Convicted Felon Publishes "History" Book, Part 2.2

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The Heart of the Matter 

It's really when D'Souza gets down to the history of early fascism that he gets to the heart of the argument about the origins of American left in fascism. It's notable that much of D'Souza's account here is correct, and even some of his conclusions, e.g., that fascism combined the philosophies of syndicalism and nationalism. However, because he is nebulous with his terminology and he falls into the trap of oversimplification, his conclusion is laughable: "When you fuse the two ideas of 'nation' and 'socialism,' what you get is National Socialism."[1]

There are some big problems with that conclusion. Perhaps most importantly, it conflates syndicalism and socialism. Primarily, they differ in terms of where they invest power: with socialism, it is in the state; with syndicalism, it is with the workers. These are both anti-capitalist, but the necessary philosophical overlap ends there.

Socialism is universally recognized to be a left-wing ideology because of its stated goal of effecting social and economic equality through state control of the means of production. As we've already seen, socialism can be democratic or Marxist. Moreover, there is no necessary relationship between socialist economic policy and the inherent social repressiveness or openness of the state.

Syndicalism similarly has a brought range of manifestations. Spain had both left and right wing syndicalist groups exercising government power at different times. During the Spanish Civil War, left-wing anarcho-syndicalists, favoring a highly decentralized state and a socially permissive society, ruled Barcelona for a time. Conversely, the Falange party, which provided much of the ideological basis for the Franco regime, was characterized as right wing and national syndicalist. It was socially repressive, traditionalist, and authoritarian, but at least in theory, it sought to empower workers – but not at the expense of a strong state.

This is why it's important not only not to confuse socialism and syndicalism but also not to lump all varieties of syndicalism together. Where as in Anarchist Catalonia, class conflict and its resolution in favor of workers was at the core of the ruling ideology, in the Falange, the emphasis was on class collaboration, i.e., mitigating or preventing class conflict by having workers and managers empowered and facilitated in negotiating. This is the backbone of fascist corporatism (on which more below).

The second problem is the assumption by D'Souza that a syncretic combination of socialism and nationalism would be the equivalent of National Socialism, which is the same as assuming that any organization that chooses a name is automatically applying that name correctly from an objective standpoint. If you find this a compelling argument, consider whether you'd consider the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (i.e., North Korea) to be democratic or even a people's republic?

What D'Souza might not be aware of is that the Nazis were not the first political party to refer to themselves as national socialist. In fact, the concept predates fascism entirely and was certainly not inherently anti-Semitic until the Nazis got their hands on it. Among the earliest political attempts to fuse nationalism and socialism was the Czech National Social Party, which would today be characterized as a typically center-left European social democrat party. Many parties with similar platforms would similarly be called national socialist were it not for the NSDAP destroying the utility of the term. None of these parties were right wing; all of them believed in varying levels of socialism and a moderate civic nationalism, which is quite different from the ethnic nationalism lying at the core of fascism.

So fascism as a syncretic movement was really national syndicalism, with the nationalism heavily ethnic and the economic policy of syndicalism offered as a theoretical "third position" of neither capitalism or socialism. The extent to which these theoretical considerations of worker empowerment would be applied in reality would obviously vary on a case-by-case basis.

Therefore, when D'Souza moves on to associate fascism with progressivism, he merely takes a further step with the same foot with which he'd already taken his first false step. D'Souza's claim is that what tied the fascists and progressives together was a strong centralized state, but the Soviets and Nazis both had strong centralized states but were diametrically opposed politically. Even D'Souza doesn't claim the Soviets were fascists. That fascists and progressives share a believe in a strong centralized states (if that generalization is even true for progressives) implies nothing at all about further similarities.

When finally D'Souza, toward the end of this chapter, uses the term "corporatism," in identifying the term Mussolini used for his economic platform, he writes

… a more descriptive term would be state-run capitalism. Mussolini envisioned a powerful centralized state directing the institutions of private welfare, forcing their private welfare in line with the national welfare. Isn't this precisely how progressives view the federal government's control of banks, finance companies, insurance companies, health care, energy, and education?"[2] 

Well, frankly, no. While (some) progressives certainly favor a strong centralized state, they are not seeking state-run capitalism, which is a surprisingly accurate term for D'Souza to use for fascist corporatism in practice, if not in theory.

Understanding economic corporatism is arguably even more important than understanding syndicalism as a system of political economy. Corporatism has its roots in the Catholic Church as a strategy for organizing a cooperative society. The idea underlying corporatism is that every interest group within a society is represented by a corporation that negotiates in its interests. Within the Catholic paradigm, the church and the state would also be corporations that would also negotiate on their best interests.

Although always lurking in the background of Catholic philosophy, corporatism entered the modern period as a specific reaction to Marxism, seeking to replace Marx's core concept of "class struggle" with "class collaboration" (see above). In seeking to position itself as "neither left (socialist) nor right (communist)" in terms of economic policy, the fascists embraced corporatism as a way of taking the pre-existing trade union structure inherent to syndicalism and associated it formally with corporation-style government.

It is true to characterize this as a planned economy of sorts; however, at least in theory, it leaves much economic power decentralized and in the hands of workers. Moreover, it leaves much of the means of production in private hands; it merely prioritizes the exercise of political power by the state. In reality, the implementation of corporatism in fascist states varied from not being applied at all (in Nazi Germany) to being applied in a slipshod manner (as in Italy). Some authoritarian states applied a corporatist model as an anti-socialist measure, notably Austria under Dollfuss and Schuschnigg. None of them embraced socialism. None of them completely disempowered individual capitalists.

These are enormously important points to bear in mind as we move into the next chapter, which purports to detail the Democratic Party's history of fascism and its impact on European fascism.

The major points to bear in mind can best be expressed in the form of questions:

Would anyone characterize the white supremacist Democratic Party from Jackson to George Wallace as progressive? Why or why not? 

Did the Confederate States favor a strong centralized government? 

Were the Southern Democrats socialists or syndicalists? 

Although certainly racism will unite the Southern Democrats until the Franklin Roosevelt administration and the Nazis, it should be clear going forward that there is almost nothing else that does. In virtually every sense, on a social level, the Southern Democrats were highly repressive and therefore quite socially right wing or conservative. From an economic standpoint, they were capitalist and particularly favored the yeoman farm as the core economic unit of society. And politically, they were heavily in favor of "states' rights" -- thus, they by definition they opposed a strong, centralized state. Bear these points in mind going forward.

To be continued. 

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[1] Dinesh D'Souza, The Big Lie: Exposing the Nazi Roots of the American Left (Washington: Regnery, 2017), 1478.
[2] Ibid, 1500.