Rise of Fascism

What led to the rise of Fascism? Was it capitalism imploding on itself? The failure of government?

Fascism is the result of communism and World War I.

Countermovement to Communism, and a result of the perceived failures of democracy/monarchies after WW1.

Democracies, like all systems of government, are naturally vulnerable to domination by a rent seeking clique.

The Weimar republic was a particularly young, unstable, and, at least in the eyes of the "stab in the back," illegitimate democracy.

It played to the ideas of nationalism and national identity in a time when those ideas were at their height and felt they were under attack by global social movements like Communism.

The ineptitude of capitalistic and Marxist ideologies in the modern context.

Fascism is simply post-modern socialism.

But why were these nationalist identities at their height? The proletariat just fought a bitter war that was not in their interests whatsoever. Why would they shy away from class struggle after this?

Because Marx was wrong.

'Class struggle' was in direct opposition to generations of tradition and conservatives were afraid of it and coalesced around things that were familiar like love for the nation and its 'glorious history'.

Seeing as the Marxist interpretation of Fascism seems most plausable, I don't know if that's true.

>love for the nation
>tradition
Nation-states weren't that old.

In fact, nationalism was a pretty progressive ideal during the 19th century.

People say the opposite because modern conservatives call themselves """""nationalist""""".

You realize the time period we're talking about is the 20th century, right? A time when many nation states do exist and have for generations. Even those that weren't unified nationally at least had a shared cultural identity that is a comparable stand-in.

>fascism is conservative
please let this meme die

Fascism synthesized right after the turn of the century. We can't take look at fascism without taking into account the 19th century.

But nationalism, in the early 20th century, wasn't attached to a single ideology like the 19th or post-war 20th century. Liberals, conservatives, republicans, monarchist; they could all be nationalist. Calling it a purely conservative ideal is historically inaccurate.

I didn't say Fascism had a monopoly on nationalism, just that it was a major tool in how they came to prominence, namely by framing a struggle between the hallowed institutions of the nation and its identity against foreign or corrupt influences; democracy, communism, etc.

>I didn't say Fascism had a monopoly on nationalism
I didn't say you did.

Then you agree that my statements are not historically inaccurate and that you were in error?

Fascism was the alt-right of the 1930s.

No. You said that nationalism was conservative.

except for the fact it was an intellectual and political movement that was taken seriously

...

Conservatives and Liberals hated Fascism you dolt. And no, I'm not talking about American Liberals.

No I didn't. I said notions of class struggle was an anathema to conservatives and that they were a big part in leading the calls toward nationalism and national identity. They were, it was. That is not up for historical debate, it is demonstrable fact.

[citation needed]

Liberals played a bigger role in leading the calls toward nationalism and national identity. Conservatives later jumped into the bandwagon.

The thing is that everyone was responsible for the rising popularity of nationalism, even socialists.

It was an extreme answer to the woes of the times, charismatic orators saying they'll bring the entire nation from economic catastrophe and rise to glory for 1000 years.

Italy's case is a bit different, as the Italian people felt cheated out of a proper victory in World War I, promised territory in Dalmatia and Turkey that were denied by the other allies at the final stages. Italians felt they needed to assert their position in Europe, along with routing the systemic corruption within the countries borders between slow government bureaucracy to the rampant corruption involving the Mafia, Mussolini promised an Empire worthy of Rome and to make the government effective again, which he somewhat succeeded at the ladder, making him immensely popular.

Germans were just looking for anyone who promised them a way out of financial ruin, and were more than happy to support an energetic orator who promised Germany a place among the stars and retribution to those who betrayed the fatherland in the Great War.

Extreme problems give way for people to support more extreme solutions.

>rising popularity of nationalism, even socialists.
Socialism largely rejected ideas of nationalism in favor of worldwide unity, especially among the proletariat. They wanted to tear down the barriers of race and nation because they saw those as tools of the oppressing classes.

Said Stalin never

I know. The keyword here is "largely". Socialists that preferred nationalism over globalism existed.

I don't care what your political opinion is, they still existed.

So your argument is that because a fringe element within the movement existed that somehow that puts their contributions on par with other clearly more devoted political factions? Okay.

Hitler thought fascism was cool

No, my argument is that every political movement contributed to the rise of nationalism.

I never said socialists were equal contributors of said rise in comparison to other movements.

ww2

Although ultimately ineffectual, coalitions were formed between the Socialists, the Liberals and Conservatives to counter Mussolini's meteoric rise. For instance, PM's Giolitti and Nitti, a Liberal and a Socialist respectively, both actively undertook the same measures to prevent a Fascist outbreak in Milan.

Unfortunately, the Italian political elite were so egotistical and fractured that they couldn't prevent an incredibly well organised Fascist Party.

the rise of nationalism was long before the existence of coherent ideological movements such as liberalism, socialism or fascism

The jews tried to take over the world so naturally europeans defended themselves

Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi was not Jewish you absolute nutter. In fact his father was apart of the Austrian nobility and a notable anti-semite in his early years.

Don't believe everything that's written on the internet you brainwashed fool.

>inb4 he accuses me of being a Jew

You NatSocs are such a fucking joke...

hitler rose to power because he was given it by hindenburg & co.

in 1932 hitler realized that even at the peak of the crisis that gave him votes, at the highest level of nazi agitation that consumed most of their money, he still only had 37% of the votes, which was useless. there was no actual power in being the largest party in a deadlocked parliament that was essentially irrelevant because of the authoritarian clique of hindenburg, von papen & co and their constant abuse of emergency powers.

so hitler went ahead with a now-or-never gambit by demanding that, in view of his popular support, hindenburg give him what he gave von papen. hitler made it clear he is not interested in any other deal: he wants to be made chancellor by hindenburg's decree or else. hindenburg told him to fuck off.

at this point, hitler is done. he had one chance and he blew it. now he's just the leader of the largest opposition party in a castrated reichstag and that gives him the power to do absolutely fuck all. he can sit there and fume and watch his support dwindle, already dropping several percent in the repeated election months later. within a year or two the party fractures and fades away and by 1940 everyone forgets about that one wacky austrian with the mustache.

except what actually happens is that hindenburg's pals are like "you know what, we could use that hitler guy. he's a moron with a big mouth, we can hire him to mop up the mess in the reichstag", so hindenburg changes his mind and hitler gets exactly what he wanted. of course nazi propaganda tried to sell this as a victory after long struggle, but what actually happened is that hitler lost and then was given the prize anyway, all because of catastrophic lack of foresight on the part of his rivals (a repeated feature of his career). without this one moronic decision by hindenburg none of hitler's further exploits can happen and all of his career up to this point is worth nothing.

Romatisism -> nationalism -> shovinism -> fascism

Mussolini's fascist party strong-armed it's way into government. Their Weimer Republic was seen as a failed case for capitalism/democracy. Along comes an Italy-admiring Hitler who proposes an alternative to an especially hated German government. Gains support. Eventually becomes chancellor. Etc. Etc.

>at this point, hitler is done. he had one chance and he blew it. now he's just the leader of the largest opposition party in a castrated reichstag and that gives him the power to do absolutely fuck all. he can sit there and fume and watch his support dwindle, already dropping several percent in the repeated election months later. within a year or two the party fractures and fades away and by 1940 everyone forgets about that one wacky austrian with the mustache.
He probably would have just set the damn thing on fire.

Germany was not culturally democratic, there was still a lot of support for strongmen like Bismarck.

Communist violence in the aftermath of ww1 posed a real threat while the Versailles treaty created antipathy with their democratic neighbor and they did not seek to emulate their government. The great depression seemed to confirm everything people like Hitler had said. The Weimar republic was too weak and it seemed like it was either going to go one way or the other, Hitler was a veteran, he had proven he was willing to risk his life for Germany.

All this made Germans trust a tyrant which turned out to be far worse than a failing democracy. It shows how important it is to resist tyranny and to have a pragmatic realistic rational logical intelligent common sense view of the world. You all make fun of "don't tread on me" types and believe that government surveillance, indefinite detention and the like is A OK as long as the people in charge are liberals like yourself, it might seem so now when things are nowhere near as bad as they were during the great depression, but it may not always be like this. There may be another great depression and our weakened democratic institutions might not be able to withstand that.

Declining capitalism where bourgeois parliamentary democracy has failed and the middle class start to join side of the capitalists.