Fascism Defined

Some background about “Fascism” is in order. The best, and classic, definition of Fascism says it is a combination of the forces of big business together with the forces of big government operating against the interests of the poor, working and entrepreneurial classes, and using the tools of science to control the minds and culture of the people.

Let’s go a little deeper to understand this definition.  Mussolini and the Fascists rose in Italy in the early Twentieth Century as an offshoot of Marxism.  Basically, the Fascisti (a term derived from the idea of bundling, standardizing and collectivizing) called for a form of Marxism that would leave much of the small business economy alone, and collectivize only the major industries, or in Marxist parlance, the major means of production.  In addition, Mussolini introduced the idea that this new form of Marxism should be advanced by using modern science to mold the minds and the culture of the masses, to as he termed it, be a totalitarian government, designed to control the total life of the populace. 

That basic concept of Fascism was changed during World War Two, when the tail of government found itself not capable of wagging the dog of the major capitalists, and the relationship reverted back to its historic arrangement with big money directing the government’s policies for the good of the upper classes.  They nonetheless retained the Fascist image of populism and its tools of cultural molding and mind control.   In other words, the business and political elites joined together to rule over the masses like little despots.  That’s what fascism has become in the modern real world. 

This small-f fascism is one, not of a particular political party, but rather it is the most accurate description of the real kind of government America has had for the last seventy years or so.  The way this American fascism has grown has not been so much a smooth creeping as a ratcheting between the big business party, and the big government party, mostly at the times of presidential elections.  Think of the following in terms of the transition to Kennedy from the Republicans in 1960, Nixon from the Democrats in 1968, Carter from the Republicans in 1976, Reagan from the Democrats, Clinton from the Republicans, Bush from the Democrats, and Obama from the Republicans.

            Say the Republicans are in power, giving the store away to the big business greedhead types.  We get sick of it, and the Democrats say “elect us and we’ll roll back the excesses of big business”.  So we elect them, and we are perennially disappointed when they mightily increase the amount of government regulation and involvement with our personal lives and don’t manage to beat back corporate greed a bit (it might even get a little worse).

            Then, every four to eight years or so, after we are getting sick of the new governmental controls, the Republicans say, “elect us and we’ll get government off your backs”.  So we elect them, and they concentrate on increasing corporate profits and making sure that the already wealthy get even wealthier.  Big government intrusion into and regulation over our lives diminishes not a whit, but in fact grows a little.  Then, after we once again get sick of the runaway greed, along come the Democrats, repeating their promise of, ”elect us and we’ll roll back the excesses of big business”. 

And so it goes, on and on, back and forth, left and right.  At each election, there is a seemingly permanent national division around the issues of morality, peace, justice and the like.  These issues, which should mostly be settled between neighbors in community, (more on this in coming posts) have been nationalized by dubious court rulings or non rulings.  Consequently, those of us who care about them almost all feel compelled to vote for one side of the dichotomy or the other.  Then, when elected, the authorities of either party deliver just enough on the issues we care about to keep us passionately divided from our neighbors, and for the rest of their term advance the fascist agenda of more power and money to big business and big government.

Every one of these times of change acts like a social/ political ratchet, a sudden change that moves only in one direction, and stops at a new political equilibrium for a few years.  At every move of the ratchet, toward big business or big government, the combined centralizing forces of big business and big government gain increasing power over our lives. 

This is why it is accurate to call modern America a fascist country, because even though “Fascism” per se, isn’t in the platforms of either major political party, the real world results of the interplay of the actions of both parties, when considered together, has tended to centralize and combine the powers of big government with the powers of big business, and use them to act against the interests of the working, entrepreneurial, and poor classes.

In addition, the aspect that makes this system distinct from old fashioned “despotism” is that the political and economic power over us is used, ala classic fascism, to shape our minds and culture.  This involves the education system, the media, corporate advertising, and any number of culture changing court decisions. Mussolini originally proposed using the power of modern media and psychology to mold the minds of the people.  The idea was that humanity could be perfected by the strict enforcement of well conceived laws and the use of modern technology to mold minds. 

This can be seen in action in all the schools of fascism, from the Hitler youth of the Nazis to the Young Pioneers and Cultural Revolutions of the Marxists in China and Russia, to the social engineering advanced by the educators and social workers in the liberal welfare state started by FDR. (The assertion here, which will be expanded on later, is that fascism is at the center of all the “isms”, and that communism, socialism, Nazism, and FDR’ism are all, when seen in light of being combinations of the power of the state with big capital against the people, just schools of fascism.)

  So first we must realize that “Fascism” means a combination of big business and big government operating against the interests of the poor, working and entrepreneurial classes which also uses modern science to mold the hearts and minds of the people.  Then we can see that a fascist oligarchy is certainly what we have today in America.  For that matter, a similar power structure is taking rule over most of the planet; a growing and terrifying international fascist oligarchy.