21st century fascism
- Thread starter love detective
- Start date
goldenecitrone
post tenebras lux
Who knows what's around the corner? In the mid-eighties I had no idea that the Soviet Union and Eastern bloc were about to collapse. Interesting times.
camouflage
gaslit at scale.
Egypt is the new beacon of (the struggle for) democracy. Occupy seems to be the defender at the moment. Frankly; a dire situation.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
One small but potentially very important point from the article that i want to pick up on and mentioned at the time of the french elections: classically support for the far right within the w/c came from sections of the traditional industrial w/c put out of work, suffering from competition from other groups and global conditions and not integrated within the labour movement. Today this support within the w/c is now just as likely to come across the whole circuit of capital not just the industrial or traditional urban working class. Post-1973-74 we've seen an aggressive financialisation/commodification/etc of distribution/circulation/administration/social reproduction type sectors of the economy with a consequent proletarianisation of the conditions of the the workers.
Now given the breakdown of those integrating labour movement bodies and institutions during a period in which these already deteriorating conditions are under further attack we have seen a rise in support for the far-right in these areas the potential must surely exist for a rise in support for the far-right on a class basis, but not on the traditional middle classes against the working class/labour movement (as was), but on a working class vs elites/austerity (rhetorically anyway, in actuality being manipulated by fractions of those elites) and vs sections of the w/c bolstered by the internal divisions that official muli-culturalism helped develop. The very ubiquity of capital relations fostering a sort of reactionary anti-capitalism but on a wider social basis than classical fascism,
(Just a few thoughts on where things may go - need to check where exactly (territorialy and economically) support for the far right is focused in europe first before suggesting this is anything beyond a few preliminary thoughts - not suggesting the bitch is in heat again or anything).
Now given the breakdown of those integrating labour movement bodies and institutions during a period in which these already deteriorating conditions are under further attack we have seen a rise in support for the far-right in these areas the potential must surely exist for a rise in support for the far-right on a class basis, but not on the traditional middle classes against the working class/labour movement (as was), but on a working class vs elites/austerity (rhetorically anyway, in actuality being manipulated by fractions of those elites) and vs sections of the w/c bolstered by the internal divisions that official muli-culturalism helped develop. The very ubiquity of capital relations fostering a sort of reactionary anti-capitalism but on a wider social basis than classical fascism,
(Just a few thoughts on where things may go - need to check where exactly (territorialy and economically) support for the far right is focused in europe first before suggesting this is anything beyond a few preliminary thoughts - not suggesting the bitch is in heat again or anything).
camouflage
gaslit at scale.
Blah blah T-Party sort of thing blah blah something about a horny dog. Too many damn Marxists on this forum.
Divisive Cotton
Now I just have my toy soldiers
Because the core constituency itself has changed. The industrial working class has been decimated and has moved on or been forced to move on, replaced in whole swathes of areas by a permanently unemployed lumpen mass
It is no accident that the former in Italy and France that were once strongholds of the Communist Party are now strongholds of the far right and are also the areas with the most concentrated unemployment.
Riklet
procrastinación
Blah blah T-Party sort of thing blah blah something about a horny dog. Too many damn Marxists on this forum.
Have you even read (all) the article? To say your contributions to this thread have been lacking is an understatement. Do you really expect to be taken seriously when this is the best you can come up with? Some people are writing genuine thought out stuff ya plank, if you disagree with them maybe you could do the same?
camouflage
gaslit at scale.
I don't disagree, just having a laff ya tit.
My only point there being a quik juxtapose of the American Tea-Party to what butchers was (or seemed to be) saying.... and letting it be known that I could be wrong because the Marxish manner of description can be a bit thick to make sense of for a humble layman like me. So back off fella.
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
Certainly this is what is happening in Italy and to a lesser extent Germany. In Italy the 'main' fascist organisations ie Forza Nuova and CasaPound are campainging against Monti and the Troika, against the bankers dominating life and work. Their campaigning has changed their 'anti-immigrant' stance from a 'racial' view to opposition to the bosses using immigration to ramp up the cheap labour. Not that the racial views of the likes of Evola etc have been dumped, merely not used as much at present because it has less traction that the anti-banker stuff. Alot of the public stalls/leafletting of FN and CPI has been on the economy and the need for a 'social' approach to the economy, opposition to the 'Borghesi' the bourgeois screwing the economy for profit etc etc.
In fairness however this has been a tack the Italian far-right has taken for a few years. The 'mutuo sociale' ie 'social mortgage' campaign of the far-right for the past 6-8 years was similar to campaigns the extra-parliamentary Left conducted there in the 1970's. Leftists mates of mines in Rome commented that ironically with Berlusconi in power that more fascists in government was 'better' in that the fash at least believed in a social safety net and a 'welfare state' whilst Berlusca would have been happy to do what Cameron is doing now.
camouflage
gaslit at scale.
From my cursory glance at French politics this is how their fash are walking too now, anti-banker etc.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Pretty much the exact opposite of the tea party - based as that is around clear anti w/c lines and a fake managed popular appeal. And pretty much like the examples that fed gave. The key bit is that modern capitalism has produced a a far larger working class and working class political 'area' than the classic industrial working class of pre-ww2 fascism and so attraction to the far-right as a response to social issues today in the form of a pro-working class agenda (leaving aside the fact that this isn't what these programs actually are but what they offer) means that if successful it will be on a far larger scale and with more social depth than historically. And it won't appear in the guise of the tea party demanding an end to 'entitlements' but of a class demand for entitlements - see the examples fed gave.Blah blah T-Party sort of thing blah blah something about a horny dog. Too many damn Marxists on this forum.
Forget the idea of modern fascism being neo-liberal - that's going to lead you up the garden path from the first step you take.
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
Yes, from the Rote SA (Red SA), Strasserism, Italian Social Republic, Socialist Reich Party of the past through to the International Thrid Position and '3rd millenia fascism' of today. In Germany the use of the slogan Frei, soziale und nazionale' (Free, social and national) is also a nod to the 'anti-capitalist' fascism which is expressed by the Nationalist Autonomen in Germany.
Strasserism in Germany was in realisty anti what they viewed as 'useless capitalism' by which they meant speculation and financiers which also had, as Blagsta says, a virulent strain of antisemitism. They weren't so vocal against what they saw as 'useful capitalism' such as industrial/German capitalism. This was allied perfectly to their view that Marxism/Bolshevism was Jewish socialism (which tiesd in with their view that capitalism and communism were financed by Jews) whereas Strasserism' was 'German Socialsm'
camouflage
gaslit at scale.
I take your point, maybe the United States are a special case that would fart-out their own special neo-liberal brand of fascism because on average they're such Political Idiots (no such thing as class in Yankland? How stupid are you fuckers anyway).
for the rest of it meanwhile here in Europe I see what you're saying.
Blagsta
Minimum cage, maximum cage
And loads of these ideas are common currency with conspiraloons, new age hippies and some of the Occupy movement.
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
Interestingly, and tying in perfectly with the themes LD and buthcers mentioned, there is in Italy a 'rise' in the name of Nicola Bombacci. Bombacci was a founding and leading member of the Italian Communist Party. He was also a friend of Mussolini during his days in the Italian SP and in later years a friend and comrade of Lenin. Bombacci however ended up as part of Mussolini's 'RSI' (Italian Social Republic) and during and after the 'Congress of Verona' in 1943 expounded the idea of 'socialization' of the economy. Mussolini desperate for support claimed this was what fascism was really meant to be and that it wasn't anti-working class. Unsurprisingly none of the 'Leftist' ideas were implemented. Bombacci ended his days 'hanging around' Milanese petrol stations with Mussolini.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Yes, Casa Pound had a conference on him end of last year, a very revealing move.
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
They also had meetings last year on Che Guevara and are notably pro IRA/Hunger Strikers, even using Sands left-leaning quotes to bolster their credentials. Much to the disgust of Sands family and the Bobby Sands Trust thay also released a Bobby Sands Cider.
They are also now using 'anti-imperialist' rhetoric to aloly to their 'working-class' demands. Again, as with Mussolini's claim, they are certainly leaning heavily on the 'social' elements of fascism, putting the socialism into national socialism as it were.
I read the IWCA article , hoping yet again for some rather more wideranging counter strategy to the detailed listing of the gains of the Far Right across Europe as the CAPITALIST SYSTEM's crisis deepens, and produces the usual scapegoatism of minorities, and selective posturing against "finance Capital" and nationalisic bombast by the Far Right/fascists. (as Fedayn and others have detailed, this is all VERY familiar from the Strasserite/SA, Salo Republic, "Left Radicalism" of fascism when it is in its "attract the working class phase". And historically, not just now, what a potent, strategy/tactic it is).
What we get, however, in the article, as "the way forward" from the IWCa is , as usual:
"There is a counter-strategy: for those radically opposed to fascism and neo-liberalism to get on the landings and take on the fascists there, by engaging with and responding to working class concerns, and articulating progressive, pro-working class solutions. That is where battle is to be joined, for now. But if that challenge is not taken up, the battles against fascism in the future will likely be considerably more daunting".
Now Socialists will ALL agree with this bit , but of course , unlike the IWCA, who seem only to interact with the "working class" precisely when it ISN'T "working". ie when it is just a RESIDENT on a housing estate and powerless CONSUMER of goods and services , rather than in the WORKPLACE where the working class actually has potential POWER to confront capitalism through the rebuilding of militant trades unionism, Socialists actually have a wideranging analysis of capitalism, its crisis, and the social system which the working class can struggle towards as an ALTERNATIVE to capitalism.
I'm afraid the IWCA's "muscular working class localist self help liberalism" (yeh, yeh, not very snappy I know, I challenge anyone else to define what the organisation actually stands for) continually bigs up the claimed unstoppable rise of the Far Right, belittles the efforts of the Left to build anti fascist organisation, trades union action against the cuts , and work against the cuts in local communities, whilst itself having only one mantra of "get out onto the landings with local activity" as its supposedly astonishingly innovative counter-strategy.
There certainly isn't a large social democratic or revolutionery political movement or militant mass trades union movement comparable to the 20's or 30's nowadays in Europe to challenge the power of Capitalism to make us pay for the crisis. There is also , as ever, mass acceptance of the most racist and chauvinist ideologies amongst the European working classes,for fascist movements to feed on, but what's new there ? All this is true. But Europe is only a PART of the world-wide working class struggle against the capitalist offensive, and the job of socialists in Europe is STILL to try to build, through struggle, militant trades unionism and political action, as part of this world wide struggle.
Working class self help localism, WITHIN CAPITALISM, , and a rejection of socialist politics, just aint going to provide any sort of way forward, just demoralization, and ever greater political compromise by groups with this limited agenda, with key aspects of the ideological armoury of capitalist reaction.
But then you would have expected me to say that wouldn't you.
What we get, however, in the article, as "the way forward" from the IWCa is , as usual:
"There is a counter-strategy: for those radically opposed to fascism and neo-liberalism to get on the landings and take on the fascists there, by engaging with and responding to working class concerns, and articulating progressive, pro-working class solutions. That is where battle is to be joined, for now. But if that challenge is not taken up, the battles against fascism in the future will likely be considerably more daunting".
Now Socialists will ALL agree with this bit , but of course , unlike the IWCA, who seem only to interact with the "working class" precisely when it ISN'T "working". ie when it is just a RESIDENT on a housing estate and powerless CONSUMER of goods and services , rather than in the WORKPLACE where the working class actually has potential POWER to confront capitalism through the rebuilding of militant trades unionism, Socialists actually have a wideranging analysis of capitalism, its crisis, and the social system which the working class can struggle towards as an ALTERNATIVE to capitalism.
I'm afraid the IWCA's "muscular working class localist self help liberalism" (yeh, yeh, not very snappy I know, I challenge anyone else to define what the organisation actually stands for) continually bigs up the claimed unstoppable rise of the Far Right, belittles the efforts of the Left to build anti fascist organisation, trades union action against the cuts , and work against the cuts in local communities, whilst itself having only one mantra of "get out onto the landings with local activity" as its supposedly astonishingly innovative counter-strategy.
There certainly isn't a large social democratic or revolutionery political movement or militant mass trades union movement comparable to the 20's or 30's nowadays in Europe to challenge the power of Capitalism to make us pay for the crisis. There is also , as ever, mass acceptance of the most racist and chauvinist ideologies amongst the European working classes,for fascist movements to feed on, but what's new there ? All this is true. But Europe is only a PART of the world-wide working class struggle against the capitalist offensive, and the job of socialists in Europe is STILL to try to build, through struggle, militant trades unionism and political action, as part of this world wide struggle.
Working class self help localism, WITHIN CAPITALISM, , and a rejection of socialist politics, just aint going to provide any sort of way forward, just demoralization, and ever greater political compromise by groups with this limited agenda, with key aspects of the ideological armoury of capitalist reaction.
But then you would have expected me to say that wouldn't you.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Say what?
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Decimation wouldn't have been so bad. This was wholesale slaughter.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
A bit presumptuous, to say the least.
Yes, and when some of them manage to relate their analyses sufficiently to the real world of insecure employment and it's concomitant of weak trade union militancy, I'm sure people will give them a fair hearing. It's not enough to prate about "if onlys", it's also necessary to actually conceptualise and disseminate solutions to the above problems in order to realise your goals.
At present "socialists" don't do that, they're mostly still to busy fighting the last war.
Well, I certainly expect you to randomly intersperse your hectoring posts with SHOUTING. Are you deaf?
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
One of their interesting 'detours' is the support for the Karen struggle in Burma and various other nationalist/self-determinationist struggles throughout the world. They seem to be developing an internationalist nationalist view of the world. They are trying to mkake inroads into the anti-globalisation movement by counterposing the drive to globalisation with nationalism/self-determination.
Trotsky said, placards, first-year undergraduates, scum off the estates.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
newbie
undisambiguated
there's another significant difference.
In the 20s and 30s the vast bulk of the working class had little or nothing to call their own except perhaps a few household goods and some clothes. Nor did they have any expectation or anticipation of any change to that other than via income from selling their labour.
We now live in a stakeholder society. The proportion of the population that has as little stake as their forebears in the 30s has shrunk substantially, to be replaced by a working class that collectively holds major assets. The working class now has a huge wealth embodied in personal pensions in particular. They also have ownership stakes in housing (including holiday and btl), in savings, in shareholdings, insurance policies and all sorts of other tangibles and intangibles. I don't know whether that stake is held by the majority of the working class, or just by a substantial minority, but either way it's far in excess of what the w/c held in the 30s. Distribution across generations is skewed, so there are many who have little stake in their own right but have an anticipation of inheritance.
So it's no longer true to say the working class has nothing to lose but their chains.
We also live in the remnants of a welfare state where many of us are, or know those who are, directly dependent on state pensions, benefits, healthcare and so on (again, I've no idea if this a majority or just a major minority).
The working class also, and this is just as important, owns a vast amount of debt. The interplay (again, particularly in housing) between working class asset stakeholding and debt is a factor that was almost entirely absent in the 20s and 30s.
Am I the only one who thinks those factors have made a gamechanging difference to the way political ideas develop?
petee
no gods, no malarkey
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Yes, all those factors now exist - and they're all now under generalised attack from those who are supposed to ensure their survival - people are seeing their pensions shriveling up in front of their eyes - does this too not play a role in the way political ideas develop? Your response is surely by the by anyway (unless you can directly relate it to a discussion on the potential growth of a contemporary far right and what forms this may take, what issues it may mobilise around and what success it may have) as it seems to imagine that other posters or the IWCA article is starting not from the position that everything has changed, let's see how and what this means but form the suggestion that an idealised working class from the past that is rearing up for revolution and is only held back by the integrative forces of the reformist unions and political parties exists today and needs to be 'talked to' for them to realise they need only their chain to fall about them. I don't think that anyone is starting from that position though (EXCEPT MAYBE AYATOLLAH).
newbie
undisambiguated
no, I don't imagine I'm the only one to have noticed these things, of course not. However to have a discussion about the hold political ideology can have without even mentioning this is like neglecting to mention not only the elephant, but also the sofa and all the rest of the room.
The article is framed in terms of comparison between now and then- but only narrow comparison of working class organisation and left/right reach. Fine if that's what interests you but I'm not sure I see much relevance to life as it's lived today... the focus on 'landings' being a bit of a giveaway. I'm no theorist and I'm not going to start lecturing you, LD, JR etc (what would be the point, you'd just laugh
). What I'd like is for one of you- who can research and think this stuff through much better than me- to address the material and social issues the real working class is facing now. Not an imaginary w/c that all live on landings with a common landlord but the real one where a big proportion are doing quite alright thanks jack and where the dominant ideological battle is not between the far left and far right but between differing graduations of individualism with a whiff of social democracy.
The article is framed in terms of comparison between now and then- but only narrow comparison of working class organisation and left/right reach. Fine if that's what interests you but I'm not sure I see much relevance to life as it's lived today... the focus on 'landings' being a bit of a giveaway. I'm no theorist and I'm not going to start lecturing you, LD, JR etc (what would be the point, you'd just laugh
). What I'd like is for one of you- who can research and think this stuff through much better than me- to address the material and social issues the real working class is facing now. Not an imaginary w/c that all live on landings with a common landlord but the real one where a big proportion are doing quite alright thanks jack and where the dominant ideological battle is not between the far left and far right but between differing graduations of individualism with a whiff of social democracy.Similar threads
