Fascist rule develops over time, and once its grip is established, there is nearly zero free space for open struggle. From a revolutionary perspective, it calls for new forms of struggle and a fortified resistance to defeatism, or the belief that little can change for the better in current conditions. Fascism can be defeated.

　　As neoliberalism seems less capable of enabling efficient capital accumulation (due to growing struggles against racism, mass incarceration, generalized privatization, and climate crisis), more capitalists see the fascistic form as attractive. Our analysis of the class basis of fascist power begins, thus, by arguing that the organizing and financial basis of fascism is anchored in the monopoly capitalist class.

　　Imperialism and monopoly

　　Togliatti states that fascism’s emergence takes place only in a setting in which finance capital rules in the monopoly-imperialist stage of capitalist development. “You can’t know fascism if you don’t know imperialism,” he declared. It is the necessary condition under which fascism as a form of capitalist rule can materialize. The extremist wing of finance capitalism is always prepared to turn to fascism because it sees racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, religious repression, immigrant scapegoating, and provocation of hostilities on international scales as strategic methods of securing leadership of the ruling coalition.

　　Fascist capitalists present an international face and inward domestic orientation. Dimitrov writes, “In foreign policy, fascism is jingoism in its most brutal form, fomenting bestial hatred of other nations.” Last May, Trump and other Republicans expressed this brutal jingoism when they demanded an attack on Mexico. Trump ordered his military campaign advisers to create battle plans. If Trump or another fascistic administration held power, they would try to carry out such plans using the vilest racist justifications to try to win support.

　　Do other ongoing U.S.-led global conflicts (e.g., over Taiwan, Ukraine, or NATO expansion) reflect a “jingoistic” or “bestial hatred”? Seven decades of deadly U.S. imperialist war have seen jingoism regularly featured. The peace movement’s consistent struggle over that period of time mobilized popular opinion against war and forced the imperialists to pretend democracy and human rights were the primary goals, denying the fascists the ability to use “bestial hatreds” to build their power. Today’s conflicts, including Cold War 2.0, give the fascists new opportunities for turning jingoism into a generalized form of ideological domination. Consequently, the broadest struggle against war and militarism holds definite anti-fascist implications.

　　Anti-fascism in the 1920s and 1930s led to a significant change in the Communist Party’s strategic theory and overall practice. If 1917-1923 represented a “war of maneuver,” the new terrain shifted generally to a “war of position” (the united front and popular front). A war of position signals a longer-term struggle to organize, educate, and mobilize an array of allied forces for the political transition to a new form of rule. Today’s political struggles may fit into the “position” category, but this doesn’t mean they will remain so.

　　Editor: Zhong Yao、Deng Panyi

　　From:https://www.cpusa.org/article/the-laws-of-fascisms-emergence/(2023-9-8)