind convincing, argument that the Ku Klux Klan could be seen as the first intimation of fascism. By contrast Paxton's definition as fascism as popular mobilization against democracy allows him to dismiss a variety of movements as non-fascist. Islamic fundamentalists are not fascist, because the Moslem states they are fighting are not democratic. By contrast, because Israel is a democracy, its chauvinist and sectarian elements could, ironically, mutate into fascism. But Peron, or the Brazilian dictator Vargas were not fascists, since they were neither fighting democracies (in fact Peron was freely elected at least twice) and both provided some genuine encouragement to labour movements. Paxton seems a bit uncertain about Spain: on the one hand Franco appears as a traditionalist and an authoritarian. On the other hand he certainly squelched Spanish democracy, slaughtered 200,000 people during World War II and before 1945 freely indulged in very fascistic rhetoric indeed. On the other hand Imperial Japan did have a fascist movement, but after assassinating several prominent politicians it was suppressed by the state in 1936. Whereupon it purged itself of any remaining liberal and democratic impulses and engaged in a record of aggression and atrocity that well merits comparison with its Nazi ally. This leads us to a problem. Paxton emphasizes power and economic interest over ideology and national spirit. But what about violence? So when Paxton seeks to distinguish between fascism and authoritarianism, he should have made clearer that the difference is not necessarily a moral one. Suharto's regime was little more than a spectacular kleptocracy, but he murdered hundreds of thousands of Indonesian communists and nationalist Timorese. Perhaps we need another definition that would deal with Apartheid, the Rape of Nanking and the destroyers of the world trade center. And since it is the failure of conservatives to hold power themselves that made them turn to fascism, some discussion of how modern conservatives win elections might be helpful. The footnotes have the odd habit of referring to future and past pages in the book, and at one point Paxton confuses Walther Funk with Wilhelm Frick. But nevertheless this is a remarkably clear and sensible book.
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