Fascism (book)

Mussolini

  1. After Great War, organized a quasi-military group of former soldiers

    1. The Blackshirts

    2. They beat up socialists and communists and union leaders, broke strikes, kept potentially rebellious farm laborers in line

    3. Used to intimidate middle class politicians in order to spread Bolshevism to Italy

  2. Country already full of tension with industrialization north and poverty south

    1. Mussolini introduced extreme nationalism, confidence, and discipline

    2. Landowners and industrialists favor call to suppress anarchism and communism

      1. Financed the blackshirts

  3. 1922, Mussolini organized war veterans to march to Rome and made his way into the prime minister’s position

    1. Violence continues; many middle class begin to turn away from him

    2. Consolidates his power, arrests opponents, outlaws political parties

    3. Dictator in 1926

  4. Dictator

    1. Focused on power of state over individual rights

      1. Antiliberal

    2. Installed a system of corporations where the state organized all citizens in a common undertaking

      1. Replace independent unions with state-sanctioned ones

      2. Took over nation’s youth organizations

  5. 1935

    1. Invaded Ethiopia to avenge Italy

    2. Used Rome’s imperial past as motivator

    3. Patriotism to inspire nation

Hitler

  1. Germany embarrassed and in debt after Great War

    1. Weimar Republic’s liberal democracy is crumbling

    2. War called use of reason for stable society into question

    3. Age of anxiety

  2. Hitler steps in with National Socialist Party

    1. Promises to restore greatness and order

    2. Many support from young people and lower middle class without savings or job security

    3. Sees the people as a single organism bound by history and race

      1. Aryan race superior to others

      2. Race mixing led to civilization’s decline

      3. German who don’t have racial pride and purity needed to be culled

      4. Nazis target communists, homosexuals, and handicapped

      5. Selective breeding

    4. Uses Jews as a scapegoat for country’s problem (already a centuries old tradition in German)

      1. Jews are main threat

      2. Jewish racial characteristic contrasted with German folk virtues

      3. Must cull all Jews for racial purity to be achieved

  3. German Communist Party has some strong support too

    1. Conservatives thought they’d be able to control Hitler

    2. President reluctant but elevated Hitler for his support of a governing coalition

      1. Hitler only agrees if he is made chancellor

    3. Hitler is head of new government 1933

    4. Fire breaks out in German parliament one month later

      1. Hitler accuses communist party od treason and has them arrested

      2. Last members pass a law suspending constitutional protections for civil liberties for 4 years

      3. Allowed Hitler to rule as dictator

      4. Socialists also arrested and sent to camps

  4. Fuhrer Hitler

    1. Many sudden and extreme changes

      1. All other political parties abolished

      2. Germany’s federal structure replaced with centralized dictatorship in Berlin

      3. Replaced/took over independent organizations in civil society

    2. Religious leaders have restricted authority

      1. Protestant churches under tight control

      2. Catholic church properties seized and priests resistant to totalitarianism were imprisoned

    3. Jewish Problem

      1. Nuremberg laws in 1935

        1. No civil rights for Jews

        2. Banned intermarriage between Jews and other Germans

      2. Many emigrated but many stayed thinking German surely wouldn’t take it further

      3. 1938, Nazis launch attack on Jews in Germany and Austria

        1. Windows of homes, synagogues, and stores were smashed

        2. More Jews flee

        3. Those who stay forced into segregated ghettos

    4. Appeal

      1. Identified enemies for countries problems

      2. Promised traditional values of order and discipline

        1. Women called to nurture children

        2. Rallies and marches made people feel they’re part of something bigger than themselves

        3. Radio broadcasts and propaganda films built up excitement

      3. Economic success

        1. German unemployment drops from 6 million to under 200,000

        2. Ministries fixed prices and allocated resources with country’s largest corporations

        3. Large public work projects, super highways and large military, put Germans back to work

Stalin

  1. Total totalitarianism

  2. Put U.S.S.R on rapid industrialization based on 5 Years Plan

    1. Collectivization

      1. Moved millions of peasants into barracks on collective farms

      2. Many resist collectivization

      3. Stalin blames this on the kulaks

      4. Red army sent to the country side to help the masses and defeat kulaks

      5. Famine ensues

    2. No unemployment allowed

      1. Workers’ wages kept low to generate investment in further industrialization

  3. Very paranoid

    1. Great Purges

      1. Former comrades forces to confess to fake charges of treason before being killed

      2. ½ army’s officer corps killed or imprisoned