Fascism Explained

The Usual Rush from Reason

By F.M.

"Sometimes," I am told, "the representative of sectional opinion manages to lift a pen. Perhaps the Editor considers that he is not representative of some sectional opinion. I am not that vain, nor that humble.

Assuming that the Penguin Polit. Dict. is correct then Fascism is defined as: "The social system aimed at is the Corporate State. Fascism claims to be neither capitalistic nor socialistic. it retains private property but places it under State control. Class struggle is rejected and industrial disputes are forbidden."

From that definition it is impossible to prove that the end of fascism is the support of the capitalistic system. If any segment of the progressive circle is of the opinion that capitalism wishes to be bolstered by being placed under State control, then further study is needed of the capitalist system. That Fascism did in fact bolster that system in Italy proves that and nothing more. It does not prove that every capitalist country is Fascist. Nor does the fact that the "class struggle is rejected and industrial disputes are forbidden" make a country Fascist. The class struggle could well be rejected in the light of history. The suppression of industrial disputes is an evil but where the rules governing the right to strike have been violated then it is not Fascism. (The rules arise from the common good as opposed to the sectional good.)

The difficulty among progressives is that the ideas of Socialism and Communism widely held cannot be reconciled with those philosophies which do not believe the State to be supreme, or that the alternative to capitalism is complete socialization. Those who oppose Socialism, as progressives understand it, become capitalists and then fascists. That there are other types of Socialism or in fact any other social philosophies worth considering other than theirs they do not wish to discover or admit.

Unbridled capitalism is an evil. That is no justification for stating that all capitalism is reactionary or Fascist and it is still less of a justification for saying that Socialism is the solution. The enthusiasm for emotional tags has resulted in an identification of Nazism and Fascism, doctrines fundamentally different. One difference being that an essential of Nazism was "race purity," but not of Fascism. This merger is the result of ignorance. The latest addition to the Fascist heap is Mr. Chamberlain who may have been a fool but certainly would never have supported the ideas contained in the definition of Fascism.

There is probably some reason for this loud declamation of Fascists to be found in the fact that many of the essentials of somewhat similar systems can be compared not only with each other but also with those of the spiritual home of many progressives: Communistic Russia. These words have a familiar ring to them: "This concept (the dictatorship of the proletariat) has meaning only when one class knows that it alone takes political power into its own page 7 hands, and does not deceive itself or others by talk about popular elected government, sanctified by the whole people." These announcements are very similar to Fascist theories and the progressive circles would wish to detract from the fact that those Fascist countries who lack freedom of press and speech and religion, or even of election were and are very similar to that country where progressives are having a free hand.

It is useless, of course, to quote from our press to progressives who maintain that any judgment made on such facts is a "telepathic job." Their sources cannot be more reliable especially since our press at least fosters two different opinions where any journals they may quote from are in fact organs of the State which is reaping the benefit of misreporting. State controlled printing presses are never satisfactory where profound differences of opinion exist but are not allowed expression.

To suggest that materlalistic progressives or progressives who are there to be in the swim should read something about the present practices of Socialism would be futile. Perhaps they may wish to read their philosophical ABC which has been omitted from their political nurturing which omission has resulted in such immaturity. I would suggest Maritain's "Render unto Caesar" and the Encyclicals of the Popes. This will probably shock the progressive soul, but to omit such works as Rerum Novarum, Quadragesimo Anno and Divini Redemptoris would be to deprive them of invaluable reading or the pleasure of saying "No" once more.