Editing Fascism (section)

===Economy===
{{Main|Economics of fascism}}

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.{{sfnp|Baker|2006|p=229–230}} Payne, Paxton, Sternhell ''et al.'' argue that while fascist economies share some similarities, there is no distinctive form of fascist economic organization.{{sfnp|Sternhell|Sznajder|Ashéri|1994|pp=227–228}}{{sfnp|Payne|1995|p=10}}{{sfnp|Paxton|2004|p=145}} [[Gerald Feldman]] and [[Timothy Mason (historian)|Timothy Mason]] argue that fascism is distinguished by an absence of coherent economic ideology and a lack of serious economic thinking. They state that the decisions taken by fascist leaders cannot be explained within a logical economic framework.{{sfnp|Woodley|2010|p=161}}

Fascists presented their views as an alternative to both international socialism and free-market economics.{{sfnp|Bastow|Martin|2003|p=36}} While fascism opposed mainstream socialism, fascists sometimes regarded their movement as a type of nationalist "socialism" to highlight their commitment to [[nationalism]], describing it as national [[solidarity]] and unity.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.historyguide.org/europe/duce.html |title=Benito Mussolini, Doctrine of Fascism (1932). |access-date=28 July 2016 |archive-date=31 July 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160731235010/http://www.historyguide.org/europe/duce.html |url-status=live}}</ref>{{sfnp|Blamires|2006b|p=610}} Fascism had a complex relationship with [[capitalism]], both supporting and opposing different aspects of it at different times and in different countries. In general, fascists held an instrumental view of capitalism, regarding it as a tool that may be useful or not, depending on circumstances.{{sfnp|Laqueur|1978|p=357}}{{sfnp|Overy|1994|p=1}} Fascist governments typically established close connections between big business and the state, and business was expected to serve the interests of the government.{{sfnp|Laqueur|1978|p=357}}{{sfnp|Overy|1994|p=1}} Economic self-sufficiency, known as [[autarky]], was a major goal of most fascist governments.{{sfnp|De Grand|1995|pp=60–61}}

Fascist governments advocated for the resolution of domestic [[class conflict]] within a nation in order to guarantee national unity.{{sfnp|Griffin|1991|pp=222–223}} This would be done through the state's mediating relations between the classes (contrary to the views of [[Classical liberalism|classical liberal]]-inspired capitalists).{{sfnp|Hoover|1935|pp=13–20}} While fascism was opposed to domestic class conflict, it held that [[Bourgeoisie|bourgeois]]-[[Proletariat|proletarian]] conflict existed primarily in international conflict between proletarian nations and bourgeois nations.{{sfnp|Neocleous|1997|pp=21–22}} Fascism condemned what it viewed as widespread character traits that it associated with the typical bourgeois mentality that it opposed, such as materialism, crassness, cowardice, and the inability to comprehend the heroic ideal of the fascist "warrior"; and associations with liberalism, individualism, and [[Parliamentary system|parliamentarianism]].{{sfnp|Blamires|2006|p=102}} From 1914, [[Enrico Corradini]] developed the idea of "proletarian nations", defining proletarian as being one and the same with producers, a [[Productivism|productivist]] perspective that associated all people deemed productive, including entrepreneurs, technicians, workers and soldiers as being proletarian.{{sfnp|Corner|2012|p=16}}{{sfnp|Gregor|1974|p=374–377}}{{sfnp|Lim|2012|p=71}} Mussolini adopted this view in his description of the proletarian character.{{cn|date=May 2025}}

[[File:VW Typ 83 vr.jpg|thumb|The need for a ''people's car'' ({{lang|de|[[Volkswagen]]}} in German), its concept and its functional objectives were formulated by [[Adolf Hitler]].{{sfnp|Nelson|1967|p=333}}]]

Because [[productivism]] was key to creating a strong nationalist state, it criticized internationalist and Marxist socialism, advocating instead to represent a type of nationalist productivist socialism. Nevertheless, while condemning parasitical capitalism, it was willing to accommodate productivist capitalism within it so long as it supported the nationalist objective.{{sfnp|Spektorowski|Ireni-Saban|2013|p=33}} The role of productivism was derived from [[Henri de Saint Simon]], whose ideas inspired the creation of [[utopian socialism]] and influenced other ideologies that stressed solidarity rather than class war and whose conception of productive people in the economy included both productive workers and productive bosses to challenge the influence of the aristocracy and unproductive financial speculators.{{sfnp|Blamires|2006b|p=535}} Saint Simon's vision combined the traditionalist right-wing criticisms of the French Revolution with a left-wing belief in the need for association or collaboration of productive people in society.{{sfnp|Blamires|2006b|p=535}} Whereas Marxism condemned capitalism as a system of exploitative property relations, fascism saw the nature of the control of credit and money in the contemporary capitalist system as abusive.{{sfnp|Spektorowski|Ireni-Saban|2013|p=33}}

Unlike Marxism, fascism did not see class conflict between the Marxist-defined proletariat and the bourgeoisie as a given or as an engine of historical materialism.{{sfnp|Spektorowski|Ireni-Saban|2013|p=33}} Instead, it viewed workers and productive capitalists in common as productive people who were in conflict with parasitic elements in society, including corrupt political parties, corrupt financial capital, and feeble people.{{sfnp|Spektorowski|Ireni-Saban|2013|p=33}} Fascist leaders such as Mussolini and Hitler spoke of the need to create a new managerial elite led by engineers and captains of industry—but free from the parasitic leadership of industries.{{sfnp|Spektorowski|Ireni-Saban|2013|p=33}} Hitler stated that the Nazi Party supported {{lang|de|bodenständigen Kapitalismus}} ("productive capitalism") that was based upon profit earned from one's own labour, but condemned unproductive capitalism or loan capitalism, which derived profit from speculation.{{sfnp|Friedman|2011|p=24}}

Fascist economics supported a state-controlled economy that accepted a mix of [[private ownership|private]] and [[public ownership]] over the [[means of production]].{{sfnp|Millward|2007|p=178}} [[Economic planning]] was applied to both the public and private sectors, and the prosperity of private enterprise depended on its acceptance of synchronizing itself with the economic goals of the state.{{sfnp|Blamires|2006|p=189}} Fascist economic ideology supported the [[profit motive]] but emphasized that industries must uphold the national interest as superior to private profit.{{sfnp|Blamires|2006|p=189}}

While fascism accepted the importance of material wealth and power, it condemned materialism, which was identified as being present in both communism and [[capitalism]], and criticized materialism for lacking acknowledgment of the role of the [[Vitalism|spirit]].{{sfnp|Davies|Lynch|2002|p=103}} In particular, fascists criticized capitalism, not because of its competitive nature nor support of private property, which fascists supported—but due to its materialism, individualism, alleged bourgeois decadence and alleged indifference to the nation.{{sfnp|Paxton|2005|p=10}} Fascism denounced Marxism for its advocacy of materialist internationalist class identity, which fascists regarded as an attack upon the emotional and spiritual bonds of the nation and a threat to the achievement of genuine national solidarity.{{sfnp|Breuilly|1994|p=290}}

In discussing the spread of fascism beyond Italy, historian Philip Morgan states: <blockquote>Since the Depression was a crisis of laissez-faire capitalism and its political counterpart, parliamentary democracy, fascism could pose as the 'third-way' alternative between capitalism and Bolshevism, the model of a new European 'civilization.' As Mussolini typically put it in early 1934, 'from 1929 ... fascism has become a universal phenomenon ... The dominant forces of the 19th century, democracy, socialism, [and] liberalism have been exhausted ... the new political and economic forms of the twentieth-century are fascist'.{{sfnp|Morgan|2003|p=32}}</blockquote>

Fascists criticized egalitarianism as preserving the weak and instead promoted social Darwinist views and policies.{{sfnp|Griffin|Feldman|2004|p=353|ps=: "When the Russian revolution occurred in 1917 and the 'Democratic' revolution spread after the First World War, anti-[[bolshevism]] and anti-egalitarianism rose as very strong "restoration movements" on the European scene. However, by the turn of that century no one could predict that fascism would become such a concrete, political reaction ... ."}}{{sfnp|Hawkins|1997|p=285|ps=: "Conflict is in fact the basic law of life in all social organisms, as it is of all biological ones; societies are formed, gain strength, and move forwards through conflict; the healthiest and most vital of them assert themselves against the weakest and less well adapted through conflict; the natural evolution of nations and races takes place through conflict." Alfredo Rocco, Italian Fascist.}} They were in principle opposed to the idea of [[social welfare]], arguing that it "encouraged the preservation of the degenerate and the feeble."{{sfnp|Evans|2005|pp=483–484}} The Nazi Party condemned the welfare system of the Weimar Republic, as well as private charity and philanthropy, for supporting people whom they regarded as racially inferior and weak and who should have been weeded out in the process of natural selection.{{sfnp|Evans|2005|p=484}} Nevertheless, faced with the mass unemployment and poverty of the Great Depression, the Nazis found it necessary to set up charitable institutions to help racially pure Germans in order to maintain popular support while arguing that this represented "racial self-help" and not indiscriminate charity or universal social welfare.{{sfnp|Evans|2005|pp=484–485}} Thus, Nazi programs such as the [[Winterhilfswerk|Winter Relief of the German People]] and the broader [[Nationalsozialistische Volkswohlfahrt|National Socialist People's Welfare]] (NSV) were organized as quasi-private institutions, officially relying on private donations from Germans to help others of their race—although in practice those who refused to donate could face severe consequences.{{sfnp|Evans|2005|pp=486–487}} Unlike the social welfare institutions of the Weimar Republic and the Christian charities, the NSV distributed assistance on explicitly racial grounds. It provided support only to those who were "racially sound, capable of and willing to work, politically reliable, and willing and able to reproduce." Non-Aryans were excluded, as well as the "work-shy", "asocials" and the "hereditarily ill".{{sfnp|Evans|2005|p=489}} Under these conditions, by 1939, over 17 million Germans had obtained assistance from the NSV, and the agency "projected a powerful image of caring and support" for "those who were judged to have got into difficulties through no fault of their own."{{sfnp|Evans|2005|p=489}} Yet the organization was "feared and disliked among society's poorest" because it resorted to intrusive questioning and monitoring to judge who was worthy of support.{{sfnp|Evans|2005|pp=489–490}}