|
Post by towardsfinalgoal on Aug 12, 2004 9:08:32 GMT -5
I would like to get a fuller understanding of what fascism is. I know the Comintern did say a lot on this subject in the 1920s-1940s, much of which was later critisized by the RCP as well as ohers in the interational communist movement. There is also some summation in the Declaration of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement, but I wonder if there is a coherent Marxist-Leninist-Maoist theory about what fascism actually is, scientifically?
I see also that there are definitively fascist elements in the generally bourgeois-democratic form of bourgeois dictatorship existing now in the U.S. as well as other imperialist countries, but what is exactly the relation between bourgeois democracy and fascism? Also, are there currently actually fascist regimes in the world, and if so, what makes them actually fascist apart from the existence of most brutal repression?
|
|
ShineThePath
Revolutionary
"Individualism is Parasitism"
Posts: 128
|
Post by ShineThePath on Aug 12, 2004 12:38:37 GMT -5
It must be known what the Fascists have said fascist is, in theory, and what it is in practice. For one fascism, as Mussolini said it was, is the exact opposite of Marxist Socialism. Fascists see war, as a course in humanity that can not be avoid, their sense of war is one of almost Romantic clashes, and glorfication of "honorable battle" for the empire. Mussolini and Hitler claimed to be the "3rd choice" between Socialism and Capitalism. This is the furthest from the truth, however. Fascism is actually a appliable tool used by Capitalists in time of extreme crisis, were the possibiliy of Socialist Revolution in these Imperialist Nations. In the third world, Fascists like Pinochet are premoted by Imperialists in order to save their interests in that nation.
Fascist tendency is not to go against either Capitalism, but to actually build its monopoly power even more. In almost every Fascist regime, the question was not to "nationalize" their industry, but how to privatize it for the capitalists, how to cut worker salary, how to crush Socialists and Communists. Mussolini recieved all his support from FI, in Italy, a group of Industrialists. Fascists have always been in the pocket of Industrialist and this for one must be realized.
Fascist elements are always being built in Bourgeois Democracy elements, the recent rise of "Christian Right" can be seen as new "SA" formations within this country's heatland; however through the history of Fascist regimes like Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, Pinochet, and others. There had always been some seperation from Church and the State. Even if the Churches support the fascists, the Fascists and Religious were never combined in Italy to Chile. Fascism usually glorifys Nationalism and Militarism, not Religion. Mussolini for example feared the Catholic Church ruining his government, so in order to get their support he granted land of the Vatican as their own. Fundamentalists on the other hand glorify the Religion, and they are different from the Fascist, though they can be united in common causes.
Fascism is usually the tendency of Bourgeois Democracy being threathened by "Socialist Reform". It is a reaction to this change that does not suit Capitalist interest. "A vote for Hindenburg, is a vote for Hitler" was a slogan for Communists in Germany during the elections. Social-Democrats criticized this as "Moscow" driven thinking, now we can see how right they were.
|
|
JC
Comrade
Posts: 76
|
Post by JC on Aug 13, 2004 11:17:02 GMT -5
Facism is the "last resort " of the capitilist class . It is the despotism they impose when in a crisis or in a period social upheaveal . Also , the facist cadre is made up usauly of lumpen and petit bourgoise type's .
Thats it in a nutshel.
|
|
ShineThePath
Revolutionary
"Individualism is Parasitism"
Posts: 128
|
Post by ShineThePath on Aug 13, 2004 17:26:47 GMT -5
Yes that is very true of Fascist Cadre, good point. However within the Nazi Party itself, there was a split between a "Left" cotingent and "Right" contingent. Nazis in the left wanted a sort of State Capitalist, they considered it "Socialist", economy. These people in the left were influenced by National Bolshevism, one of them being Joseph Goebells, who praised the German Worker, and denounced the Capitalists and Petite Bourgeoisie at an early age in his first novel. Others like Ernst Roehm were even more extreme. The leader of the 4.5 million strong SA, Ernst Roehm preached the need of a "Real Revolution", a "social revolution". Industrialists, who had provided the funds for the Nazi victory, were unhappy with Roehm's "socialistic" views on the economy and his claims that the real revolution had still to take place. The Army as well feared, the SA would swallow whole the German Army.
As we know, Hitler killed off Roehm, and his SA officers. In order to end the threat of the SA.
|
|
|
Post by kasama on Aug 14, 2004 12:28:44 GMT -5
on the issue of facsism:
It is important to take note of the perceptual features of fascism, but also dig into its essence.
Capitalism has historically produced different FORMS of rule.
For example, some capitalist societies have been ruled through parliamentary democracy. Some through military dictatorships. Others through constiutional monarchies. Still others, through revisionist state capitalist forms. and so on.
All of these state forms are in essense a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie -- in that the state serves the ruling class, its interests, and organizes society in ways that reinforce the capitalist mode of production.
However fascism is a particular form of bourgeois rule.
MLM says (in a handy short definitioni): fascism is the open terroristic dictatorship of the most powerful sections of the imperialist ruling class.
[this is a development of, and a criticism of, an earlier definition of fascism promoted by the Comintern under the leader Georgi Dimitrov -- it was a definition that embodied and encouraged some fundamental right errors and departures from revolutonary Marxism. but that is a side story. It is also opposed to the social democratic view of fascism -- which focuses on the rightwing social base of crazed and desperate petty bourgeoisie -- and which does not see fascism as a phenom serving the capitalist ruling class.]
And the heart of this view of fascism is this:
that it is a more open and more openly terroristic form of class dictatorship.
It is when the bourgeoisie takes the gloves off, and does not rule through a fog of bourgeois democratic procedures and "rights."
And it generally happens in extreme times, when the bourgeoisie feels the need to aggressively suppress an "emerging political challenge" (or finish the suppression of an attempt at power by the revolutionary proletariat), or when their international situation is intensifying and they need to "harden the homefront."
This is the essense. And the ways fascism has existed and come to power in real political life (Nazism in Germany, military dictatorship in Chile, etc.) are rather varied.
|
|