7 - The Spread of Fascist Movements – Yet of Authoritarian Regimes

Summary

After Chapter 6 explained the unusual rise of fascism in Germany, Chapter 7 analyzes the reasons for the much more common imposition of conservative authoritarianism in the less developed countries of Eastern and Southern Europe and Latin America, where establishment sectors kept fascist movements under control. The chapter discusses the complex and tension-filled relations of these right-wing groupings, which cooperated in battling the radical and not-so-radical left, yet divided on what type of autocracy – conservative authoritarianism versus fascist totalitarianism – to install. The chapter explains how fascist movements emerged in many countries, but how establishment sectors subdued them to hierarchical, exclusionary forms of autocracy. Interestingly, however, these authoritarian regimes often imported elements of fascism, such as corporatism, though they used these alien institutions only as instruments for their own top-down rule, and even as weapons against domestic fascists.