Capitalism - efficient use of capital and labor, since those who produce goods and services others want, or invest their money in said production, receive payments from others.
Democracy - The people get a say in how their country is run. While this has a downside in that the people’s voice become averaged out, with plenty of idiots in the average, and only 1-2 candidates will have any mathematical chance of being elected, at least the people generally vote for what they feel is in their best interests.
Communism - The state owns all the businesses and provides everyone a job. You cannot be unemployed. The state provides everyone healthcare and food and housing. You may not receive the best healthcare/food/housing in the world, but you probably will receive something instead of nothing, regardless of whether you are able to work a job others find valuable. Since the state controls all the capital, it can reinvest those resources in technological advances and scientific research and infrastructure upgrades, allowing an agricultural society to become a nuclear armed world power within mere decades.
Dictatorship - one person controls the country. That one person sees dissent as a possible threat to his own life, and so brutally suppresses it. This means that in societies where rival tribes are inches from fighting a civil war from another, neither tribe can mass murder the other because the dictator suppresses both. (Sadaam probably only had to murder a few hundred people a year, preventing what turn out to be hundreds of thousands of deaths)
Similarly, the dictator may order efforts the modernize the society, or at least the capital city, so that the people can be more productive and efficient and increase the dictator’s personal power. The trains run on time, and other public infrastructure is well kept for because those who mismanage public funds (which belong to the dictator effectively) are punished severely.
Fascism - uh, goose stepping and cool uniforms? The companies get state support and so are worse than both capitalism and communism? What positive qualities does this form of government have?
Fascism and dictatorship are only minorly different. The benefits you outline for the latter are pretty much the same as for the former.
The difference is one of degree and tone but dictatorship tends to be used to describe a government built around a strongman who has come to have absolute power on an ad hoc basis, built around no particular idealogy. Fascism is in effect not much different but tends to be used to describe a situation where the dictator might be a party rather than one person, and where the absolute consolidation of power is viewed as an idealogically beneficial situation rather than simply an outcome of the dictator’s rule.
The benefits of fascism are (in theory) the efficiency of single minded government unhampered by the “committee effect” that occurs when alternate points of view are given airtime.
Well this is interesting. It makes me wonder - are fascist governments capable of self reflection and deliberation, then? You read about modern China making decisions that sound really, really good and, well, wise. Such as deciding to invest massively in research in artificial intelligence and robotics, to require that coal plants adhere to the strictest possible emissions standards, to change policy and stop building new coal plants, to restrict public university funding to degrees that actually pay for themselves.
All these things require a Central Committee of educated leaders who aren’t dogmatic about any given ideology but are actually deciding what the right decision to do is based on reputable evidence.
The people I see demanding fascism are stuck on beliefs.
They *believe *gun rights must be unrestricted and are uninterested in whether or not personal gun ownership is worth the benefits.
They believe in a particular religion and are uninterested in anything but it’s tenants.
They *believe *the solution to law and order is more and more severe punishment for crimes. They are uninterested in evidence regarding the effectiveness of punishment, they just want the criminals to be tortured as much and as long as possible.
They *believe *torture works and are uninterested in actually hearing if it really works.
They *believe *a particular form of energy is only fading away because of environmentalists, and are uninterested in hearing the truth.
I think the benefits of fascism are mostly psychological. You’re told you’re part of a great system with a wonderful destiny. And all your problems and set-backs are given an enemy you can blame them on and attack. It’s all lies but they’re attractive lies.
I think you’re confusing American far-rightism with fascism. Fascism doesn’t necessarily have to involve most of the above qualities.
The most famous example, of course, being Nazi Germany - the Third Reich cared little for religion, so it doesn’t have to stick to a religion, as you mention; in fact, fascism may be most compatible with downright atheism.
As for gun ownership - hardly, in fact, a fascist regime may have the most vested interest in confiscating guns owned by its private citizenry.
As for energy - it would be perfectly possible and plausible for a fascist regime to embrace non-oil energy, if that served the regime’s interests. (Imagine a fascist tyranny with no natural petroleum to drill, but plenty of wind, tidal, solar, nuclear, geothermal power.) Power is power. Energy is energy. Electricity is electricity. No reason fascism has to be all about petrocarbons.
Don’t confuse those who come to power in a fascist state with those stupid enough to put them there.
Clever populist fascists will say whateverthehell gets them fanatical support. They don’t need to believe in what they are saying, and probably often don’t. They are good at finding the emotional buttons of the uneducated and pushing them unashamedly.
I mean, first you have to define fascism, don’t you? It wasn’t a very well defined term to begin with, and has been used as a pejorative for so long that any meaning it once had has been diluted.
Under some definitions of fascism, you could include governments like the government of Singapore. And there you have your answer.
Fascism, communism, dictatorship, theocracy, absolute monarchies…all are different flavours of totalitarianism which has the virtue of certainty and clarity of purpose and people can be drawn to that and feel comfortable with it…for a while.
Often, fascism isn’t the most preferred in the absolute sense but is more preferable in a relative sense after a series of weak and ineffectual rulers. There’s a longing for a strongman to step in and do what needs to be done, even at the expense of political freedom.
Take a look at the Philippines under Duterte for example. Most people acknowledge that he’s a violent and often simplistic man but the drug problem had gotten so bad that they were willing to elect in someone willing to murder drug dealers wholesale, even if it meant some his political enemies got murdered in the process.
I fear whatever government replaces Maduro’s in Venezuela will be similarly fascistic. The opposition in Venezuela hasn’t ever shown a strong regard for democracy and whoever assumes control is going to need the backing of the military. The population just wants to be able to put food on the table and have regular medical imports again and if fascism is what it takes to get there, then maybe that’s worth the tradeoff.
You saw a lot of the same instincts in America after 9/11 among the segment of the population that now believed terrorism was the #1 problem facing America. There were a number of popular movements to give incredible power to the government, all in the name of possibly saving just one more life from terrorism.
We have a tendency to retreat to fascism out of fear, some of it justified and some of it stoked by vested powers. The positive quality is that fascism offers itself as a solution to fear. That you can use the vast power of the state to directly attack the fear rather than hold to more pluralistic values like human rights and due process.
Had it really though? Or is the drug menace perception more a matter of scapegoating than reality?
This isn’t a rhetorical question, I really don’t know. I guess I’m just always more than a little sceptical about those seeking to gain kudos off fighting The Drug Menace.
I’ll preface any comment by saying I think Fascism is a much worse system than Democracy and that I’m very much playing the devil’s advocate here, but let’s not pretend that Democracy is perfect. It’s only when you analyze the flaws of Democracy with an honest and fairly objective perspective that you can really understand how Fascism can have any good aspects to it.
Terms are important though. I assume you mean Fascism as Mussolini described it when he coined the term out of thin air: Fascism is the merger of the State and Religion - the State becomes the Religion, and all ideas, truths, goals, and morals come from the State. This is powerful, because you take the dedication intrinsic to religion and wield it with specific intent.
It is extremely effective at galvanizing a population towards specific aims, and pushing that population towards a set of norms and moral principles. Yes, the Nazi’s and Italian Fascists espoused horrible norms and principles, but that has less to do with Fascism and more to do with those particular leaders being psychopaths. For instance, if instead of the ethnic purity of the Nazi’s, the Germans had embraced militant multiculturalism, liberals (read: those upholding the idea of Liberalism/Democracy) might not be so horrified by them.
In a single generation, a Fascist society could completely eradicate racism by controlling all education and breaking the parent to child cycle of teaching hate. A Fascist society dedicated to the sciences could eradicate all moral principles that stand in the way of progress, such as opposition to stem cell research and cloning.
The reason these things didn’t happen is because the Fascist leaders set about purging ethnicities, religious affiliations and homosexuals instead of setting moral standards like “anti-science is a taint.”
You can’t do these things effectively in a Democracy. In a Democracy, morals and beliefs come from the people and - assuming we’re talking a Republic - are represented by duly elected officials who fight for these causes from the top down. In a Fascist state, there is no representation of unacceptable beliefs. They are punished, purged, ostracized or otherwise rendered powerless. Only the Orthodox Way exists in a functional Fascist state, which is great when the Orthodox Way is exactly Your Way.
I think your post is in general thrust highly perceptive.
The only thing I take issue with is this: “For instance, if instead of the ethnic purity of the Nazi’s, the Germans had embraced militant multiculturalism, liberals…”
There are certain values and ideas that correlate to education and thought, and certain values and ideas that correlate to lack of education and instinctive reaction.
I don’t think it is coincidence that fascism has historically tended towards the latter to galvanize its supporters. I could be wrong but don’t think that fascism would get off the ground if it tried to rouse the general populace to strong emotion with stirring tales of multiculturalism.
They wouldn’t have to approach it so directly. Teach the people to be intolerant of those who look at differences between people. Teach all to hate those impure, tainted ones who have the gall to question the validity of Tradition, like the Tradition of assimilating all the best features of all the best people of the world. After all, those who would reject multiculturalism really want to undermine our ability to grow, advance and evolve. They are parasites, seeking to advance their own limited ways and deprive us of all our god given right to appropriate all that is glorious.
Fascism runs off of hate of the other as much as it does off of love of self. One must simply be strategic in what and who becomes the other.
Edit: I’m bending things a little here. Mousolini rants about tradition, and would find multiculturalism disgusting and barbaric. But just as Nazism was a branch of Fascism with a lot of differences, so too am I envisioning a branch not directly equivalent to Italy