Week 15: Post-fascism & Neo-fascism Discussion Questions

WEEK 15: POST-FASCISM & NEO-FASCISM DISCUSSION QUESTIONS Introduction/Break-Out Groups ● What is the thesis or argument of the reading? ● What are some main points or evidence of the reading? ● What is a historiographical intervention or change this reading makes to our understanding of fascism in the past or today? ● How does this reading relate to our course thus far? Passmore - Chapter 10 “Fascism and Us” Kevin Passmore, Fascism, 149-156. ● What was the approach of Martin Broszat in 1985 to viewing Nazism in a modern light, what argument does he make regarding this? (150) ○ What are the implications of the argument? ○ Why would some view it favorably and others unfavorably? ■ “Broszat’s argument that the welfare policies of modern Germany permitted critics to accuse him of presenting Nazism in a positive light. With some justice, these critics argued that he had artificially isolated the modernization process from other aspects of Nazism, and therefore neglected the racist nature of the Nazi welfare policy.” (150) ● Passmore develops a new working definition of fascism: “Fascism is a contradictory set of interrelated and contest ideologies and practices that cannot easily be categorized in terms of binary opposites such as tradition and modernity or radical and reactionary.” (151) ○ What are our thoughts on this new working definition from our course thus far? ○ Does it work in tandem with other definitions and theories regarding fascism? ● “ … We must not confuse morality with academic research. Moral positions can’t be deduced from the study of the past … they [actions of the past fascist regimes] will be seen as crimes only if the reader shares the moral perspective of the writer. Anyway, the question of whether or not the modern far right’s stance is ‘fascist’ has no bearing on the moral acceptability of its proposals.” (152) ○ Do you agree or disagree with Passmore’s argument? ○ What role do academics play in defining fascism/crimes? Is this role necessary for determining these terms or for recalling the context in which they developed? ○ What implications does this assertion have for how we define fascism and crimes and morality in these spheres? 1 ● “To reduce the far right to its similarities with fascism carries the risk of obscuring what is new about it and of diverting attention from the possibility that fascists may not be alone in advocating or practicing policies that others would regard as morally wrong.” (152) ○ How does this apply to his previous statement? ○ Why does “reducing” the far right to “its similarities” with fascism potentially diminish or “divert” attention that fascists are the only ones who could commit wrongdoing? Do you agree with this argument? ● “Although one cannot afford to be complacent, contemporary academics do not usually assume that history is regulated by scientific laws, and still less that knowledge of these laws provides a moral standard … A proper scholarly method is intrinsically antifascist, in that it threats skeptically what fascists regard as beyond criticism. Academic enquiry accepts that its insights depend on perspective, that other perspectives will be possible, and that their answers will always be superseded. This necessary mutual criticism can only happen in a democratic environment.” (154) Paxton - Chapter 7: “Other Times, Other Places” Robert O. Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism, 172-205. ● Are there the potentials for fascism exist today? ○ What are some differences in views of post- 45 fascism between Western and Eastern Europe? ○ What are some reasons as to why neo/post fascists may be less popular or not yet in power in some states in Western and Eastern Europe? ■ “A revival of fascism faced additional obstacles after 1945: the increasing prosperity and seemingly irreversible globalization of the world economy, the triumph of individualistic consumerism,4 the declining availability of war as an instrument of national policy for large nations in the nuclear age, the diminishing credibility of a revolutionary threat. All these postwar developments have suggested to many that fascism as it flourished in Europe between the two world wars could not exist after 1945, at least not in the same form.” (173) “Whether or not one believes that fascism can recur depends, of course, on one’s understanding of fascism. Those who warn that fascism is returning tend to present it rather loosely as overtly violent racism and nationalism.8 The author who announced most categorically the death of fascism in 1945 argues that its defining elements—unlimited particular sovereignty, a relish for war, and a society based on violent exclusion— simply have no place in the complex, interdependent post–World War II world.9 The commonest position is that although fascists are still around, the conditions of interwar Europe that permitted them to found major movements and even take power no longer exist.” (173) 2 ● Paxton argues that fascism in the US could take a form that could be pious, anti-black and antiIslamic.” Do you agree or disagree with this statement? ○ Could fascism develop in the US? And if so, under which precursors or motivating factors? ○ “For example, while a new fascism would necessarily diabolize some enemy, both internal and external, the enemy would not necessarily be Jews. An authentically popular American fascism would be pious, antiblack, and, since September 11, 2001, anti-Islamic as well; in western Europe, secular and, these days, more likely anti-Islamic than antiSemitic; in Russia and eastern Europe, religious, anti-Semitic, Slavophile, and antiWestern. New fascisms would probably prefer the mainstream patriotic dress of their own place and time to alien swastikas or fasces. The British moralist George Orwell noted in the 1930s that an authentic British fascism would come reassuringly clad in sober English dress.There is no sartorial litmus test for fascism.” (174) ● Post-1945, how does immigration impact the potential for fascism across Europe? ○ Are immigrants/migrants able to become the new “others” to further develop fascism? ○ “The immigrant threat was not only economic and social. The immigrants were seen increasingly as undermining national identity with their alien customs, languages, and religions.” (180) ○ “European immigration had changed. Whereas earlier immigrants had come from southern or eastern Europe and differed only slightly from their new hosts (with the notable and significant exception of Jews from eastern Europe in the 1880s and the 1930s), the new immigrants came from former colonial territories: North and subSaharan Africa, the Caribbean, India, Pakistan, and Turkey. And whereas earlier immigrants (some Jews again excepted) had tended to assimilate quickly and disappear, the new immigrants often clung to visibly different customs and religions. Europeans had to learn to coexist with permanent African, Indian, and Islamic communities that flaunted their separate identities.” (180) Roger Griffen - Chapter 10 “Fascism and Us” Roger Griffin, Fascism, 91-125 ● On page 96, David Goodhart discusses how his theory of “Somewheres’ and Anywheres’ goes on to say that populism is not fascist longing for an ultra-nation, but anomie. But a vague feeling of existential threat, identity issues, and an imaginary somewhere.” Do we agree with this or not? ● Why does neo-fascism postwar gain hold in subcultures? ● What impact has the internet had on neo-fascism? ● With so much usage of the word fascism, why hasn’t there been more attention given to the neofascist groups? ● Why has neo-fascism become a force in which groups/movements can come about, die out, and be replaced almost immediately? 3 Umberto Eco - Chapter 1 “Ur-Fascism” Umberto Eco, “Ur-Fascism,” 1-29 ● What is “Ur-Fascism” as argued by Eco? ○ How does this new definition of fascism work with those developed by Passmore, Paxton, and other scholars thus far in this course? ● “Some days later I saw the first American soldiers. They were African-Americans. The first Yankee I met was a black man, Joseph …” (2) ● “The Liberation was a common undertaking achieved by people of different colours.” (5) ○ How does the portrayal of an African American man liberating a fascist state relate to fascism? ○ How could this have impacted the author with a person of color liberating him? ○ What are the differences between Italian fascism and Nazism in race discourse? Eco’s 14 Common Feature’s of Fascism: 1. “Cult of tradition” (16-18) 2. “Traditionalism implies the rejection of modernism” (18-19) 3. “Irrationalism also depends on the cult of action for action’s sake” (19) 4. “No form of syncretism can accept criticism.” (19-20 5. “Dissent is moreover a sign of diversity.” (20) 6. “Ur-Fascism springs from individual or social frustration.” (20) 7. “To those with no social identity at all …” (20-21) 8. “The disciples must feel humiliated by the enemy’s vaunted wealth and power.” (21-22) 9. “For Ur-Fascism there is no struggle for life but, rather, a ‘life for struggle.’” (22) 10. “Elitism is a typical aspect of all areactionary ideologies, insofar as it is basically aristocratic.” (22-23) 11. “From this point of view, everyone is trained to become a hero.” (23-24) 12. “Since both permanent war and herosim are difficult games to play, the Ur-Fascist transfers his will to power onto sexual questions.” (24) 13. “Ur-Fascism is based on ‘qualitative populism.’” (24-26) 14. “Fascism uses newspeak.” (26) ● What is Ur-Fascism or ‘eternal facsim’ and what are the charateristics of it as argued by Eco? ● How do these characteristics work with our definitions and understandings of fascism thus far? Concluding Questions ● Are far-right movements fascist, populist, or something else? ● Do attempts to define fascism by scholars/political science/survivors/etc. Make it easier or more complicated to identify fascism in the past/today? 4 ● How do different characteristics/definitions of fascism build or contradict one another from this course? What commonalities can be seen across time and regions? ● What are the impacts/dangerous potentials of fascism being conflated (as some authors would argue) with populism/far-right/political movements today? 5