Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement, characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy. Opposed to anarchism, democracy, pluralism, egalitarianism, liberalism, socialism, and Marxism, fascism is at the far right of the traditional left–right spectrum.
Neo-fascism is a post-World War II far-right ideology that includes significant elements of fascism. Neo-fascism usually includes ultranationalism, ultraconservatism, racial supremacy, right-wing populism, authoritarianism, nativism, xenophobia, and anti-immigration sentiment, sometimes with economic liberal issues, as well as opposition to social democracy, parliamentarianism, Marxism, capitalism, communism, and socialism. As with classical fascism, it occasionally proposes a Third Position as an alternative to market capitalism.
The British Union of Fascists (BUF) was a British fascist political party formed in 1932 by Oswald Mosley. Mosley changed its name to the British Union of Fascists and National Socialists in 1936 and, in 1937, to the British Union. In 1939, following the start of the Second World War, the party was proscribed by the British government and in 1940 it was disbanded.
The New Party was a political party briefly active in the United Kingdom in the early 1930s. It was formed by Sir Oswald Mosley, an MP who had belonged to both the Conservative and Labour parties, quitting Labour after its 1930 conference narrowly rejected his "Mosley Memorandum", a document he had written outlining how he would deal with the problem of unemployment.
Fascist has been used as a pejorative or insult against a wide range of people, political movements, governments, and institutions since the emergence of fascism in Europe in the 1920s. Political commentators on both the Left and the Right accused their opponents of being fascists, starting in the years before World War II. In 1928, the Communist International labeled their social democratic opponents as social fascists, while the social democrats themselves as well as some parties on the political right accused the Communists of having become fascist under Joseph Stalin's leadership. In light of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, The New York Times declared on 18 September 1939 that "Hitlerism is brown communism, Stalinism is red fascism." Later, in 1944, the anti-fascist and socialist writer George Orwell commented on Tribune that fascism had been rendered almost meaningless by its common use as an insult against various people, and argued that in England the word fascist had become a synonym for bully.
Social fascism was a theory developed by the Communist International (Comintern) in the early 1930s which saw social democracy as a moderate variant of fascism.
Italian fascism, also classical fascism and Fascism, is the original fascist ideology, which Giovanni Gentile and Benito Mussolini developed in Italy. The ideology of Italian Fascism is associated with a series of political parties led by Mussolini: the National Fascist Party (PNF), which governed the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, and the Republican Fascist Party (PFR), which governed the Italian Social Republic from 1943 to 1945. Italian fascism also is associated with the post–war Italian Social Movement (MSI) and later Italian neo-fascist political organisations.
The All-Russian Fascist Party (VFP), and from 1937 onwards the Russian Fascist Union, was a minor Russian émigré movement that was based in Manchukuo during the 1930s and 1940s.
The National Fascist Party was a political party in Italy, created by Benito Mussolini as the political expression of Italian fascism and as a reorganisation of the previous Italian Fasces of Combat. The party ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 when Fascists took power with the March on Rome until the fall of the Fascist regime in 1943, when Mussolini was deposed by the Grand Council of Fascism. The National Fascist Party was succeeded by the Republican Fascist Party in the territories under the control of the Italian Social Republic, and it was ultimately dissolved at the end of World War II.
Russian Fascist Organization (RFO) was the name adopted by a Russian émigré group active in Manchuria before World War II.
Revisionist Maximalism was a short-lived right-wing militant political ideology and Jewish militant ideology which was part of the Brit HaBirionim faction of the Zionist Revisionist Movement (ZRM) created by Abba Ahimeir.
Although the fascist ideology originated in and is primarily associated with Europe, fascism crossed the Atlantic Ocean during the interwar period and influenced South American politics, with Italian fascism having a deep impact in the region, both directly and indirectly.
Russian Women's Fascist Movement was the women's wing of the All-Russian Fascist Party, which existed in Manchuria in the 1930s and 1940s. It was established in Harbin to unite women in Russia who "believe in God and desire a loving home and respectable work". Ideologically, the Russian Women's Fascist Movement (RGFD) adheres to Russian fascism, following the main slogan of Russian fascists "God, Nation, Labor". They supported the Russia of National Labor, which was built on a corporate system of Russian fascism in which a woman would achieve her "rightful place" in the law as the bearer of the idea of beauty and as the keeper of the home.
British fascism is the form of fascism which is promoted by some political parties and movements in the United Kingdom. It is based on British ultranationalism and imperialism and had aspects of Italian fascism and Nazism both before and after World War II.
The British Fascists were the first political organisation in the United Kingdom to claim the label of fascism, formed in 1923. The group had lacked much ideological unity apart from anti-socialism for most of its existence, and was strongly associated with British conservatism. William Joyce, Neil Francis Hawkins, Maxwell Knight and Arnold Leese were amongst those to have passed through the movement as members and activists.
The World Committee Against War and Fascism was an international organization sponsored by the Communist International, that was active in the struggle against Fascism in the 1930s. During this period Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, Italy invaded Ethiopia and the Spanish Civil War broke out. Although some of the women involved were Communists whose priority was preventing attacks on the Soviet Union, many prominent pacifists with different ideologies were members or supporters of the committee. The World Committee sponsored subcommittees for Women and Students, and national committees in countries that included Spain, Britain, Mexico and Argentina. The Women's branches were particularly active and included feminist leaders such as Gabrielle Duchêne of France, Sylvia Pankhurst of Britain and Dolores Ibárruri of Spain.
Fascist Italy is a term which is used in historiography to describe the Kingdom of Italy when it was governed by the National Fascist Party from 1922 to 1943 with Benito Mussolini as prime minister and dictator. The Italian Fascists imposed totalitarian rule and crushed political opposition, while simultaneously promoting economic modernization, traditional social values and a rapprochement with the Roman Catholic Church.
Ruscism, a portmanteau of Russian fascism, is a neologism and a derogatory term which is used by a number of scholars, politicians and publicists to describe the political ideology and policies of the Russian state under Vladimir Putin. It is used in reference to the Russian state's autocratic political system, ultranationalism and neo-imperialism, militarism, expansionism, corporatism, close alignment of church and state, political repression, use of censorship and state propaganda, and a cult of personality around Putin.
