Stalinism and Fascism: Totalitarian Regimes of the 20th Century
Stalinism: The Struggle for Power
One of the totalitarian regimes, insofar as they involve a direct attack on the rights and freedoms in their own democratic models, was the Stalinist dictatorship, which ruled the USSR with an iron fist from 1925 to 1953. When Lenin fell ill in 1922, two sectors representing different conceptions of the revolution and socialism confronted each other: Trotsky and Stalin.
- For Trotsky, socialism was impossible without the concert of the international labor movement. In addition, the party and the state should be more open.
- Stalin was a supporter of socialism in one country, to strengthen the revolution in Russia and from there to help the implementation of other similar schemes. On the other hand, he proposed a political and administrative centralization of the country.
Stalinism
The rise of Stalin’s dictatorship led away from the principles that had inspired the Bolshevik revolution. Stalin took control of the party and politics, using the dreaded NKVD, directed by Nicolai Yezhov and Lavrenty Beria, to end the old Bolshevik guard. In the Moscow trials, they were falsely accused of treason, condemned, and executed or sent to Siberia. The Stalinist state was definitely institutionalized with the 1936 Constitution, which consolidated the model of socialization of the means of production and enshrined the duty of citizens to serve the regime and its interests. Stalin’s absolute power was supported by absolute control of the state and the Communist Party, which led to the formation of a submissive breed of leaders, the nomenclature, consisting of party members who survived the purges.
The Stalinist Economy
With Stalin, the economy was subject to state direction, through strong centralization, using a planning model. The so-called five-year plans had two basic lines of action:
- Sustaining a process of accelerated industrialization, in which Russia launched a total modernization of its infrastructure and its heavy industry.
- In the field, forced collectivization was implemented through a system based on collective and state farms.
Stalinism guaranteed a range of social services such as food, housing, education, or health, especially in large cities, although the gains were far from being as deep as proclaimed by propaganda.
The Purges
The darker side of the Stalinist era was the purges carried out by the regime, which caused millions of deportations and murders.
- Ethnic minorities: Stalin displaced millions of people to remove any vestige of multinationalism and ensure compliance with his authoritarian policy.
- The farmers: The ideal of collective farming was not shared by the peasants, who were subjected to fierce repression that produced tens of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of displaced people.
- Intellectuals: All dissidents considered enemies of the regime were taken to Siberia. There he established a system of concentration camps, or gulags, from which escape was virtually impossible.
Fascism: General Features
What is Fascism?
Fascism was a political movement that arose in the interwar period. It was characterized by the exaltation of the nation, from exclusive and aggressive approaches, which sought to introduce militarism into society. It was also characterized by anti-Marxism, anti-liberalism, the rejection of the parliamentary model, and by totalitarianism. Many political models existed under that name, which showed specific traits but maintained affinities between them. Thus, we often speak of fascism to refer to those policy options and regimes that shared some basic features, such as the subordination of the individual to the nation, and its anti-democratic and totalitarian nature.
Ideological Foundations of Fascism
Nationalism
The nation became the real catalyst of fascism, a factor capable of uniting the wills of the various strata of society. It was an extreme, exclusive nationalism, with an expansive nature, both within society and externally.
Social Darwinism
Darwin’s theories on natural selection were applied by some authors in the social sphere, which established the survival of the fittest as an explanation of the functioning of human structures. This perception led to a marked racism based on the presumed superiority of some races over others. The extreme case is represented by Germany, where they endowed consistency to the theory of the Aryan race, an alleged group from which all Germans came and rooted in the legendary peoples of antiquity.
Corporatism
This is the conception of society as an organization of corporations based on traditional reminiscences, clearly at the service of the state, in which charismatic leadership and the party embody the values of the nation above individuals, organizing society and the economy under these principles. It denies the class struggle and unites employees and employers in a single organization since the interests of the nation are above class interests and differences, through the corporate organization of the world of work.
Characteristics of Fascism
The most significant applicable characteristics of these models are:
Political Features
- Rejection of liberalism and parliamentary democracy, replaced by a disciplined and authoritarian society.
- Anti-Marxism, with class warfare seen as contrary to national interests.
- Supremacy of the state, namely the obligation of citizens to put the interests of the nation before their own.
- Expansionist, aggressive, and militaristic nationalism.
- Single party, whose interests were identified and linked to the ultimate consequences to the nation.
- A charismatic leader, understood as the embodiment of the supreme values of the country. This is the Führer in Germany or the Duce in Italy.
Economic Features
- Autarchy: Since other countries are perceived as enemies, a policy of self-sufficiency that eliminates external dependence is proposed.
- Imperialism: The superiority of the nation means that the rest are used to benefit national interests.
- Public works programs: Used as a means to reduce high unemployment rates and give the state “monumental prestige”.
- War economy: Based on the construction of arms and the militarization of the social and cultural aspects of citizenship.
Social Features
- Comprehensive control of society, forced to fit into various associations related to the single party.
- Elitism: A hierarchical society is proposed, in which an intellectual summit has the task of leading the masses.
- Scapegoat: Explaining the evils of the nation as a result of the conspiracy of groups outside it.
- Fine-grained control of the media. Totalitarian regimes were pioneers in the use of new mass media for propaganda purposes.