WVLS317 – DEMOCRACY &

FASCISM

FASCISM & DEMOCRACY (transcript)

– INTRODUCTION –
SECTION 1: INTRODUCTION

Hi Everyone, and welcome to this class on “Fascism & Democracy” as part of your WVLS313 course. I
am Prof Chantelle Gray, and I will be guiding you through today’s lesson.

In this course, you have been looking at concepts that are often seen as binary opposites. You have
also learnt to problematize these binaries – or to critically evaluate whether these concepts are true
dualisms or merely posed as such for particular historical reasons.

Democracy and fascism, like the other dualisms you have looked at, are also regarded as binary
opposites – and for good reason. But these are also concepts that are used quite loosely in many
contexts to imply quite a wide range of meanings. In many ways, the concept of democracy, for
example, has become far removed from its original connotations, which included aspects such as
mutual aid, egalitarianism and decentralized organization – or what is popularly described as “the rule
of the people”. These days it refers more readily to liberal or representative democracy, which often
comprise many “layers of nonrepresentative statecraft” that “now work hand in hand with equally
undemocratic international NGOs and multinational financial bodies” (Milstein, 2010: 35). Similarly,
fascism can mean anything from Hitler’s Nazism to populist uprisings to something that is simply
undesirable – be that a person, a political movement, or even country, as the writer George Orwell
noted in Politics and the English Language in 1946 already.

Our aim in this class will therefore be to unpack what we mean by the concepts democracy and
fascism, and to think about whether they should be regarded as binary opposites or not. Because the
prescribed reading by Eric Yonke, titled “On Fascism and Democracy”, covers mostly the historical
roots of fascism, I will cover at least some basics of democracy with you in this class.
– CONTENT –
SECTION 2: FASCISM

What do you think of when you hear the word fascism? Do you immediately think of Hitler or Mussolini?
Perhaps Stalin comes to mind, or things like swastikas, propaganda, and mass delusion? Maybe you
immediately think of fascism as the opposite of democracy.

You wouldn’t be entirely wrong to associate fascism with any of these elements, excepting perhaps
Stalin whose regime was, more accurately, totalitarian rather than fascist. So, before we look at some
of the words and phrases you would have encountered in your prescribed reading to describe fascism
– like paramilitarism, ethnic-national preservation, and hyper-nationalism – it is helpful to distinguish
between authoritarianism, totalitarianism, and fascism.

Although all three of these are forms of government that have a centralised power structure with which
they attempt to control the populace, they also differ in some important ways. Authoritarianism, which
underlie all of these forms of government, is characterised by limited freedom and very strict
government controls, which include “anti-regime activity” (Longley, 2022). The latter, in many ways, is
what we might think of as the opposite of a democracy where people are allowed to express anti-
government views and action. Another key feature of authoritarian regimes is the “presence of a ruling
executive with vague, shifting, and loosely-defined powers” that “justifies itself to the people as a
‘necessary evil’ uniquely capable of” dealing with “societal problems” (Longley, 2022). In democracies,
then, we might expect to find a strong constitution which guides and restricts governmental power. Two
examples of authoritarian regimes are those of Venezuela under Hugo Chávez and that of Cuba under
Fidel Castro.

Whereas authoritarian regimes have strong leaders, they do not have a single dictator. This is the main
difference between authoritarian and totalitarian regimes. Here we can think immediately of Russia
under Stalin, China under Mao Zedong and North Korea under Kim Jong-un. Besides a single dictator,
totalitarian regimes are also marked by strict censorship and continuous pro-government propaganda,
mandatory military service and population control, the ban of certain religious and/or political groups
and, perhaps most importantly, the presence of a secret police (Longley, 2022). In her groundbreaking
work, The Origins of Totalitarianism, the political philosopher Hannah Arendt in fact argues that it is
precisely the presence of the secret police that turned the populace against each other – because
basically it meant that everyone started spying on each other for fear of being spied on (Arendt, 1962:
460-479). To say it differently, she thinks that is the secret police that created the right conditions for
fascism to emerge – or at least that it is an important element. Many would argue that the lack of a
secret police should be one of the elements of a democracy – and of course they would be right – but
you may then ask yourself if institutions like the FBI in the United States have not come to replace the
secret police, and what that means for our understanding of democracy.
You may have noticed in our discussion thus far that totalitarianism is an intensification of
authoritarianism – and in many ways fascism is an even further intensification. One might even say that it
is a combination of authoritarianism and totalitarianism. But what stands out about fascist regimes – like
those of Italy under Mussolini and Germany under Hitler – is an extremist “devotion to one’s nation over
all others” (Longley, 2022). Basically, what this means, is that classes – like the lower classes, middle
classes and upper classes – are transformed into masses, and this is achieved by focusing on “cults of
national unity and racial purity” which is achieved through the ‘cleansing’ of the nation “selective breeding”
(Longley, 2022). As we know, this misguided devotion led to the state-funded subjugation and murder of
roughly six million Jews over twelve years. So how did it get to this point?

After the First World War, Europe found itself in an “economic and political crisis” (Yonke, 2012: 25).
Many people were destitute and worried about the future – and this public anxiety was exactly what
Mussolini and Hitler exploited. The first thing they did was to create national myths. In your reading you
would have seen that Mussolini did this by rallying Italians through an “imaginary association with the
Ancient Roman Empire”, whereas Hitler promised to create the “Third Reich” – an empire that was
supposed to follow on the First Reich or the Roman Empire, and the Second Reich, or the thousand-year
German empire that existed before its destruction by Napoleon Bonaparte. What we see here is a kind of
hyper-nationalism according to which the nation is seen as something that needs protection from both
internal and external enemies. There is also this idea of a return to a better mythical past.

To create this fabled and pure nation, a paramilitary is established to exist alongside the military. So, the
paramilitary is an extra fighting force that is deeply ideological and participates in military action during
wartime and peacetime – in the name of fascism. In other words, they are seen as “defenders of the
moral order” (Yonke, 2012: 29) that helps to “cleanse” the nation from unwanted elements.

What is interesting is that the “fascists never polled a majority in open elections” but rose to power by
forming coalitions with more conservative parties in parliament (Yonke, 2012: 33). We, can, in other
words, analyse coalitions in terms of fascist tactics and strategies. This is not to say that all coalitions are
fascist, but rather that they could be should other fascist tactics and strategies be observed – like rhetoric
that centres on the nation-state or the return of the nation to some former glory.

Fascism remains important to study because it emerged in some of the “most highly industrialized and
generally well-educated societies” (Yonke, 2012: 34), meaning it can happen again – even to us. Having
said that, it may be the case that fascism has morphed to look somewhat different in our contemporary
societies. So how might we explain fascism in today’s world? And in what ways do democracies differ
from fascist regimes?
– DISCUSSION –
SECTION 3: CONTEMPORARY UNDERSTANDINGS OF FASCISM AND DEMOCRACY

Democracy is often described as “the rule of the people”, meaning it is concerned with how a territory
should be governed by its citizens and what kinds of political organisations and institutions they may need
to do so. Perhaps the most important aspect here is the idea that democracies should have an “active
citizenry” (Yonke, 2012: 37) that participates in every level of societal organisation for the good of the
people. Yet most contemporary democracies rarely function like this anymore. The majority of people
have very little say in the everyday organisation of their countries apart from voting in elections. To boot,
many democracies have quite strong central governments – even when other opposition parties
participate – so is this not something we should think about more critically and even try to change?

What would a democracy look like if it had more decentralized organisations that allowed people in their
own neighbourhoods, for example, to come together and make decisions that affect their lives? Could we
not find better ways to distribute essentials like housing, food and education in this way? These are, at
the very least, some important questions we should be thinking about.

We might also ask ourselves if fascism still looks exactly like it did in the time of Hitler and Mussolini. In
other words, what are the criteria we should use to judge whether something is fascist or not? This is not
an easy or simple discussion to have, though there are at least some aspects of historical fascism that
remain warning signs. For example, rhetoric that focuses on a pure national identity – and especially
racial purity – as well as a return to some mythical better past can be found in fascist-leaning movements
today.

Perhaps something else to take into account is what the philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari
call microfascism, which is to say something “in us all, in our own heads, and in our everyday behaviour”
that “causes us to love power” and “desire the very thing that dominates and exploits us” (Foucault in
Deleuze and Guattari, 1983: xiii). This really is a call for us to examine our own behaviour, thoughts,
“postures, attitudes, perceptions”, language use and “expectations” (Deleuze and Guattari, 1987: 215). It
is easy to describe and identify macrofascisms, such as those of Hitler and Mussolini, but much more
difficult to think about the more hidden forms of fascism that may be lurking inside each of us.

With that, I hope you have enjoyed this class and that it has provoked some important questions for you
to think about.
REFERENCES

Arendt, H. (1962), The Origins of Totalitarianism. Cleveland, New York: The World Publishing Company.

Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F. (1983), Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia Vol. 1, trans. R. Hurley,
M. Seem and H.R. Lane. London, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F. (1987), A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia Vol. 2, trans. B.
Massumi. London, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Longley, R. (2021), Totalitarianism, Authoritarianism, and Fascism, ThoughtCo, 6 December. Available

Milstein, C. (2010), Anarchism and Its Aspirations. Oakland, CA: AK Press/ The Institute for Anarchist
Studies.

Orwell, G. (2013[1946]), Politics and the English Language. London: Penguin Classics.

Yonke, E. (2012), On Fascism and Democracy. In: P. Gilk and D. Kast (eds), A Whole Which Is Greater:
Why the Wisconsin “Uprising” Failed. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock, pp. 24-38.