Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

Discussions on the propaganda, architecture and culture in the Third Reich.
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Sid Guttridge
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#421

Post by Sid Guttridge » 14 Jan 2021, 12:10

Hi ljadw,

Mussolini was the founder of Fascism as an Italian political movement and of the first such movement to gain power.

However, the tenets of Fascism spread beyond Italy.

"Fascism" is now also legitimately used to describe such movements anywhere.

What are the basic tenets of Fascism?

1) Fascist negations: anti-liberalism, anti-communism, and anti-conservatism.

2) Fascist goals: the creation of a nationalist dictatorship to regulate economic structure and to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture, and the expansion of the nation into an empire.

3) Fascist style: a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth, and charismatic authoritarian leadership.

So, if you want to know if Hitler, Nasser, Sukarno, Castro, Stalin, Erdogan or anyone else is Fascist, test them against these criteria.

Cheers,

Sid.

ljadw
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Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#422

Post by ljadw » 14 Jan 2021, 13:53

Sid Guttridge wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 12:10
Hi ljadw,

Mussolini was the founder of Fascism as an Italian political movement and of the first such movement to gain power.

However, the tenets of Fascism spread beyond Italy.

"Fascism" is now also legitimately used to describe such movements anywhere.

What are the basic tenets of Fascism?

1) Fascist negations: anti-liberalism, anti-communism, and anti-conservatism.

2) Fascist goals: the creation of a nationalist dictatorship to regulate economic structure and to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture, and the expansion of the nation into an empire.

3) Fascist style: a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth, and charismatic authoritarian leadership.

So, if you want to know if Hitler, Nasser, Sukarno, Castro, Stalin, Erdogan or anyone else is Fascist, test them against these criteria.

Cheers,

Sid.
The use of fascism now to describe such movements anywhere by Anglo-Saxon intellectuals who have no notion what fascism was 100 years ago and what life was in Italy 100 years ago,and who do this for ideological and political motives,is not legitimate .
It is very obvious for every Neanderthaler that you can't use something that originated 100 years ago in an European country (and disappeared 25 years ago ) to describe ( better : attack other movements in countries outside Europe ).
Saying that X,Y, Z are today fascist is Marxist propaganda .During WWII the Communists said that the enemy was fascism, they remained silent about national socialism ,for the reason we know .And they labeled all their opponents as fascists, not as national socialists .
Carter was a fascist, De Gaulle was a fascist,McGovern was a fascist,etc.....


gebhk
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#423

Post by gebhk » 14 Jan 2021, 14:13

Hi Sid

Another way of looking at this is to assess the 'output' (no doubt my healthcare manager background creeping out) - ie how the system affects the citizens of the country in question and its neighbours. What it's called or what arbitrary pigeonhole political academics put it in is somewhat besides the point to the lived experience of those exposed to it. I would suggest that if you adopt that approach you would find Stalinism and Nazism tick a lot more boxes in common than, say, with Mussolini's Fascism and that rather than discrete 'boxes' there are sliding scales on the various factors. To quote just one example: racism, racial persecution and genocide are hardy restricted to the Nazis and/or Fascists. Neither is 'empire building'.

Ultimately, however, each system is a unique product of ideology, local circumstances and evolution which can be and should be assessed upon its own merits. Understanding neither needs nor benefits from pigeonholing.

Sid Guttridge
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#424

Post by Sid Guttridge » 14 Jan 2021, 14:54

Hi gebhk,

I think what you say has some merit.

However, as one of the main tenets of Fascism is anti-Communism, they can at best be accommodated together under "Totalitarianism. Hitler could be Fascist, but Lenin could not.

I would suggest that the main difference that separates Communism from Fascism is that the former claims to be internationalist, whereas the latter is always avowedly nationalist.

Cheers,

Sid.

gebhk
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#425

Post by gebhk » 14 Jan 2021, 15:32

However, as one of the main tenets of Fascism is anti-Communism, they can at best be accommodated together under "Totalitarianism. Hitler could be Fascist, but Lenin could not.
I agree, however I would suggest we are again straying into meaningless lables and distinctions. How communist was Stalin's Russia? Not very, by most philosophical definitions. In fact many would argue that Stalin was just as anti-communist as the next man - he did after all exterminate as many ideological communists as he could get his hands on...... Just more pejorative lables for the benefits of propaganda rather than for any practical description. Anyone who is considered to be against the Soviet Union is a 'Fascist'. Anyone who is against the Nazis is a 'Commie'. That is why I am much more interested in the results rather than ideological lables.

This then moves us to another issue, which is of time, place and perspective. From the perspective of a Tasmanian native and, say, a Polish Jew, there would have been little to choose between Victorian England and Nazi Germany respectively. From the point of view of the analogous metropolitan Briton and German, the difference was vast.

gebhk
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#426

Post by gebhk » 14 Jan 2021, 16:20

I would suggest that the main difference that separates Communism from Fascism is that the former claims to be internationalist, whereas the latter is always avowedly nationalist.
We again run into the issue of evolution and change. Soviet Russia clearly moved from an internationalist to a strongly nationalist position in response to, first the Russo-Polish war of 1920 and, far more powerfully of course, WW2. This 'conversion' was announced urbis et orbis by the change of national anthem from the Internationale to the Hymn of the Soviet Union which also made no bones about which republic ran the show. Does that mean Stalin's Russia became Fascist in 1944? 1936 when he first decided the Internationale should be replaced by a Sovet/Russian centric hymn? Sometime earlier or later?

Again, I would suggest this highlights the futility of arbitrary lables.

Sid Guttridge
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#427

Post by Sid Guttridge » 14 Jan 2021, 16:30

Hi gebhk,

I would say that the move from Internationalist to Nationalist (if one can describe a union of 15 republics as a "nation") came during WWII. You can add the closure of the Comintern in 1943 to your list.

There is also the further switch in propaganda emphasis from the Soviet Union to defending Mother Russia once the Germans had over run everything west of Russia itself.

However, none of this seemed to stop Soviet regimes from believing that their system was applicable to everyone. Fascist regimes did not share this feature.

The labels aren't at all arbitrary. They are an attempt to identify commonalities and differences in assorted systems.

This may well throw up anomalies, but it doesn't fundamentally undermine their overall utility.

When representatives entered the French Assembly and sat on the Left or Right in the 1790s they knew where to sit, with whom and why.

Cheers,

Sid.

gebhk
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#428

Post by gebhk » 14 Jan 2021, 18:47

The labels aren't at all arbitrary.
I would suggest that by definition they are. The very fact that we don't agree how to classify two systems because we are using different classifications tells me so.
They are an attempt to identify commonalities and differences in assorted systems.
I would suggest they do very little of that. They merely attempt to pigeonhole what regimes say rather than what they do. And the problem is that what they say may have little relationship to reality and can change from one day to the next. Personally, I am more interested in what they do. And I would suggest that from the point of view of Hans or Ivan there was little, politically, to choose between Stalinism and Nazism.
This may well throw up anomalies, but it doesn't fundamentally undermine their overall utility.
From my experience of practical healthcare, arbitrary classifications are the opposite of utilitarian. My own experience is that the mere labelling of a phenomenon immediately produces certain assumptions which may not be valid and often absolves people from accurately describing the facts of the case. For example a Category 2' pressure injury, clinically means nothing useful at all. I cannot go and treat a patient for a Category 2 pressure injury without going and assessing it myself. However, if I am told the patient has a superficial wound, y x z cm in diameter and exuding small amounts of clear fluid blahdy blah, I can go with an appropriate selection of dressings etc to treat the wound and save myself a long trek back and forth across the length of the hospital!. The only utilitarian thing about wound classification is that it gives wound care experts something to argue about at conferences. Something rings familiar here, methinks :oops: .
When representatives entered the French Assembly and sat on the Left or Right in the 1790s they knew where to sit, with whom and why.
Off course they did - the cynic in me wants to say 'with their mates', but seriously the division had meaning to them in that place and in that moment. That is hardly a good rationale to say that we should henceforth assume that everyone who sits on the left will believe and act in the same way as those French left-sitters in the 1790s.

gebhk
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#429

Post by gebhk » 14 Jan 2021, 18:56

They are an attempt to identify commonalities and differences in assorted systems.
I would argue that they do not identify commonalities and differences. In fact they do the opposite by replacing such comparisons with an allocation to a certain category on a 'best fit' principle.

ljadw
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#430

Post by ljadw » 14 Jan 2021, 20:16

Sid Guttridge wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 12:10
Hi ljadw,

Mussolini was the founder of Fascism as an Italian political movement and of the first such movement to gain power.

However, the tenets of Fascism spread beyond Italy.

"Fascism" is now also legitimately used to describe such movements anywhere.

What are the basic tenets of Fascism?

1) Fascist negations: anti-liberalism, anti-communism, and anti-conservatism.

2) Fascist goals: the creation of a nationalist dictatorship to regulate economic structure and to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture, and the expansion of the nation into an empire.

3) Fascist style: a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth, and charismatic authoritarian leadership.

So, if you want to know if Hitler, Nasser, Sukarno, Castro, Stalin, Erdogan or anyone else is Fascist, test them against these criteria.

Cheers,

Sid.
As Dollfuss and Schuschnig did not want to expand the Austrian nation into an empire ,they were not fascists and thus Austro-fascism is a political term used as an insult .
Salazar also did not want to expand Portugal into an empire, neither does Trump . But FDR wanted to expand US into an empire,and following your definition he is thus a fascist . :roll:
As racism and anti-Semitism are not a basic tenet of Fascism, Hitler is not a fascist .
If Hitler is a fascist, so is Marx,who was a racist and anti-Semite.

George L Gregory
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#431

Post by George L Gregory » 14 Jan 2021, 20:55

ljadw wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 08:54
It is ON YOU to prove that Hitler was a fascist . If he was one, so were Nasser, Sukarno,Castro and Stalin .
Fascism was what Mussolini said it was, not what you are saying it is .
If all authoritarian regimes are fascist, than is Erdogan also a fascist ,and were Idi Amin and Mao fascists and is Kim a fascist .
All serious academic historians and scholars categorise Hitler and the Nazis as a fascist.

Fascism isn’t the same as totalitarianism, although totalitarianism is a key tenet of fascism, not every person who is a totalitarian is a fascist, but every fascist is a totalitarian.

Hitlerism and Stalinism share many key tenets, but Stalin wasn’t a fascist.

George L Gregory
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Location: Britain

Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#432

Post by George L Gregory » 14 Jan 2021, 20:59

ljadw wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 20:16
Sid Guttridge wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 12:10
Hi ljadw,

Mussolini was the founder of Fascism as an Italian political movement and of the first such movement to gain power.

However, the tenets of Fascism spread beyond Italy.

"Fascism" is now also legitimately used to describe such movements anywhere.

What are the basic tenets of Fascism?

1) Fascist negations: anti-liberalism, anti-communism, and anti-conservatism.

2) Fascist goals: the creation of a nationalist dictatorship to regulate economic structure and to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture, and the expansion of the nation into an empire.

3) Fascist style: a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth, and charismatic authoritarian leadership.

So, if you want to know if Hitler, Nasser, Sukarno, Castro, Stalin, Erdogan or anyone else is Fascist, test them against these criteria.

Cheers,

Sid.
As Dollfuss and Schuschnig did not want to expand the Austrian nation into an empire ,they were not fascists and thus Austro-fascism is a political term used as an insult .
Salazar also did not want to expand Portugal into an empire, neither does Trump . But FDR wanted to expand US into an empire,and following your definition he is thus a fascist . :roll:
As racism and anti-Semitism are not a basic tenet of Fascism, Hitler is not a fascist .
If Hitler is a fascist, so is Marx,who was a racist and anti-Semite.
Someone can be an antisemite and a racist without being a fascist.

Whether or not someone is to be described correctly as a ‘fascist’ depends on his/her views and not if he/she believes in some of the ideas that fascists also believe in, okay? For example, fascism is anti-communist and there are millions of people who are anti-communists and they aren’t fascists because of that.

Karl Marx was one of the founders of Marxism and advocated for a stateless society. That’s the complete opposite of fascism.

Do you even know what you are posting???

ljadw
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Posts: 15586
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#433

Post by ljadw » 14 Jan 2021, 22:26

George L Gregory wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 20:55
ljadw wrote:
14 Jan 2021, 08:54
It is ON YOU to prove that Hitler was a fascist . If he was one, so were Nasser, Sukarno,Castro and Stalin .
Fascism was what Mussolini said it was, not what you are saying it is .
If all authoritarian regimes are fascist, than is Erdogan also a fascist ,and were Idi Amin and Mao fascists and is Kim a fascist .
All serious academic historians and scholars categorise Hitler and the Nazis as a fascist.

Fascism isn’t the same as totalitarianism, although totalitarianism is a key tenet of fascism, not every person who is a totalitarian is a fascist, but every fascist is a totalitarian.

Hitlerism and Stalinism share many key tenets, but Stalin wasn’t a fascist.
ALL ? :lol:
Hitler was a German nationalist , so was Marx
Hitler was a racist, so was Marx :the racist statements of Marx, although hidden by the media, are well known .
Hitler was an anti-Semite ,so was Marx
Hitler wanted to impose a totalitarian regime, so did Marx .
Hitler supported eugenics, so did Marx and his followers.
Those who say that Hitler was a fascist,must also say that Marx was a fascist .
Mussolini was not a racist, he was not an anti-Semite,he did not impose eugenics .
There are more interfaces between Nazism and Marxism,and between Fascism and Marxism,than between Nazism and Fascism .

Sid Guttridge
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Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#434

Post by Sid Guttridge » 15 Jan 2021, 00:07

Hi ljadw,

You post, "As Dollfuss and Schuschnig did not want to expand the Austrian nation into an empire, they were not fascists......".

I think there are thirteen separate points in the following

"1) Fascist negations: anti-liberalism, anti-communism, and anti-conservatism.

2) Fascist goals: the creation of a nationalist dictatorship to regulate economic structure and to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture, and the expansion of the nation into an empire.

3) Fascist style: a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth, and charismatic authoritarian leadership.
"

As Dollfuss and Schussnig score 12 out of 13, (92%), I am going to give them a conditional pass. But they must try harder in future.

Salazar didn't need to expand Portugal into an empire - it already had at least four colonies in Africa and three in Asia.

Cheers,

Sid.

ljadw
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Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

Re: Why didn't Hitler advocate Austrian nationalist ideas?

#435

Post by ljadw » 15 Jan 2021, 08:37

Austro-fascism was not hostile to conservatism. and I like to see examples where S + D tried to promote a self-determined Austrian culture : both were German nationalists,as where the socialists (SozialDemokratische Arbeiterpartei Deutschösterreichs ).
Already before WWI,Japan wanted to have its own empire,but no one will say that there was a Japanese fascism in 1904.
The same for Manifest Destiny,or for Leopold II and Congo, or for the colonisation of a big part of Africa by France and Germany .
The fascist style can be found back in non fascist regimes .
Baden Powell promoted also youth and masculinity .

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