What makes a country fascist

This is probably a good time to pivot to the glittering elephant in the room: Donald Trump. Is he a fascist? I make the case in my book that he practices fascist politics.

But the blame there is as much on the Republican Party as it is on Trump, because none of this would matter if they were willing to check Trump. Can you elaborate on that? He explicitly praised the Immigration Act , which severely limited the number of immigrants allowed to enter the US, as a useful model.

The s and the s was a very fascist time in the United States. And yet at the same time there are countervailing forces that push us in the opposite direction, and so America exists in this perpetual tension between liberal democracy and reactionary fascism. We have an exceptional devotion to liberty and equality, as embodied in our struggle for civil rights and our fight against fascism in World War II.

But, as you said, the fascist threat is always lurking, and we just have to be aware of it. What does your book have to say about the way forward? If we are indeed threatened by fascist movements, both here and abroad, what can citizens and governments do about it? Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not Jewish. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me.

We learned first from that poem who the targets are. Simple acts of courage early on will save you impossible acts of courage later. Our weapons are our high ideals of liberty and equality, and we have to fight to keep those American ideals. An informed electorate is essential to a functioning democracy.

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By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. Fascism always takes on the individual characteristics of the country it is in, leading to very different regimes. For instance, Paxton wrote in "The Five Stages of Fascism" that "religion … would play a much greater role in authentic fascism in the United States" than it would in the more secular Europe.

Further complicating matters, nonfascist governments have often mimicked elements of fascist regimes to give the appearance of force and national vitality, Paxton said. For example, mass mobilizations of citizens in colored shirts do not automatically equate to a fascist political practice, he said. The prevalence of the word "fascism" in common vernacular also causes definitional problems.

In recent years, the term "is used more often as a political insult than as a historically-informed analytical term," according to The Lowy Institute , an Australian think tank in Sydney. And while all fascist movements are far right, not all far right movements are fascist, Burley said.

Related: What is antifa? Unlike most other political, social or ethical philosophies — such as communism, capitalism, conservatism, liberalism or socialism — fascism does not have a set philosophy. As Paxton wrote, "There was no 'Fascist Manifesto,' no founding fascist thinker. Though fascism's definition can be elusive, all fascist movements share some core beliefs and actions. Fascism requires some basic allegiances, such as to the nation and to a gatekeeping "master race" or group.

The core principle — what Paxton defined as fascism's only definition of morality — is to make the nation stronger, more powerful, larger and more successful. Since fascists see national strength as the only thing that makes a nation "good," fascists will use any means necessary to achieve that goal. As a result, fascists aim to use the country's assets to increase the country's strength. This often leads to a nationalization of assets, and in this, fascism resembles Marxism — an anti-capitalist economic, philosophical and political framework of beliefs that promote a classless society, according to the Center for the Study of Language and Information at Stanford University in California.

Guided by the principle of extreme nationalism, fascist regimes tend to perform similar actions, though the particulars differ, author George Orwell wrote in his essay " What Is Fascism? Fascists also excel at propaganda, using it as a tool to scapegoat certain groups; however, those groups may differ from country to country.

For instance, the Nazi regime demonized Jews and other ethnic minorities, such as the Romani people, while Mussolini's Italian regime targeted Bolsheviks — radical, far-left Marxists. Mussolini worked regularly with Jews, and his mistress, Margherita Sarfatti, was Jewish, though she later converted to Catholicism. Because of Mussolini's alliance with Hitler, he did eventually incorporate antisemitic components into his regime, and Sarfatti fled Italy in after Mussolini began passing antisemitic legislation, according to the Jewish Women's Archive.

But overall, Mussolini differed from Hitler on the subject of biological racism. Related: What are the different types of governments?

Paxton also said that fascism is based more on feelings than philosophical ideas which may explain why fascism can be hard to define. In his essay " The Five Stages of Fascism ," published in in the Journal of Modern History, he defined seven "mobilizing passions" for fascist regimes. They are:. Once in power, "fascist dictatorships suppressed individual liberties, imprisoned opponents, forbade strikes, authorized unlimited police power in the name of national unity and revival, and committed military aggression," Paxton wrote.

Mussolini's fascism mixed extreme nationalist expansion with social programs like women's suffrage and workers' rights, accumulating power by forming alliances with conservatives and existing government factions. According to the AHA , in Italy in , strong-arm squads known as the Blackshirt Militia, who were financed by industrialists, fought socialist farmer organizations, conducted raids on socialist newspapers and occupied socialist-led towns.

They threatened to march on Rome in The government tried to placate Mussolini by naming him prime minister, but in , he established himself as dictator.

What followed was violent suppression of dissent; the deification of Mussolini; violent expansion into Ethiopia, Albania and other countries; and in , alliance with Nazi Germany and participation in World War II.

Hitler learned many lessons from Mussolini, including the importance of propaganda and violence. In the s, he led his Nazi Party to prominence through dramatic speeches, grand entrances and passionate rhetoric against Jews, Marxists, liberals and internationalists — those who support social and economic collaboration between nations, Paxton wrote.

By the summer, Hitler's rule had become a dictatorship. The spread of fascist ideas originated in Italy under the reign of Benito Mussolini. He gained control of Italy as the leader of the National Fascist Party, and he remained in power until his downfall in Despite his totalitarian rule over the Kingdom of Italy, Mussolini was ultimately voted out of office and ended up being arrested after the fact. The officials who supported him for so many years were the ones to overthrow Mussolini, and the hope was that this would be the end of Mussolini as a fascist dictator.

However, Nazi Germany was starting to take flight, and Mussolini was recruited to assist the Germans with their fascist movement. He continued to participate in fascist ideologies until he was murdered by a fatal gunshot wound on April 28, Eventually, fascist ideologies spread throughout Europe, seeping first into Germany before making its way over to Asia.

Japan was the first Asian country to experience Fascism in full force, followed by the Republic of China in. Today , very few political parties describe themselves as fascists.

Instead, this term is usually used as an epithet by their political opponents. This trend stems from the fact that there have been several fascist movements throughout history. Whether government systems recognize the traces of Fascism in their ideologies or not does not take away from the reality that many systems of government still incorporate fascist ideas into their modern-day strategies.

There were seemingly endless movements driven by fascist beliefs in Portugal and Spain, but in the early s, the movements were less frequent. Eventually, they stopped altogether.