Helen Roche | |
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Born | Helen Roche |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | University of Cambridge |
Academic work | |
Institutions | Durham University |
Helen Roche is a British historian and an associate professor in modern European cultural history at Durham University. [1]
Roche attended Leweston School in Dorset before studying classics at Gonville and Caius College,Cambridge,from 2004 to 2012,where she completed her doctorate under the supervision of Paul Cartledge,Robin Osborne,and Brendan Simms. [2] She held research fellowships at Lucy Cavendish College,Cambridge and the Institute of Advanced Studies at University College London before taking up a permanent post at Durham University. Her research is in German history,classical reception,the comparative study of fascism,the history of education,and related areas. [3] At Durham University,she is an associate fellow of the Institute of Advanced Study. [4]
In 2021,Roche published The Third Reich’s Elite Schools:A History of the Napolas. This study of the German National Political Institutes of Education has been praised as an important contribution to the history of Nazi Germany. [5] Several British newspapers reported on Roche’s uncovering the links between the Napolas and elite British private schools in the 1930s. [6] [7] In March 2022,she was interviewed on this subject on the Free Thinking programme on BBC Radio 3. [8]
Fascism is a far-right,authoritarian,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 placed on the far-right wing within 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.
Roger David Griffin is a British professor of modern history and political theorist at Oxford Brookes University,England. His principal interest is the socio-historical and ideological dynamics of fascism,as well as various forms of political or religious fanaticism.
Timothy Wright Mason was an English Marxist historian of Nazi Germany. He was one of the founders of the History Workshop Journal and specialised in the social history of the Third Reich. He argued for the "primacy of politics," i.e.,that the Nazi government was "increasingly independent of the influence of the [German] economic ruling classes," and believed the Second World War had been triggered by an economic crisis inside Germany.
Fascist has been used as a pejorative epithet 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.
The history of fascist ideology is long and it draws on many sources. Fascists took inspiration from sources as ancient as the Spartans for their focus on racial purity and their emphasis on rule by an elite minority. Fascism has also been connected to the ideals of Plato,though there are key differences between the two. Fascism styled itself as the ideological successor to Rome,particularly the Roman Empire. From the same era,Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's view on the absolute authority of the state also strongly influenced fascist thinking. The French Revolution was a major influence insofar as the Nazis saw themselves as fighting back against many of the ideas which it brought to prominence,especially liberalism,liberal democracy and racial equality,whereas on the other hand,fascism drew heavily on the revolutionary ideal of nationalism. The prejudice of a "high and noble" Aryan culture as opposed to a "parasitic" Semitic culture was core to Nazi racial views,while other early forms of fascism concerned themselves with non-racialized conceptions of the nation.
Historians and other scholars disagree on the question of whether a specifically fascist type of economic policy can be said to exist. David Baker argues that there is an identifiable economic system in fascism that is distinct from those advocated by other ideologies,comprising essential characteristics that fascist nations shared. Payne,Paxton,Sternhell et al. argue that while fascist economies share some similarities,there is no distinctive form of fascist economic organization. Gerald Feldman and Timothy Mason argue that fascism is distinguished by an absence of coherent economic ideology and an absence of serious economic thinking. They state that the decisions taken by fascist leaders cannot be explained within a logical economic framework.
Richard John Alexander Talbert is a British-American contemporary ancient historian and classicist on the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,where he was William Rand Kenan,Jr.,Professor of History (1988-2020) and then Research Professor in charge of the Ancient World Mapping Center until his retirement in 2024. Talbert is a leading scholar of ancient geography and ideas of space in the ancient Mediterranean world.
What constitutes a definition of fascism and fascist governments has been a complicated and highly disputed subject concerning the exact nature of fascism and its core tenets debated amongst historians,political scientists,and other scholars ever since Benito Mussolini first used the term in 1915. Historian Ian Kershaw once wrote that "trying to define 'fascism' is like trying to nail jelly to the wall".
National Political Institutes of Education were secondary boarding schools in Nazi Germany. They were founded as ‘community education sites’after the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.
The Mass Psychology of Fascism is a 1933 psychology book written by the Austrian psychoanalyst and psychiatrist Wilhelm Reich,in which the author attempts to explain how fascists and authoritarians come into power through their political and ideologically-oriented sexual repression on the popular masses.
Gavriel David Rosenfeld is President of the Center for Jewish History in New York City and Professor of History at Fairfield University. His areas of academic specialization include the history of Nazi Germany,memory studies,and counterfactual history. He is an editor of The Journal of Holocaust Research and edits the blog,The Counterfactual History Review,which features news,analysis,and commentary from the world of counterfactual and alternate history.
Fascist movements gained popularity in many countries in Asia during the 1920s.
Joanne Clare Fox,is a British historian specialising in the history of film and propaganda in twentieth-century Europe.
MacGregor Knox is an American historian of 20th-century Europe,and was from 1994 to 2010 the Stevenson Professor of International History at the London School of Economics. He is the son of the British-born classical scholar and historian Bernard Knox and the novelist Bianca VanOrden.
Richard Steigmann-Gall is an Associate Professor of History at Kent State University,and the former Director of the Jewish Studies Program from 2004 to 2010.
Professor Lynette Gail Mitchell is Professor in Greek History and Politics at the University of Exeter. Mitchell is known for her work on ancient Greek politics and kingship.
The Anatomy of Fascism is a 2004 book by Robert O. Paxton,published by Alfred A. Knopf.
Roel Konijnendijk is a Dutch historian working in the United Kingdom. He is known for his research on Classical Greek warfare and military thought,and has authored the book Classical Greek Tactics.