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In a recent article, an author uses a definition of fascism developed by the writer and retired businessman, Laurence Britt. To develop his theory, Britt compared the regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Salazar, George Papadopoulos and Suharto, all of which he deemed fascist. Can we now accept this new definition and change this article to reflect its findings? Please discuss at WP:RSN#Proud Boys. Note that while the source is used to label the Proud Boys as fascist, it could also be used as a source for other articles if it is deemed reliable. TFD ( talk) 23:23, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
It comes under Appropriate notification: "An editor who may wish to draw a wider range of informed, but uninvolved, editors to a discussion can place a message at any of the following: The talk page of one or more directly related articles." I also mentioned at RSN that I would ask for input in talk pages. Specifically, inappropriate canvassing is appealing to editors who share one's views, not editors who have a general interest in the topic. Obviously the editors of this article would have a better understanding of the definition of fascism but do not necessary share the same views about it. The discussion is not about whether by this definition the Proud Boys are fascist but whether they are fascist period. It assumes that the definition in the source is the correct one because it is a reliable source. And of course if that is the correct definition of fascism, it can affect other articles. TFD ( talk) 00:28, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
If you'd like to withdraw your comments, please feel free to strike them through. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 22:52, 25 November 2020 (UTC)Editing own comments
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At first glance, fascism's non-economic policies may seem to resemble those of communism. Both involve a large amount of governmental intervention into citizens' everyday lives. Both involve authoritarianism, totalitarianism, and extreme nationalism as well as dictatorial rule. Both involve government propaganda. But there are two main differences. The first is the economy. In communism, there is extreme egalitarianism, while in fascism, this is not present. In addition, there is an important difference that pertains to the government itself. In communism, a dictator takes power and establishes the communist society, making everything government-owned. On the other hand, fascism is, at its core, anarchy. The private companies of the country essentially make up the government. So the "government" that has totalitarian and dictatorial power and intervenes at will is actually private companies. "Private" doesn't exist in the communist dictionary. I hope this clears things up at least partially. Mrytzkalmyr ( talk) 01:27, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
So far, all countries which have been deemed “fascist” have all been socialist. Russia, Cuba, Italy (WW II era), etc. Said countries have all been staunchly anti-religion, a key pillar of the right wing. Even here in the USA, fascism and communism has strongly related.
There are a number of quotes making this association, including one from the President. Wiki’s page on McCarthyism:
Following the First Red Scare, President Harry S. Truman signed an executive order in 1947 to screen federal employees for association with organizations deemed "totalitarian, fascist, communist, or subversive", or advocating "to alter the form of Government of the United States by unconstitutional means.‘
The conclusion reached by the article is not consistent with the long-term, widespread application of the term. States with official state religions and adherence to religious law (ie. Sharia) are more consistent with is considered “right-wing”. Opie8 ( talk) 05:59, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
I'm not a right-winger. In fact, I'm further left than most left-wingers. That said, I still understand when things are and are not neutral in point-of-view.
Consider that these two lines exist in this article, separated by two paragraphs.
1) Since the end of World War II in 1945, few parties have openly described themselves as fascist, and the term is instead now usually used pejoratively by political opponents.
2) Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism[1][2]
Does this pass the intellectual smell-test?
Given that it *is* a pejorative, and there is, was, and always be some controversy over it (I'm sure both parties have traits of it), it's the only Wiki article I believe I've personally seen which makes no mention of the associated controversy. Wikipedia generally disallows pejoratives to be used in this manner, and the fact that they are allowing this is something that many people will find shocking on both sides of the spectrum. Especially given that there is no factual definition of there term, and its primary use in the United States *is* a pejorative. While those who agree with what is written may find it to be factual, this is all the more reason to apply a higher level of scrutiny to the article. A topic like this lends itself to bias very easily, and I think this is a textbook case of what such a scenario looks like. Were we to be completely fair, I think we would all concede that there aren't a lot of right-wing folks who have a significant amount of editorial control at Wikipedia. This leads certain points of view to be amplified through the echo chamber. Given that no contrary points of view were sought (and they do exist), I think this article falls short of Wikipedia's usual standards. Opie8 ( talk) 06:40, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
The opening sentence states that fascism is characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition and strong regimentation of society and of the economy, but that could also be said of Stalinism too, so it is kind of useless. I would have thought a better definition would be Roger Griffin's – that fascism is "a revolutionary form of ultra-nationalism that attempts to realize the myth of the regenerated nation" and is characterised by a revolutionary agenda; a "populist" drive towards mobilizing the energies of members of the national community; and an organic concept of the nation. Comments? -- Nug ( talk) 11:59, 9 January 2021 (UTC)
I would like to recommend changing the lead and provide a suggestion below. I would welcome any comments.
TFD ( talk) 17:28, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
-- Mvbaron ( talk) 19:30, 12 January 2021 (UTC)Fascism is a right-wing ideology and movement, which originally emerged in Italy following the 1914-1918 world war and eventually came to prominence in numerous other countries.
Sometimes well known facts are wrong. While seating along ideological lines came into being in 1789, the terms left, right and center did not come to be used for ideological positions until the early 20th century. (See Gauchet, Marcel. "Right and Left". In Pierre Nora, Lawrence D. Kritzman (Eds.), Realms of memory: conflicts and divisions. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997.) [3] That's why Marx (d.1883) and Engels (d. 1895) did not use the terms, while Lenin and Stalin used the terms in the 1920s. Meanwhile it did not enter common use in the UK until the Spanish Civil War. (Charles Loch Mowat, Britain Between the Wars: 1918–1940 (1955) p. 577.) You can see the increase in usage from 1800 to 2019. [4] I have plotted it against the terms conservative, fascist and far right.
I would be interested if you could provide any examples of the use of the terms left-wing and right-wing in English in the mid-1800s. There is the example of David Strauss in 1837 coining the terms left, right and center Hegelian, but other than that I cannot find anything.
I note that your source is writing about contemporary politics, hence it mentions neo-Nazis but not Nazis. It's provided as an explanation of why the French New Right, formed in the 1960s, is considered far right.
In any case whether we call fascism right-wing or far right isn't crucial to the changes I suggested.
TFD ( talk) 12:20, 14 January 2021 (UTC)
Has anyone discussed the etymology section, whether or not it needs to be changed? We rather directly state that "fascism" was coined from "fasces". However, Merriam-Webster and Etymonline say there is not a direct correlation between coining "fascism", and "fasces", and perhaps there is some influence, but that "fascism" is formed from "fascio" (meaning "group, association," literally "bundle"). Read into their explanations, it seems to make sense. ɱ (talk) 14:32, 14 January 2021 (UTC)
From "Alice Yaeger Kaplan, Russell Berman. Fascism: Etymologies and Political Usage. In: Reproductions of Banality : Fascism, Literature, and French Intellectual Life. Theory and History of Literature. University of Minnesota Press; 1986.":
Fasces—Latin. Rods or branches wrapped around an ax. Carried by Latin "lie- tors" (executioners) as a show of power. By extension: (1) to cede the fasces, to acknowledge authority; (2) an assembly or crowd.
Citing Sicilian gangs such as the fasci del Lavoratore and fasci Siciliani, the Oxford English Dictionary (Supplement) and Encyclopedia Britannica mark the reemergence of a political connotation for fasces in the 1890s. An obscure French gangster-aristocrat named the Marquis de Mores may have had some knowledge of these groups when, in 1894, he published his "doctrine du faisceau," an anti-Semitic populism that moved him to organize racist leagues in the Paris suburb of La Villette. It is in France, then, that a "faisceau" bound by racism is first organized. (...)
However, the first well-known twentieth-century groups to use the name were Italian interventionists (fasci interventista rivoluzionario, fasci d'azione internazionalista, and so on) organized in 1914 in support of Italy's entrance into World War I. Again, at the level of received ideas, the first modern fascist movement was undoubtedly the Italian one. Mussolini's fasci di combattimento, founded in 1919 as a splinter group of the Italian Socialist party, was established in power in 1922 with the Roman fasces (fascio, in Italian) as its symbol. [1]: xxvii
They only reference 'fasces', and make no mention of 'fascio', it's less clear than I wish though... But in the end, it's perhaps splitting hairs. The info from the quote I just posed might be worth to include anyways. -- Mvbaron ( talk) 10:08, 15 January 2021 (UTC)
References
It seems to me that Paxton gives a sufficiently clear explanation in The Anatomy of Fascism (p.4):
- The word fascism has its root in the Italian fascio, literally a bundle or sheaf. More remotely, the word recalled the Latin fasces, an axe encased in a bundle of rods that was carried before the magistrates in Roman public processions to signify the authority and unity of the state. Before 1914, the symbolism of the Roman fasces was usually appropriated by the Left. Marianne, symbol of the French Republic, was often portrayed in the nineteenth century carrying the fasces to represent the force of Republican solidarity against her aristocratic and clerical enemies. Fasces are prominently displayed on Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theater (1664–69) at Oxford University. They appeared on the Lincoln Memorial in Washington (1922) and on the United States quarter minted in 1932.
- Italian revolutionaries used the term fascio in the late nineteenth century to evoke the solidarity of committed militants. The peasants who rose against their landlords in Sicily in 1893–94 called themselves the Fasci Siciliani. When in late 1914 a group of left-wing nationalists, soon joined by the socialist outcast Benito Mussolini, sought to bring Italy into World War I on the Allied side, they chose a name designed to communicate both the fervor and the solidarity of their campaign: the Fascio Rivoluzionario d’Azione Interventista (Revolutionary League for Interventionist Action). At the end of World War I, Mussolini coined the term fascismo to describe the mood of the little band of nationalist ex-soldiers and pro-war syndicalist revolutionaries that he was gathering around himself. Even then, he had no monopoly on the word fascio, which remained in general use for activist groups of various political hues.
So the ancient Roman connotation was absolutely present, but the much more immediate denotation of fascio as a group or band of people committed to a common purpose is also very important for understanding why Mussolini chose the name fascism for his movement. Generalrelative ( talk) 18:46, 9 February 2021 (UTC)
I know that this has come up before, and that the discussion is likely to be controversial, but I believe the time has come for a source-based conversation on whether and how to discuss the growing number of scholarly commentators (including noted experts on fascism), who have compared Trumpism to fascism in one way or another. Instead of WP:BOLDly adding the text, I'll present it here for comment first, though note that this text is live over at Fascism in North America where a skeleton text on Trump already existed (to which I added more refs and discussion):
Note too that this topic is discussed in the article Trumpism but in a rather scattershot way. Thoughts? Generalrelative ( talk) 04:24, 8 February 2021 (UTC)
References
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The intention is to provoke a discussion that could be an Aufhebung of the 'is Trumpism fascism?' debate: what can and what can we not understand by thinking in comparisons with the past?
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anti-Communistwhose opposition to Trump is in any way
interestingor would require explanation by crude logic like
Russia bad, therefore Trump bad. Many people who care about the rule of law and democratic norms have been concerned about the danger Trump poses since he launched his presidential campaign in 2015.
personal feudbut there is evidently a personal dimension to it.
trivializes or even justifies the Holocaustis an almost tragic inversion of reality.
This [postfascism?] is a political formation with a mythical notion of the truth. Like the fascists, populists replace historical truth with fake ideas about a glorious past that their leaders promise to revive.- and now confusingly talks about "populists" instead of fascists. Finchelstein then asks:
Will the rise of leaders like Bolsonaro, Trump, and Orban lead to a twenty-first-century fascism? (...) It is probably (...) unlikely. Mvbaron ( talk) 11:00, 11 February 2021 (UTC)
Finchelstein presents his views in greater detail in From Fascism to Populism in History ("Fascism Returns," pp. 7-9, and "Trumpism in History," pp. 9-14). Enzo Traverso defines the concept of post-fascism in an interview published in Jacobin: "On the one hand, the new far right is no longer fascist; on the other hand, we cannot define it without comparing it with fascism. The new right is a hybrid thing that might return to fascism, or it could turn into a new form of conservative, authoritarian, populist democracy. The concept of post-fascism tries to capture this." [16]
There is a serious question however to what extent mainstream U.S. politics can be compared with European politics. Are racism, conspiracism and authoritarianism something that the U.S. imported from Italy and Germany, or do they have their roots in U.S. history? Maybe the right-wing populists in Europe are copying America and not vice versa.
TFD ( talk) 14:52, 11 February 2021 (UTC)
Mussolini received funding both from Italy (not only Ansaldo, but also -among others - it:Giuseppe Toeplitz, the president of the Banca Commerciale) and from abroad (especially from England, which was interested in Italy entering the war on the side of the Entente). Renzo De Felice devotes several pages to this subject in the first volume of his biography of Mussolini ("Il Rivoluzionario"). Alex2006 ( talk) 18:35, 25 June 2021 (UTC)
The possibility of adding "oh shut up about fascism being left wing" to the WP:EDITNOTICE at Template:Editnotices/Page/Fascism has been brought up. Is this a good idea? A bad idea? Against policy? The very purpose of edit notices? --jpgordon 𝄢𝄆𝄐𝄇 18:39, 26 June 2021 (UTC)
So Cdjp1 added content from the now deleted Left-wing fascism article per the dicussion at the AFD. Beyond My Ken reverted it giving a non-reason here. I restored citing the discussion at the AFD and that is has RS backing. Then Black Kite & MjolnirPants stumbled over each other trying to revert. BK citing BRD while ignoring the AFD discussion and Mr. Pants disliking the one source. So how should we add this back in? PackMecEng ( talk) 23:43, 4 July 2021 (UTC)
PackMecEng, your edit begins, " Victor Klemperer described what he saw as similarities between Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic as examples of the GDR's "left-wing fascism." It is sourced to his book, The Lesser Evil: The Diaries of Victor Klemperer, 1945–1959, although no page number is given. I could not find the quote in the book. You are adding text to this article without reading the sources first because of your personal ideology, which is not the way to create a neutral article. Had you even heard of Klemperer before you added the quote? TFD ( talk) 02:34, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
he said that because Peronism had working class support, that it was left-wing.Pretty much, though he's not as definitive about it. What's notable is that the way he does that is by using that working class support to contrast Peronism and Fascism. That section consists of 1-2 paragraphs describing Peronism, 2-3 paragraphs comparing it to Fascism while acknowledging that it's frequently considered a type of fascism, and then multiple paragraphs contrasting it with Fascism and comparing other South American Authoritarian regimes to it. He never outright states that Peronism is not Fascism, but he very clearly doesn't believe it is (he makes it clear that South American Authoritarianism shares features with European Totalitarianism, but only writes about the former as distinct from the latter). His conclusion states "If Peronism is considered a variant of fascism, then it is a fascism of the left because it is based on the social strata who would otherwise turn to socialism or Communism as an outlet for their frustrations," which (in the context) very strongly implies that he finds it somewhat nonsensical to consider Peronism to be a variant of fascism.
Fascism with a lower middle class base was centrist, while fascism with aristocratic and grand bourgeois support was right-wing.Replace "Fascism" with "Authoritarianism" in your sentence, and I think that would be exactly right. It's partially correct as is, as he considers the roots of Fascism to be in social strata, not political ideology, but when, on those rare occasions on which he directly addresses the left-right political spectrum, he never wavers in claiming or implying that Fascism is right-wing.
Lipset argues in Political Man that Fascism is an expression of extremism of the conservative middle class, rather than the extreme right, whose extremism he considers to be Totalitarianism, and contrasts this both with leftist views like Socialism and Communism -which he considers to be the extremism of the working class and poor- and the Monarchism which he considers the most radical ideology of the bourgeoise and upper class.
Incidentally, there is an interesting article in NBC NEWS by Noah Berlatsky,That's a very interesting article. I'm not sure if it warrants inclusion here or over at Fascism (insult), but it's still a damn good read and I appreciate the link. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:20, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
Comment on content., not users, this is not History Today. Slatersteven ( talk) 12:40, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I find this interesting seeing as in Mussolini's own biography he refers to Fascism as 'The True Left'. I, personally, do not believe that far-right as a designation works for Fascism. It was unique. It [Italian Fascism] was economically far-left and socially far-right. There are very few economists alive who would refer to the Fascist and National Socialist economies as 'conservative'. Maximum70 ( talk) 18:34, 23 September 2021 (UTC)
The formatting of the references in this article is a bit of a hodge-podge: about 2/3 non-templated list-defined references, many unused references that have been commented out, numerous list-defined references using CS1 templates, a handful of inline templated references, and one lonely short footnote (which is inevitably throwing a multiple-target error).
Given that most of the references are to pages within books, and hence there are many repeatedly-cited sources, I would suggest one of the two following changes:
I'm happy to do the work of making either of those changes, but would personally prefer option 1 (I find the little superscript numbers that {{ rp}} produces make the article look messy and break up the citations, and LDRs make my head hurt).
Thoughts? Wham2001 ( talk) 06:34, 26 August 2021 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 50 | Archive 51 | Archive 52 | Archive 53 | Archive 54 | Archive 55 |
In a recent article, an author uses a definition of fascism developed by the writer and retired businessman, Laurence Britt. To develop his theory, Britt compared the regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Salazar, George Papadopoulos and Suharto, all of which he deemed fascist. Can we now accept this new definition and change this article to reflect its findings? Please discuss at WP:RSN#Proud Boys. Note that while the source is used to label the Proud Boys as fascist, it could also be used as a source for other articles if it is deemed reliable. TFD ( talk) 23:23, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
It comes under Appropriate notification: "An editor who may wish to draw a wider range of informed, but uninvolved, editors to a discussion can place a message at any of the following: The talk page of one or more directly related articles." I also mentioned at RSN that I would ask for input in talk pages. Specifically, inappropriate canvassing is appealing to editors who share one's views, not editors who have a general interest in the topic. Obviously the editors of this article would have a better understanding of the definition of fascism but do not necessary share the same views about it. The discussion is not about whether by this definition the Proud Boys are fascist but whether they are fascist period. It assumes that the definition in the source is the correct one because it is a reliable source. And of course if that is the correct definition of fascism, it can affect other articles. TFD ( talk) 00:28, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
If you'd like to withdraw your comments, please feel free to strike them through. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 22:52, 25 November 2020 (UTC)Editing own comments
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At first glance, fascism's non-economic policies may seem to resemble those of communism. Both involve a large amount of governmental intervention into citizens' everyday lives. Both involve authoritarianism, totalitarianism, and extreme nationalism as well as dictatorial rule. Both involve government propaganda. But there are two main differences. The first is the economy. In communism, there is extreme egalitarianism, while in fascism, this is not present. In addition, there is an important difference that pertains to the government itself. In communism, a dictator takes power and establishes the communist society, making everything government-owned. On the other hand, fascism is, at its core, anarchy. The private companies of the country essentially make up the government. So the "government" that has totalitarian and dictatorial power and intervenes at will is actually private companies. "Private" doesn't exist in the communist dictionary. I hope this clears things up at least partially. Mrytzkalmyr ( talk) 01:27, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
So far, all countries which have been deemed “fascist” have all been socialist. Russia, Cuba, Italy (WW II era), etc. Said countries have all been staunchly anti-religion, a key pillar of the right wing. Even here in the USA, fascism and communism has strongly related.
There are a number of quotes making this association, including one from the President. Wiki’s page on McCarthyism:
Following the First Red Scare, President Harry S. Truman signed an executive order in 1947 to screen federal employees for association with organizations deemed "totalitarian, fascist, communist, or subversive", or advocating "to alter the form of Government of the United States by unconstitutional means.‘
The conclusion reached by the article is not consistent with the long-term, widespread application of the term. States with official state religions and adherence to religious law (ie. Sharia) are more consistent with is considered “right-wing”. Opie8 ( talk) 05:59, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
I'm not a right-winger. In fact, I'm further left than most left-wingers. That said, I still understand when things are and are not neutral in point-of-view.
Consider that these two lines exist in this article, separated by two paragraphs.
1) Since the end of World War II in 1945, few parties have openly described themselves as fascist, and the term is instead now usually used pejoratively by political opponents.
2) Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism[1][2]
Does this pass the intellectual smell-test?
Given that it *is* a pejorative, and there is, was, and always be some controversy over it (I'm sure both parties have traits of it), it's the only Wiki article I believe I've personally seen which makes no mention of the associated controversy. Wikipedia generally disallows pejoratives to be used in this manner, and the fact that they are allowing this is something that many people will find shocking on both sides of the spectrum. Especially given that there is no factual definition of there term, and its primary use in the United States *is* a pejorative. While those who agree with what is written may find it to be factual, this is all the more reason to apply a higher level of scrutiny to the article. A topic like this lends itself to bias very easily, and I think this is a textbook case of what such a scenario looks like. Were we to be completely fair, I think we would all concede that there aren't a lot of right-wing folks who have a significant amount of editorial control at Wikipedia. This leads certain points of view to be amplified through the echo chamber. Given that no contrary points of view were sought (and they do exist), I think this article falls short of Wikipedia's usual standards. Opie8 ( talk) 06:40, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
The opening sentence states that fascism is characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition and strong regimentation of society and of the economy, but that could also be said of Stalinism too, so it is kind of useless. I would have thought a better definition would be Roger Griffin's – that fascism is "a revolutionary form of ultra-nationalism that attempts to realize the myth of the regenerated nation" and is characterised by a revolutionary agenda; a "populist" drive towards mobilizing the energies of members of the national community; and an organic concept of the nation. Comments? -- Nug ( talk) 11:59, 9 January 2021 (UTC)
I would like to recommend changing the lead and provide a suggestion below. I would welcome any comments.
TFD ( talk) 17:28, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
-- Mvbaron ( talk) 19:30, 12 January 2021 (UTC)Fascism is a right-wing ideology and movement, which originally emerged in Italy following the 1914-1918 world war and eventually came to prominence in numerous other countries.
Sometimes well known facts are wrong. While seating along ideological lines came into being in 1789, the terms left, right and center did not come to be used for ideological positions until the early 20th century. (See Gauchet, Marcel. "Right and Left". In Pierre Nora, Lawrence D. Kritzman (Eds.), Realms of memory: conflicts and divisions. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997.) [3] That's why Marx (d.1883) and Engels (d. 1895) did not use the terms, while Lenin and Stalin used the terms in the 1920s. Meanwhile it did not enter common use in the UK until the Spanish Civil War. (Charles Loch Mowat, Britain Between the Wars: 1918–1940 (1955) p. 577.) You can see the increase in usage from 1800 to 2019. [4] I have plotted it against the terms conservative, fascist and far right.
I would be interested if you could provide any examples of the use of the terms left-wing and right-wing in English in the mid-1800s. There is the example of David Strauss in 1837 coining the terms left, right and center Hegelian, but other than that I cannot find anything.
I note that your source is writing about contemporary politics, hence it mentions neo-Nazis but not Nazis. It's provided as an explanation of why the French New Right, formed in the 1960s, is considered far right.
In any case whether we call fascism right-wing or far right isn't crucial to the changes I suggested.
TFD ( talk) 12:20, 14 January 2021 (UTC)
Has anyone discussed the etymology section, whether or not it needs to be changed? We rather directly state that "fascism" was coined from "fasces". However, Merriam-Webster and Etymonline say there is not a direct correlation between coining "fascism", and "fasces", and perhaps there is some influence, but that "fascism" is formed from "fascio" (meaning "group, association," literally "bundle"). Read into their explanations, it seems to make sense. ɱ (talk) 14:32, 14 January 2021 (UTC)
From "Alice Yaeger Kaplan, Russell Berman. Fascism: Etymologies and Political Usage. In: Reproductions of Banality : Fascism, Literature, and French Intellectual Life. Theory and History of Literature. University of Minnesota Press; 1986.":
Fasces—Latin. Rods or branches wrapped around an ax. Carried by Latin "lie- tors" (executioners) as a show of power. By extension: (1) to cede the fasces, to acknowledge authority; (2) an assembly or crowd.
Citing Sicilian gangs such as the fasci del Lavoratore and fasci Siciliani, the Oxford English Dictionary (Supplement) and Encyclopedia Britannica mark the reemergence of a political connotation for fasces in the 1890s. An obscure French gangster-aristocrat named the Marquis de Mores may have had some knowledge of these groups when, in 1894, he published his "doctrine du faisceau," an anti-Semitic populism that moved him to organize racist leagues in the Paris suburb of La Villette. It is in France, then, that a "faisceau" bound by racism is first organized. (...)
However, the first well-known twentieth-century groups to use the name were Italian interventionists (fasci interventista rivoluzionario, fasci d'azione internazionalista, and so on) organized in 1914 in support of Italy's entrance into World War I. Again, at the level of received ideas, the first modern fascist movement was undoubtedly the Italian one. Mussolini's fasci di combattimento, founded in 1919 as a splinter group of the Italian Socialist party, was established in power in 1922 with the Roman fasces (fascio, in Italian) as its symbol. [1]: xxvii
They only reference 'fasces', and make no mention of 'fascio', it's less clear than I wish though... But in the end, it's perhaps splitting hairs. The info from the quote I just posed might be worth to include anyways. -- Mvbaron ( talk) 10:08, 15 January 2021 (UTC)
References
It seems to me that Paxton gives a sufficiently clear explanation in The Anatomy of Fascism (p.4):
- The word fascism has its root in the Italian fascio, literally a bundle or sheaf. More remotely, the word recalled the Latin fasces, an axe encased in a bundle of rods that was carried before the magistrates in Roman public processions to signify the authority and unity of the state. Before 1914, the symbolism of the Roman fasces was usually appropriated by the Left. Marianne, symbol of the French Republic, was often portrayed in the nineteenth century carrying the fasces to represent the force of Republican solidarity against her aristocratic and clerical enemies. Fasces are prominently displayed on Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theater (1664–69) at Oxford University. They appeared on the Lincoln Memorial in Washington (1922) and on the United States quarter minted in 1932.
- Italian revolutionaries used the term fascio in the late nineteenth century to evoke the solidarity of committed militants. The peasants who rose against their landlords in Sicily in 1893–94 called themselves the Fasci Siciliani. When in late 1914 a group of left-wing nationalists, soon joined by the socialist outcast Benito Mussolini, sought to bring Italy into World War I on the Allied side, they chose a name designed to communicate both the fervor and the solidarity of their campaign: the Fascio Rivoluzionario d’Azione Interventista (Revolutionary League for Interventionist Action). At the end of World War I, Mussolini coined the term fascismo to describe the mood of the little band of nationalist ex-soldiers and pro-war syndicalist revolutionaries that he was gathering around himself. Even then, he had no monopoly on the word fascio, which remained in general use for activist groups of various political hues.
So the ancient Roman connotation was absolutely present, but the much more immediate denotation of fascio as a group or band of people committed to a common purpose is also very important for understanding why Mussolini chose the name fascism for his movement. Generalrelative ( talk) 18:46, 9 February 2021 (UTC)
I know that this has come up before, and that the discussion is likely to be controversial, but I believe the time has come for a source-based conversation on whether and how to discuss the growing number of scholarly commentators (including noted experts on fascism), who have compared Trumpism to fascism in one way or another. Instead of WP:BOLDly adding the text, I'll present it here for comment first, though note that this text is live over at Fascism in North America where a skeleton text on Trump already existed (to which I added more refs and discussion):
Note too that this topic is discussed in the article Trumpism but in a rather scattershot way. Thoughts? Generalrelative ( talk) 04:24, 8 February 2021 (UTC)
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The intention is to provoke a discussion that could be an Aufhebung of the 'is Trumpism fascism?' debate: what can and what can we not understand by thinking in comparisons with the past?
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anti-Communistwhose opposition to Trump is in any way
interestingor would require explanation by crude logic like
Russia bad, therefore Trump bad. Many people who care about the rule of law and democratic norms have been concerned about the danger Trump poses since he launched his presidential campaign in 2015.
personal feudbut there is evidently a personal dimension to it.
trivializes or even justifies the Holocaustis an almost tragic inversion of reality.
This [postfascism?] is a political formation with a mythical notion of the truth. Like the fascists, populists replace historical truth with fake ideas about a glorious past that their leaders promise to revive.- and now confusingly talks about "populists" instead of fascists. Finchelstein then asks:
Will the rise of leaders like Bolsonaro, Trump, and Orban lead to a twenty-first-century fascism? (...) It is probably (...) unlikely. Mvbaron ( talk) 11:00, 11 February 2021 (UTC)
Finchelstein presents his views in greater detail in From Fascism to Populism in History ("Fascism Returns," pp. 7-9, and "Trumpism in History," pp. 9-14). Enzo Traverso defines the concept of post-fascism in an interview published in Jacobin: "On the one hand, the new far right is no longer fascist; on the other hand, we cannot define it without comparing it with fascism. The new right is a hybrid thing that might return to fascism, or it could turn into a new form of conservative, authoritarian, populist democracy. The concept of post-fascism tries to capture this." [16]
There is a serious question however to what extent mainstream U.S. politics can be compared with European politics. Are racism, conspiracism and authoritarianism something that the U.S. imported from Italy and Germany, or do they have their roots in U.S. history? Maybe the right-wing populists in Europe are copying America and not vice versa.
TFD ( talk) 14:52, 11 February 2021 (UTC)
Mussolini received funding both from Italy (not only Ansaldo, but also -among others - it:Giuseppe Toeplitz, the president of the Banca Commerciale) and from abroad (especially from England, which was interested in Italy entering the war on the side of the Entente). Renzo De Felice devotes several pages to this subject in the first volume of his biography of Mussolini ("Il Rivoluzionario"). Alex2006 ( talk) 18:35, 25 June 2021 (UTC)
The possibility of adding "oh shut up about fascism being left wing" to the WP:EDITNOTICE at Template:Editnotices/Page/Fascism has been brought up. Is this a good idea? A bad idea? Against policy? The very purpose of edit notices? --jpgordon 𝄢𝄆𝄐𝄇 18:39, 26 June 2021 (UTC)
So Cdjp1 added content from the now deleted Left-wing fascism article per the dicussion at the AFD. Beyond My Ken reverted it giving a non-reason here. I restored citing the discussion at the AFD and that is has RS backing. Then Black Kite & MjolnirPants stumbled over each other trying to revert. BK citing BRD while ignoring the AFD discussion and Mr. Pants disliking the one source. So how should we add this back in? PackMecEng ( talk) 23:43, 4 July 2021 (UTC)
PackMecEng, your edit begins, " Victor Klemperer described what he saw as similarities between Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic as examples of the GDR's "left-wing fascism." It is sourced to his book, The Lesser Evil: The Diaries of Victor Klemperer, 1945–1959, although no page number is given. I could not find the quote in the book. You are adding text to this article without reading the sources first because of your personal ideology, which is not the way to create a neutral article. Had you even heard of Klemperer before you added the quote? TFD ( talk) 02:34, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
he said that because Peronism had working class support, that it was left-wing.Pretty much, though he's not as definitive about it. What's notable is that the way he does that is by using that working class support to contrast Peronism and Fascism. That section consists of 1-2 paragraphs describing Peronism, 2-3 paragraphs comparing it to Fascism while acknowledging that it's frequently considered a type of fascism, and then multiple paragraphs contrasting it with Fascism and comparing other South American Authoritarian regimes to it. He never outright states that Peronism is not Fascism, but he very clearly doesn't believe it is (he makes it clear that South American Authoritarianism shares features with European Totalitarianism, but only writes about the former as distinct from the latter). His conclusion states "If Peronism is considered a variant of fascism, then it is a fascism of the left because it is based on the social strata who would otherwise turn to socialism or Communism as an outlet for their frustrations," which (in the context) very strongly implies that he finds it somewhat nonsensical to consider Peronism to be a variant of fascism.
Fascism with a lower middle class base was centrist, while fascism with aristocratic and grand bourgeois support was right-wing.Replace "Fascism" with "Authoritarianism" in your sentence, and I think that would be exactly right. It's partially correct as is, as he considers the roots of Fascism to be in social strata, not political ideology, but when, on those rare occasions on which he directly addresses the left-right political spectrum, he never wavers in claiming or implying that Fascism is right-wing.
Lipset argues in Political Man that Fascism is an expression of extremism of the conservative middle class, rather than the extreme right, whose extremism he considers to be Totalitarianism, and contrasts this both with leftist views like Socialism and Communism -which he considers to be the extremism of the working class and poor- and the Monarchism which he considers the most radical ideology of the bourgeoise and upper class.
Incidentally, there is an interesting article in NBC NEWS by Noah Berlatsky,That's a very interesting article. I'm not sure if it warrants inclusion here or over at Fascism (insult), but it's still a damn good read and I appreciate the link. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:20, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
Comment on content., not users, this is not History Today. Slatersteven ( talk) 12:40, 8 July 2021 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I find this interesting seeing as in Mussolini's own biography he refers to Fascism as 'The True Left'. I, personally, do not believe that far-right as a designation works for Fascism. It was unique. It [Italian Fascism] was economically far-left and socially far-right. There are very few economists alive who would refer to the Fascist and National Socialist economies as 'conservative'. Maximum70 ( talk) 18:34, 23 September 2021 (UTC)
The formatting of the references in this article is a bit of a hodge-podge: about 2/3 non-templated list-defined references, many unused references that have been commented out, numerous list-defined references using CS1 templates, a handful of inline templated references, and one lonely short footnote (which is inevitably throwing a multiple-target error).
Given that most of the references are to pages within books, and hence there are many repeatedly-cited sources, I would suggest one of the two following changes:
I'm happy to do the work of making either of those changes, but would personally prefer option 1 (I find the little superscript numbers that {{ rp}} produces make the article look messy and break up the citations, and LDRs make my head hurt).
Thoughts? Wham2001 ( talk) 06:34, 26 August 2021 (UTC)