Giovanni Gentile on Fascism

Gentile is one of my favorite rightwing intellectuals, not because I agree with him of course, but because he is a true intellectual, and I respect that even in my ideological enemies.

Beats fake intellectual clowns like Jonah Goldberg any day of the weak. The fascists were not liars peddling bullshit and crap like so many of today's rightwing intellectuals. Classic fascist doctrine held a lot of important truths and was not dishonest at all. Instead of being a pile of crap and lies, it merely peddled repugnant truths.

The Doctrine of Fascism, by Gentile (supposedly by Mussolini himself, but Gentile actually wrote it) from 1932, is the clearest evocation of Mussolini-type fascism, which was different in important ways from the biological racism of the Nazis. Let's take a look at some excerpts from this seminal essay. In particular, we will note how Mussolini's fascism differs from Marxism, because the two are often confused.

Mussolini came to power after the "March on Rome" in 1922, and was appointed Prime Minister by King Victor Emmanuel.

In 1932 Mussolini wrote (with the help of Giovanni Gentile) an entry for the Italian Encyclopedia on the definition of fascism.

Let us now examine Leo Strauss, the father of the neocons. A woman named Shadia Drury has done an excellent job of explicating his work. Strauss operated very much in a Mussolini fascist tradition.

Two Drury articles are here - the first, by Drury herself - Saving America: Leo Strauss and the Neoconservatives - is an analysis of Strauss and the Straussians. The second is an interview with Drury - Noble Lies and Perpetual War.

I have read this material are recommend it highly. It's a bit hard to get through, but it's not Marx. If you read it carefully and really think about what you are reading, you may finally figure out what these neocons are really all about.

Drury notes some other authors who ply the same waters as Strauss - in particular Alexandre Kojève and Carl Schmitt. All of these have influenced the neocons. The unmistakable conclusion is that the neocons are fascists.

Astute reader James Hajduk sees Gentile as a "rightwing Hegelian". I agree with that odd analysis.

Gentile follows, in blockquotes, followed by my analysis.

Fascism, the more it considers and observes the future and the development of humanity quite apart from political considerations of the moment, believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace. It thus repudiates the doctrine of Pacifism -- born of a renunciation of the struggle and an act of cowardice in the face of sacrifice.

War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the peoples who have courage to meet it. All other trials are substitutes, which never really put men into the position where they have to make the great decision -- the alternative of life or death....

This is very Straussian. These guys believe in war for the sake of war and for no other reason. When man does not go to war, he becomes soft, decadent, depraved, cosmopolitan, and...democratic. He sits in cafes and becomes effete, devotes himself to pleasure, and develops a fear of death to the extent that he will hardly fight for anything anymore.

...The Fascist accepts life and loves it, knowing nothing of and despising suicide: he rather conceives of life as duty and struggle and conquest, but above all for others -- those who are at hand and those who are far distant, contemporaries, and those who will come after...

This is very "organic" blood-and-soil type stuff here.

...Fascism [is] the complete opposite of…Marxian Socialism, the materialist conception of history of human civilization can be explained simply through the conflict of interests among the various social groups and by the change and development in the means and instruments of production....

Fascism, now and always, believes in holiness and in heroism; that is to say, in actions influenced by no economic motive, direct or indirect.

More organic blood-and-soil type stuff here.

And if the economic conception of history be denied, according to which theory men are no more than puppets, carried to and fro by the waves of chance, while the real directing forces are quite out of their control, it follows that the existence of an unchangeable and unchanging class-war is also denied - the natural progeny of the economic conception of history.

And above all Fascism denies that class-war can be the preponderant force in the transformation of society....

Fascism actually arises when there is a severe crisis in capitalism such that the workers or the Left is about to seize power. As a last-ditch effort to save their power and money, the elite resorts to fascism. It's not ideal, but it's better than the alternative.

In 1921, Italy was semi-feudal. Peasants were rising up all over the land against the landlords who held almost all the land. The peasants worked on the land as farm laborers or rented land in debt bondage in a semi-feudal system. There was a Left revolution in the rural areas all over Italy.

This is when Italy started to go fascist, as the landed oligarchy in the countryside mobilized working class men as an army to attack the rural peasantry. The upshot was Mussolini's March on Rome the next year - 1922. Italian fascism needed a crisis, and they got one in 1921.

Note the use of working class, especially thuggish, young male, working class elements to attack the their brothers, the peasants. In the same way, Salvadoran fascism in recent years made use of young working class men as an army for the oligarchy - they constituted a significant portion of the death squads.

After Socialism, Fascism combats the whole complex system of democratic ideology, and repudiates it, whether in its theoretical premises or in its practical application.

Fascism denies that the majority, by the simple fact that it is a majority, can direct human society; it denies that numbers alone can govern by means of a periodical consultation, and it affirms the immutable, beneficial, and fruitful inequality of mankind, which can never be permanently leveled through the mere operation of a mechanical process such as universal suffrage....

Fascism at its core is simply elitist. That is all there is to it. It opposes democracy because they think that the masses are asses. Rule by the common man is the ultimate horror, not because he doesn't know what he is doing and will be persuaded to harm himself, but because this will lead to the pleasure society and the softening of men.

Further, the elite fears it will lead to a loss of power and money on their part. By denying the obvious existence of class struggle, fascism actually cements ruling class rule forever. It allows class struggle on the part of the elite, of course, but denies it on the part of the workers.

The business class is allowed a good profit, but Italian fascism may ask that they produce for the state instead. Producing for the state usually produces high profits for business in all varieties of fascism.

...Fascism denies, in democracy, the absurd conventional untruth of political equality dressed out in the garb of collective irresponsibility, and the myth of "happiness" and indefinite progress....

Fascism is actually opposed to the notion of the progress of men. Things are cemented and in some ways are timeless. We are the same as we were 100 or 1000 or 2000 years ago. Class relations, male and female roles, etc., are cemented forever in the name of tradition. Liberalism and even science is regarded with contempt.

Varieties of fascism similar to Italian fascism sprang up all over Europe in the 1920's and 1930's and were often very powerful. Note that conservatism is also generally opposed to the notion of progress of man. Man is man, he is the same as he will ever be, and all attempts at moving forwards are "social engineering" designed to upset the "natural order of things".

Conservatism often tosses in the notion that this "natural order of things" is ordained by whatever Deity is worshiped by the people.

The "natural order of things" usually means something like a few rich people owning just about everything and most everyone else having hardly even anything, but both conservatism and fascism regard this as "normal" and attempts to change this natural order as unnatural, doomed to failure and against human nature itself.

...Given that the nineteenth century was the century of Socialism, of Liberalism, and of Democracy, it does not necessarily follow that the twentieth century must also be a century of Socialism, Liberalism and Democracy: political doctrines pass, but humanity remains, and it may rather be expected that this will be a century of authority...a century of Fascism.

For if the nineteenth century was a century of individualism it may be expected that this will be the century of collectivism and hence the century of the State....

However, this collectivism preserves profits. It collectivizes workers and owners as one coherent mass with "mutual interests". This is quite the opposite of Marxism.

The foundation of Fascism is the conception of the State, its character, its duty, and its aim. Fascism conceives of the State as an absolute, in comparison with which all individuals or groups are relative, only to be conceived of in their relation to the State.

The conception of the Liberal State is not that of a directing force, guiding the play and development, both material and spiritual, of a collective body, but merely a force limited to the function of recording results: on the other hand, the Fascist State is itself conscious and has itself a will and a personality -- thus it may be called the "ethic" State....

It is true, from its foundations in the Dark Ages, when society continued to exist without the state, liberal society has always seen the people as being first and then the state.

The people create the state and run it. The state is run by the people themselves for their interests and is subordinate to them. The state and society are separate. This is the root structure of all Western liberal democracy, and it is in opposition to fascism and also to Russian thinking, where the state and society have always been one.

...The Fascist State organizes the nation, but leaves a sufficient margin of liberty to the individual; the latter is deprived of all useless and possibly harmful freedom, but retains what is essential; the deciding power in this question cannot be the individual, but the State alone....

...For Fascism, the growth of empire, that is to say the expansion of the nation, is an essential manifestation of vitality, and its opposite a sign of decadence. Peoples which are rising, or rising again after a period of decadence, are always imperialist; and renunciation is a sign of decay and of death.

Fascism is the doctrine best adapted to represent the tendencies and the aspirations of a people, like the people of Italy, who are rising again after many centuries of abasement and foreign servitude.

But empire demands discipline, the coordination of all forces and a deeply felt sense of duty and sacrifice: this fact explains many aspects of the practical working of the regime, the character of many forces in the State, and the necessarily severe measures which must be taken against those who would oppose this spontaneous and inevitable movement of Italy in the twentieth century, and would oppose it by recalling the outworn ideology of the nineteenth century - repudiated wheresoever there has been the courage to undertake great experiments of social and political transformation; for never before has the nation stood more in need of authority, of direction and order.

If every age has its own characteristic doctrine, there are a thousand signs which point to Fascism as the characteristic doctrine of our time. For if a doctrine must be a living thing, this is proved by the fact that Fascism has created a living faith; and that this faith is very powerful in the minds of men is demonstrated by those who have suffered and died for it.

This is classic stuff here. All fascism is imperialistic and expansionistic, because this is the natural and normal tendency of the tribe or nation as state. Fascism takes different ethnicities and molds them into one in the form of the state.

Fascism is Phoenix-like - a society used and abused for foreigners, fallen into decadence, enslavement and weakness, will rise again, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of its own abasement, mining the glory of the nation's past (in Mussolini's case, there were constant evocations of reclaiming the ancient glory that was Rome) to once again rise in the tradition of the elders to the greatness that is the destiny of the people of that nation.

There is an ethnic (or at least national) supremacism here, no matter how much folks try to say Mussolini was not racist.

Note: Readers should carefully read the Commenting Rules before commenting to avoid having their comments edited or deleted and to avoid being banned from the site.