THE NATURE OF FASCISM REVISITED ANTÓNIO COSTA PINTO THE NATURE OF FASCISM REVISITED SOCIAL SCIENCE MONOGRAPHS, BOULDER DISTRIBUTED BY COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS, NEW YORK 2012 © 2012 António Costa Pinto ISBN 978-0-88033-666-6 Library of Congress Control Number: 2009939128 Printed in the United States of America For my son Filipe Contents !. List of Figures and Tables vii 2. Preface and acknowledgements ix 1. Fascists: A ‘revolutionary right’ in interwar Europe ! 2. The origins of fascist ideology: The Sternhell debate "# 3. New interpretations (I): The constituencies of fascism $% 4. New interpretations (II): Conceptual problems &' 5. Fascism, dictators, and charisma %# 6. Ruling elites, political institutions, and decision- making in fascist-era dictatorships: Comparative perspectives (# 7. Fascism, corporatism, and authoritarian institutions in interwar European dictatorships !!# 8. Index !)! List of Figures and Tables Figures 5.1 *e charismatic triangle 82 Tables 5.1 Forms of political legitimation 85 6.1 Ministers’ occupational background (%) 108 6.2 Political o+ces held by ministers (%) 109 7.1 Dictatorship and corporatism in Europe (1918–45) 125 New interpretations (I): 3 The constituencies of fascism European fascism continues to attract a considerable degree of attention, as witnessed by the publication of many works over the past few years.1 Recently the comparative study of fascism has increasingly centered on its ideologi- cal and cultural dimensions, at times becoming ideology-centered. We could even say that, at least on a superficial level, the analysis of so-called generic fascism has moved from a sociological to a more political perspective, giving both ideology and culture much more importance than previously. On the other hand, this area has become more restricted in disciplinary terms with historians clearly dominating, while sociology and political science seem to be abandoning the subject.2 Michael Mann’s Fascists represents a welcome return from the best tradi- tions of comparative historical sociology towards the analysis of fascism and its role in the crises and collapse of democracy. *is book restores society and politics to the center of the study of fascism. Deviating slightly from his major work, "e sources of social power (1986, 1993), Mann utilizes the vast academic literature on fascism to provide an analysis of both the phenomenon and the conditions for its success. *is book asks the classic questions: Who were the fascists? How did they grow and who supported them? And what 1 In this chapter I review the following books: M. Mann, Fascists, Cambridge, 2004; R. O. Paxton, The anatomy of fascism, London, 2004; N. Bermeo, Ordinary people in extraordinary times: The citizenry and the breakdown of democracy, Princeton, NJ, 2003; D. Musiedlak, Mussolini, Paris, 2005; P. H. Lewis, Latin fascist elites: The Mussolini, Franco and Salazar regimes, Westport, CT, 2003. 2 With some exceptions that are connected to studies of the crises and fall of democratic regimes, as in the case of D. Berg-Schlosser and J. Mitchell, eds, Conditions of democ- racy in Europe, 1919–39: Systematic case studies, London, 2000, and from the same edi- tors, Authoritarianism and democracy in Europe, 1919–39: Comparative analyses, London, 2003, as well as Bermeo’s book, which is reviewed here. See also G. Capoccia, Defend- ing democracy: Reactions to extremism in interwar Europe, Baltimore, MD, 2005. 48 !e nature of fascism revisited are the conditions most conducive to their taking power? *rough an exami- nation of six cases in which fascist movements were important in overthrow- ing the liberal democratic order, and where they obtained power as either the dominant political force or as a junior partner, Mann attempts to construct a dynamic model that is not merely a taxonomy of fascism. Like Mann’s study, the historian Robert O. Paxton’s "e anatomy of fas- cism is also a critical reaction to some aspects of the ‘ideological centrism’ of recent years. Because it was written by a historian, criticism of culturalism is more present in Paxton’s book, the author of which is more marked by the ‘fascistology’ debates than Mann. By claiming that ‘what fascists did tells at least as much as what they said’ (a stance that has been criticized by histori- ans such as Zeev Sternhell and Roger Griffin), Paxton attempts to locate the ideas in their rightful place.3 It would be reductionist to say Paxton’s work is a development of his ar- ticle, ‘*e -ve stages of fascism’; however, in strictly theoretical-methodo- logical terms, that is exactly what this is.4 What Paxton has achieved in this book – which is the culmination of several years research and teaching and which is destined for a much greater audience than just the specialists – is to present a global vision of the fascist phenomenon in a more developed and sophisticated manner than before. *e book’s structure follows the five stages cycle: (i) the creation of the movements, (ii) their embedding in the political system, (iii) the seizure of power, (iv) the exercise of power, and (v) ‘finally, the long duration, during which the fascist regime chooses either radicaliza- tion or entropy’ (p. 32). According to Paxton, this creates a simpler illustra- tion of how fascism ‘far from [being] static, was a succession of processes and choices,’ requiring di.erent conceptual tools for each stage. What is fascism? I readily confess that I do not know where the tendency for short definitions of fascism comes from. Such definitions are obviously central to the func- tionality of an analysis; however, some are little more than soundbites. *ere has to my knowledge been no similar obsession in the study of communism or democracy. Nevertheless, neither Mann nor Paxton can resist the tempta- tion that captured their predecessors. Despite this, however, these works are 3 See the indirect critique by Z. Sternhell, New York Review of Books 52, no 8, 12 May 2005, which comments on A. Lyttelton’s review of Paxton, New York Review of Books 51, no 16, 21 October 2004, and the very critical review of R. Griffin in American His- torical Review 109, no 5, 2004, pp. 1530–1. 4 R. O. Paxton, ‘*e -ve stages of fascism’, Journal of Modern History 70, no 1, 1998, pp. 1–13. New interprestations (I): !e constituencies of fascism 49 much richer than the definitions and particularly in the case of the former the definitions represent the anchor in a sophisticated set of hypotheses concern- ing the success or failure of fascism. In other words, they are instruments of study that structure both the analysis and the narrative. Mann begins his book with a definition of ‘fascism in terms of [the] key values, actions, and power organizations of fascists. Most concisely, fascism is the pursuit of a transcendent and cleansing nation-statism through paramili- tarism’ (p. 13). *e five key terms, some with internal tensions, are national- ism, statism, transcendence, cleansing, and paramilitarism. Given that many of these concepts are relatively consensual it is not necessary to introduce them in any great detail: Nationalism: the ‘deep and populist commitment to an “organic” or “in- tegral” nation’; Statism: this is concerned with goals and organizational form. *e or- ganic conception imposes an authoritarian state ‘embodying a singular, cohesive will [as] expressed by a party elite’ adhering to the leadership principle (p. 14). Mann is well aware of the tensions between movement and bureaucracy and confirms that ‘fascism was more totalitarian in its transformational goals than in its actual regime form’ (p. 13); Transcendence: this is the typical neither/nor of fascism as a third way. Mann stresses that the core constituency of fascist support can be under- stood only by taking their aspirations to transcendence seriously. ‘Nation and state comprised their center of gravity, not class’ (p. 15); Cleansing: ‘Most fascisms entwined both ethnic and political cleansing, though to di.er[ring] degrees’ (p. 16);5 Paramilitarism: both a key fascist value and an organizational form. Just as many analysts have done before him, Mann stresses that ‘what essentially distinguishes fascists from many military and monarchical dictatorships of the world is [the] “bottom-up” and violent quality of its paramilitarism. It could bring popularity, both electorally and among elites’ (p. 16). *is is not too far from other definitions of fascism, such as Stanley G. Payne’s typological description, to give only one example.6 Mann states that the diverse combinations of this definition can result in more-or-less fascist movements, but that he does not have the imagination to ‘plot fascist move- ments (each one obviously unique) amid a five-dimensional space’ (p. 17). However, one of the problems with the functionality of his definition is that 5 M. Mann, The dark side of democracy: Explaining ethnic cleansing, New York, 2005. 6 S. G. Payne, A history of fascism,1914–194, Madison, WI, 1995, p. 7. 50 !e nature of fascism revisited it talks of di.erent units: at times referring to parties or movements, at others referring to political regimes, and sometimes referring to both. *is same problem is also present in Paxton’s book, given that ‘a definition that does full justice the phenomenon of fascism must apply to the later stag- es as e.ectively as it does to the earlier ones’ (p. 206). Paxton provides the definition at the end of his book: Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoc- cupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood, and by compensa- tory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but e.ective collaboration with tradi- tional elite groups, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion (p.