Submitted by BernieSanders moderator in Fascism (edited )

This Submission has been created with an attempt to educate and inform. People should not be ignorant in the differences between Nazism and Fascism.

Fascism:

Fascism is a form of authoritarian nationalism, which believes in total mobilisation of society under a single party state. Fascism views political violence, war, and imperialism as means that can achieve national rejuvenation and aims to promote a masculine, martial culture.

Classical Fascism promotes a corporatist economic system, where employer and employee associations are linked in the interest of the nation but actions such as strikes are illegal. Fascism tended to favor big industry and state investment in capitalist buisness.

Fascism is very traditionalist, promoting moral hygiene and national tradition.

National Socialism (Nazism):

National socialism is the form of Fascism adopted by Nazi Germany. National socialism extols the virtues of a single race (historically the Aryan race) over all other races, and sees the expansion of that race's control as the most effective way to combat their racial enemies (historically the jews).

Like Fascism, National Socialism puts the authoritarian state above all else, but adds state-run Eugenics programs to ensure racial purity.

National Socialism is commonly referred to as right-wing due to these social characteristics, but economically national socialism favored neither the Socialist struggle for class equality nor free market capitalism, with mercantilism in the service of the state preferred.

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freedomforall wrote

Fascism is a form of authoritarian nationalism

Although fascism can manifest itself in the form of authoritarianism and nationalism, in its essence, it has a more abstract definition. As this video suggests, fasci- comes from "fascio", meaning "group" in Italian, which comes from "fascis", which literally means "bundle" (of sticks) in Latin. In its essence, fascism is just the idea that the benefit of the group is more important than the benefit of the individual, and it takes on the symbolism that a bundle of sticks is more resistant to breaking than a lone stick.

I believe that in this sense, it is very similar to communism. However, fascist regimes also have a strong tendency to separate "they" and "us", and this, in turn, lends itself to nationalism. The authoritarian part is the manifestation of the benefit of the group over the benefit of the individual, where individuals may cause harm to others if not controlled.

So, in summary, fascism does commonly manifest itself in the form of nationalist authoritarianism, but it is not part of the definition.

Fascism views political violence, war, and imperialism as means that can achieve national rejuvenation

While it is true that under fascist views, these are valid means to achieve the ends of national rejuvenation, I don't think that they're included in the definition either. In practice, however, it is true that nationalism lends itself to a view of "we" above "others" and in this view, the "we" is human and the "other" is simply a foreigner with potential. While inter-nation relationships can be promoted, they are also not necessary, as fascism is very flexible. In WWII, we saw that Germany became allied with other fascist states out of convenience and conquered other states as a means to achieve their goals. So yes: violence, war and imperialism are valid tools under fascism, but their role in the strict definition is debatable.

aims to promote a masculine, martial culture.

Although under fascism, the role of each gender is indeed different due to the perceived duties of the individuals in the greater working of things, I think that calling it a "masculine" culture is a tiny bit of an overreach. I do concede that military force has a much greater priority under fascist regimes, but the pursuit of a masculine society might not be as prevalent today due to the social progress that has been seen around the world in the last few decades. I am open to debate on this point.

On all other points, I do agree with your text.

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