Comparing Fascism, Communism and Nazism

Fascism vs. Communism Communism and fascism are two influential ideologies associated with European totalitarianism in the 20th century. Though communism contributed to the rise of fascism and Soviet Union’s expansion during Cold War, I believe that fascism had more influence at the time: its favor of authoritarianism gave rise to violent dictatorship in fascist nations, its hatred for other races led to the notorious Holocaust, and its ultranationalism stimulated German expansionism which catalyzed the outbreak of WWII; those catastrophes controlled the way people lived, caused great damage to the involved nations and races, and ultimately led to new world order with United States and Soviet Union as sole superpowers. The defining characteristics of the two ideologies were crucial to the nature of the regimes and their influence on the world. Fascism is an authoritarian single-party state based on “mystical nationalism, often with racist elements and especially a charismatic leader who presents himself as a national savior .”

Fascism is defined as, “an authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization.” Peter Hyland reports that throughout the 1920s and the 1930s, an economic depression was growing and becoming widespread throughout the world. People were losing faith in their democracies and in capitalism. Leaders who gained power supported powerful militarism, nationalism, and initiated the return of an authoritarian rule. J.R. Oppenheimer says that the rise of fascism and totalitarianism in Europe and Russia instigated a “critical step on the path to war.” In 1922, Benito Mussolini held leadership in Italy, promising a proficient and militaristic nationalistic state. During his control as prime minister, he gained a large group of followers, banned the disparagement of government, and used extreme violence against his enemies within the parliament.

Fascism in the 1920’s lead Europe to support for the middle class people. Not many people have first-hand accounts with Fascism. For me, it was a family member born in Fascist Italy. “They built modern train systems, provided meals for kids at school, provided money for families who had grandparents living with them, provided activities for kids in the summer, and street lighting.”(Renato Pellegrini, My Grandfather). With the modern train systems, people were able to get across the country a lot quicker than the older trains. Fascism in Italy gave kids meals at school because many families could not afford to feed their children several times a day. Fascism in Italy gave its people an understanding that Mussolini was their second “god”. Fascism in Italy also provided families with extra money who had their grandparents living with them. During the Fascist rule, many families were not able to afford to feed their families, let alone grandparents. The government was able to supply them with enough money to feed their family. Fascism also ...

Even though fascism is mostly condemned by todays politicians and did succeed in producing one of the most radical and hated group of extremist of the last century, it did achieve a lot of good when it came to repairing countries that had nearly collapsed under the crushing weight of the Great Depression and the extreme inflation that came with it, and giving the people of that period faith in a time where faith had little meaning; However must always come to an end, and with the outbreak of World War Two and the defeat of Germany and Italy, all the death that fascism caused came to light and now very few people around the world believe that fascism is the only political view that will save the world form self-destruction.

Fascism in Europe rose and spread quickly because of the World War I which left very complex and sptriual vacuum behind.Europe was shaken by violent political and economic convulsions and in half of Europe the old conservative order had dissappeared.The moral values of the world of yesterday had vanished and the middle calsses had become very poor.In fact, the last vestiges of civilization seemed threatened by a new, highly popular phenomenon whose name is Bolshevism.Those who believed that a strong leadership and a new order were needed but who found communism unaccaptable craved a political alternative and it was the fascism.Fascism was nationalist,elitist and antiliberal and als...

Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany as Totalitarian Atates A totalitarian state refers to a country in which the central government exercises total control over all aspects of people's life. Main features include an infallible leader, one-party rule, strict party discipline, elitism, planned economy, an official doctrine, absolute obedience of individuals to the State, nationalism and usually an expansionist foreign policy. Up to these criteria, both Fascist Italy (1922-43) and Nazi Germany (1933-45) could be deemed totalitarian states to a large extent.

Since mainstream left-liberal media do not seriously ask this question, the analysis of what has gone wrong and where we are heading has been mostly off-base. Investigation of the kinds of under-handed, criminal tactics fascist regimes undertake to legitimize their agenda and accelerate the rate of change in their favor is dismissed as indulging in "conspiracy theory." Liberals insist that this regime must be treated under the rules of "politics as usual." But this doesn't consider that one election has already been stolen, and that September's repeat of irregularities in Florida was a clear warning that more such thuggery is on the way. If the "f" word is uttered, liberals are quick to note certain obvious dissimilarities with previous variants of fascism and say that what is happening in America is not fascist. It took German justice minister Herta Daeubler-Gmelin to make the comparison explicit (under present American rules of political discourse, she has been duly sacked from her cabinet post); but at the liberal New York Times or The Nation, American writers dare not speak the truth. The masked assertion that we are immune to the virus ignores degrees of convergence and distinction based on the individual patient's history. The Times and other liberal voices have been obsessed over the last year with the rise of minority fascist parties in the Netherlands, France, and other European countries. They have questioned the tastefulness of new books and movies about Hitler, and again demonized such icons of Nazism as Leni Riefenstahl. Is this perhaps a displacement of American anxiety onto the safer European scene, liberal intellectuals here not wanting to confront the troubling truth? The pace of events in the last year has been almost as blindingly fast as it was after Hitler's Machtergreifung and the consolidation of fascist power in 1933. Speed stuns and silences.

Each and every individual country has its own ideologies, economies, and ways of governing. In the early 1900’s Italy had developed its own ideology that had a huge impact on the lives of the Italian people. This ideology was known as Fascism. Fascism was not only a way of governing, but it was also known as a social organization. Fascism became what it was in response to the movement of social theories. There is much more behind the idea of fascism such as where it came from, who the creator of Fascism was, and why it was popular among many civilians.

Sheldon Richman, an author for The Concise Encyclopedias of Economics refers to fascism as “socialism with a capitalist veneer.” He continues

The Difficulty of Liberal and Democratic Politicians to Oppose the Rise of Fascism in the Years 1919-1922