The Anatomy of Fascism by Robert O. Paxton (PDF)

Description

What is fascism? By focusing on the concrete: what the fascists did, rather than what they said, the esteemed historian Robert O. Paxton answers this question.From the first violent uniformed bands beating up “enemies of the state,” through Mussolini’s rise to power, to Germany’s fascist radicalization in World War II, Paxton shows clearly why fascists came to power in some countries and not others, and explores whether fascism could exist outside the early-twentieth-century European setting in which it emerged. “A deeply intelligent and very readable book. . . . Historical analysis at its best.” –The Economist The Anatomy of Fascism will have a lasting impact on our understanding of modern European history, just as Paxton’s classic Vichy France redefined our vision of World War II. Based on a lifetime of research, this compelling and important book transforms our knowledge of fascism–“the major political innovation of the twentieth century, and the source of much of its pain.”

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Paxton has written an excellent book on fascism as practiced by Hitler and Mussolini. He focuses on the actions taken by fascists in Italy and Germany, both during their rise and while in power. He is more interested in examining the activities of fascists than their ideology, writings and speeches, so those looking for an intellectual history might be disappointed. However, if you want to understand how fascists came to power, what they did when in control, and how their actions differentiate them from authoritarian, dictatorial and militaristic states, this is a great read.Paxton’s basic definition is that “fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.” (P. 218)He argues that it was crises of democratic liberal governments, the rise of Bolshevism in the U.S.S.R., and mass-based politics and media techniques, which opened space for fascist movements in the early 20th century. They exploited the weaknesses and divisions of post-WWI democracies, and argued the dangers of communism through new media, to mobilize people to political action. Conservatives, fearful of liberals and socialists, allied with fascists in common cause, and helped elevate them to the realm of legitimate politics. Paxton stresses that in both fascism’s rise and rule, Hitler and Mussolini did not have the dominance of totalitarians, and had to negotiate and share power with traditional elites, for example in business and religion, who were crucial to fascist rule.He writes that “the outermost reach of fascist radicalization was the Nazi muder of the Jews.” He points out, first, that despite Hitler’s intense anti-semitism, he could not have accomplished mass murder without allies, including his Nazi party, state actors such as government officials and the military, and those citizens who quietly acquiesced. Second, he argues that “the Holocaust developed step by step, from lesser acts to more heinous ones.” (P.158) The Nazis ratcheted up their persecutions, from segregation, to ethnic cleansing as a part of the campaign in the east, to the full Final Solution. While my description is simplified here, Paxton argues well how important it is to understand mass killing came at the end of years of pushing against the boundaries of democratic and legal norms intended to protect people from state persecution, in favor of a political culture of demonization, racism, xenophobia, exclusion and violence.On looking out for fascism, he writes that “the well-know warning signals – extreme nationalist propaganda and hate crimes – are important but insufficient. . . we can find more ominous warning signals in situations of political deadlock in the face of crisis, threatened conservatives looking for tougher allies, ready to give up due process and the rule of law, seeking mass support by nationalist and racialist demagoguery.” (P.205)An important book which, through examining the actions of fascists, from street violence and allying with traditional elites, to persecuting political enemies and nationalizing economies, provides insight into fascism’s rise and rule.

⭐Fascism is the genus to which Nazism, Falangism, Francisme, the Arrow Cross, the Order of the Archangel Michael, the Ustasha, and possibly also certain strains of militant Islam belong. The book provides a very useful primer to the subject (which, by the way, goes well beyond a standard insult for supposed right wingers). It is, however, addressed to college students and won’t be much fun for those with an occasional interest, nor very informative for those who have already read on the subject. But even people familiar with the subject can always use a single refresher source. The bibliographic essay is excellent, and the copious footnotes are very rewarding (who ever knew that Iceland had fascists?). The book is not as fulfilling as Payne’s, but it is much shorter and up to date.Although these things should be obvious to any college-educated person, it is still useful to assert that third world dictatorships (such as Pinochet or Mobutu) are not fascist, that Fascism’s symbols must be rooted in a country’s culture (so that Swastikas and Roman salutes are quite useless in most countries), that Fascism could achieve power only with the support of existing elites but was not a mere tool of those elites, and that Fascism was authentically democratic (this is a good lesson who believe democracy is always good no matter what its consequences), although it never came to power via an election.Paxton is intriguing when he refers to his opinion that the USA, at the end of the ’60s, was ripe for a fascist takeover. He refers to the revulsion many Americans felt for the counterculture of the time, the fear of many lower middle class white males at being left behind by women and blacks after the Civil Rights movement, and the likelihood that Vietnam War veterans might fail to be integrated into the new scheme of things and thus could perform a role similar to the fascist squadristi or the Nazi SA, and allow themselves to be used to frighten the electorate into a strong-arm fix to the crisis. He doesn’t elaborate on this scenario, but it might have been viable if the American political system had failed to recover from the Nixon resignation. This would have been particularly likely after the oil crises of the 1970s if the two main parties had fallen apart. Remember that Wallace, then a racist, captured in 1968 13% of the popular vote, and 5 Southern states.This is an interesting “What If” that the author could have explored further, although he probably chose not to in order not to bulk out the book excessively. Thus, it retains its sense of urgency and provides abundant interesting information on most pages.In spite of these merits The book does make a serious blunder, when, in the final chapter, it compares Fascism to Communism and concludes that Nazism was far worse because it persecuted people for who they were, whereas Communism persecuted them because of what they did or had, and these things could be changed. This is blatantly untrue.When Stalin ordered the kulaks to be liquidated as a class, he did not mean that those who gave up their excess property would be left alone. He meant that anyone classed as a kulak should be liquidated irrespective of what he did or didn’t do. Indeed, many kulaks were not richer than their neigbours, and were classified as such only to fulfil the quotas imposed by the Vozhd.When the Soviet Union or China created the groups “Enemies of the People”, it included the children or spouses of such enemies of the people, who clearly couldn’t have done anything to prevent it. “Enemies of the People” were persecuted, incarcerated and often killed.And when Stalin ordered that the families of soldiers who did not stand their ground in battle should be punished (read: executed) he wasn’t giving them any choice: how could the families prevent a relative from behaving cowardly? So, it is wrong, and not just factually, to state that Communism punished people only because of what they did. The implication that people under Communism could save themselves by changing their behaviour is also false, and deeply offensive. In reality Communism killed people for who they were, and for who their parents, or spouse, or children, or siblings were, or for the actions of their neighbours, and even for their own nationalities: witness the cruel deportation of the Chechens and other peoples during WWII. When top Bolsheviks ordered the murder of tens of thousands of Poles at the Katyn Massacre because these people were leaders in their communities (priests, teachers, nobles, etc.), just what could these victims have done to survive? When Mao, during the cultural revolution, sent urban students to “learn from the peasants” and live for years in unimaginable squalor, just what was he punishing?I don’t have a clear and articulated opinion on whether communism or fascism was worse (although I do know that in fascist states one would usually be left alone unless one belonged to a persecuted group- see Eric Johnson’s “Nazi Terror”-, whereas in commuist states one could be swept along by the periodic purges irrespective of what one was and what one did- see Robert Conquest’s “The Great Terror”, inter alia), but I am certain that Paxton belittles the awfulness of Communist rule, and somehow assumes that its victims were to blame for what they suffered (since they wouldn’t have been punished if they had changed their behaviour). To anyone who might be misled by Paxton’s opinion, I can only recommend enduring texts such as Anne Appleabum’s “Gulag: A History”, or Solzhenitsyn’s “Gulag Archpielago”.I still give Paxton 3 stars because this dubious opinion is marginal to his analysis (he clearly didn’t think it through and might choose to elaborate the point in a further edition) and other than that the book is pretty good if slightly wooden.

⭐This book certainly provides a brilliant, scholarly and highly perceptive analysis of fascism. The book clearly mentions the origins of fascism from its nineteenth century roots to the ‘real’ fascism in Italy and Germany from 1919-45. Generally speaking, most writers define their subject matter at the beginning: Robert O. Paxton leaves this to the end of the book – although he defines the word fascism as being taken from Italian: ‘fascio’, literally a bundle of sheaf, as I remember from my student days and I also can recall that this was taken from Latin meaning Fasces, an axe encased in a bundle of rods.More importantly, Paxton’s viewpoint differs markedly from many other writers on the subject in that he suggest that fascism should not be studied in isolation from other factors. He stresses that fascism should not be just viewed as a tool of a particular interest group and at the same time this tends to be a popular movement. Paxton concentrates on examining the development of fascism through five stages: “creating fascist movements; taking root; getting power; exercising power and the long-term (radicalisation or entropy)”. In a sense, he (Paxton) argues that fascist movements tend to develop autonomously and they do get support from some of the existing liberal and conservatives elite at times of social, economic and political upheaval or crisis and when many of the democratic institutions within the state are unable to resolve the crisis. However, Paxton makes very brief references to the Marxist school of thought and which clearly offers the most sharpest analysis of fascism through the writings of Leon Trotsky (1879-1940) – who had lived through it from its height in Italy and Germany from 1919 to 1940s.Overall, Paxton’ss analysis of fascism takes account of some of the more recent developments in Britain like the rise of the British National Party (BNP) ‘wannabe’ fascist groups as arising from other forces through which Emile Durkheim termed “Organic Solidarity” (dominant in more advanced societies) and “Mechanical Solidarity” (dominant in more traditional societies) as the original Italian fascist movements did. Interestingly, the recent rise in the neo-fascist movements like the English Defence League (EDL) (not mentioned in the book) have branded Islamic Fundamental movements like Al-Qaeda and Taliban as fascist. Paxton’s answer to this, as according to the book: “… they are not reactions against a malfunctioning democracy. Arising in traditional hierarchical societies, their unity is, in terms of Emile Durkheim’s famous distinction, more mechanical than organic. Above all, they have not “given up free institutions, since they never had any.” On the question of what is Fascism? The answer in the book, clearly states that “Fascist actions are best from those actions for some of them remain unstated and implicit in fascist public language” which Paxton terms as “Mobilising Passions”.Finally, Paxton concludes: “…that when fascist are close to power when conservatives begin to borrow their techniques, appeal to their “mobilising passions” and try to co-opt the fascist following…” It is due to “having the historical knowledge” that we may be able to separate the ‘wannabe’ fascists “…with their shaved heads and swastika tattoos, from authentic functional equivalents in the form of a mature fascist-conservative alliance…” A must buy and read book!

⭐Shatters the preconception of fascism as an ideology of right or left. Shows how it progresses, it’s justifications for existence, how it occurs and what it’s ultimate goal is. Somewhat into the book so far, easy to read, decently formatted, and quite gripping. A strong recommend.

⭐Paxton’s “Anatomy of Fascism” is, in fact, more than an overview or introduction. It is focused on real Fascism in Italy and Germany from c. 1919-45 (but with adequate consideration of later developments and possible ‘Fascisms’ elsewhere). It is a scholarly and highly perceptive analysis of Fascism – by far the best that I’ve encountered so far anywhere. In a word, it is brilliant.

⭐An essential introduction to the history and mechanics of Fascism. Hard to find a better book that’s actually about Fascism as opposed to a specific movement.

⭐Hands down the best book I’ve read on fascism. This is less a book that provides a definition of fascism. Instead, its a book that shows the underlying mechanics of fascism and what conditions can cause it to develop.

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