Fascist Totalitarianism: Characteristics, Ideology & Tactics

Fascist Totalitarianism: Characteristics and Methods

The fascist totalitarianism—especially Italian and German fascism—mainly shared the following characteristics: Their social support was mixed, creating a genuine mass movement that involved all social classes. It opposed liberal democracy, rejecting its institutions because they were considered ineffective in the face of economic crisis and social revolution. They rejected socialism, communism and the organized labor movement, which they dismantled and repressed. They exhibited a rooted nationalism that strengthened national feeling and unity, which degenerated into racist policies. They established a centralized totalitarian state with the party as the main organizational format. They created a charismatic leader (Il Duce in Italy, the Führer in Germany) who embodied all power and represented the nation. It established hierarchical social classes, organized by work in corporations, where company direction corresponded to the chief and the most able. They extolled militarism that permeated civil society; it was considered fundamental to indoctrinate youth in military and nationalistic values. Revanchism was resorted to and it justified war as a means to promote territorial expansion of an imperialist character.

Methods of Control and Propaganda

Strategies were used to spread terror (paramilitary forces, concentration camps) and to attract and manipulate the masses (propaganda through the media, large rallies, and cultural control). Italian fascism during the postwar period emerged from a situation of social disorder and political instability, caused by revolutionary attempts and social unrest in Italy, which weakened the democratic system and promoted the rise to power of Benito Mussolini (1922). He established a totalitarian political system called fascism, characterized by:

• Absolute power: Mussolini and the Fascist Party held total authority.
• Single-party system: elimination of political opposition and substitution of Parliament by the Fascist Grand Council.
• Ultranationalism: an ideology that led to aggressive policies toward other nations.
• Autarkic economics: a state-directed, interventionist economic policy and rearmament.
• Corporatism: promotion of corporatist organization and suppression of workers' rights (strikes were banned).
• State control of industry: private companies were under state surveillance; mining and industry were subordinated to state interests.
• Public works and agriculture: the construction of large public works and increases in agricultural production.