Fascism: A History - Softcover

Eatwell, Roger

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099441918 ISBN 13: 9780099441915

Publisher: Vintage Books, 1996

Synopsis

Fascism is one of the most destructive and influential political movements of the twentieth century. Its imagery—of mad dictators and nihilistic violence—haunts our imaginations, and its historical legacy is almost too momentous to be understood. At the same time, it is curiously elusive: how do we define fascism? What is the basis of its appeal? Why did it take root so successfully in Germany and Italy, and not in France or Britain?
 
Fascism—a sweeping, enthralling study—tackles these questions, and considers fascism in the round. It draws together its different strands, in Italy, Germany, France, and Britain, looking at its evolution up to and during World War II; and it assesses post-war fascism, and examines its future in a Europe whose boundaries continue to change. Along the way, Fascism provides vivid portraits of Mussolini, Hitler, Oswald Mosley, and other key figures within the movement. Lucid, dramatic, and challenging, Fascism is a definitive book of its kind.

About this title

About the Author

Roger Eatwell teaches at the University of Bath. He taught previously at the University of Wales. Eatwell is a scholar of extremist far-right European politics and has authored several books on the subject of fascism.

From Kirkus Reviews

An eminently readable survey of the history of fascism. Works on fascism continue to proliferate, demonstrating the public's continuing fascination with the subject. Eatwell (Social Sciences/Univ. of Bath, England) offers a broad introduction, covering fascist movements in France, Italy, Germany, and England. These four countries provide the basis for a comparative analysis seeking to identify what fascism was and why it succeeded in Italy and Germany but was a failure in France and England. Eatwell chronicles fascism's roots, its growth between the world wars, its triumph and decline, and its lingering presence after 1945. He depends on secondary sources, but as this is a wide-ranging work of synthesis rather than an original analysis, this is not a great defect. (The notes reveal the author's familiarity with the latest interpretations.) Eatwell's theoretical framework is outlined in the introduction: Popular images of fascism in our culture, defined mostly by how it functioned rather than what it advocated, tell only part of the story. According to Eatwell, behind the irrational facade there lay ``a coherent body of thought'' with roots in the late 19th century, which drew from the theories of both the left and the right and claimed to offer an intensely nationalistic, radical `` `Third Way' which was neither capitalist nor communist.'' Fascism, he reminds us, appealed to some of the seminal intellectuals of the 20th century, including Martin Heidegger in Germany and Giovanni Gentile in Italy (although, contrary to Eatwell's claim, support from a philosopher does not automatically confer rationality), and a failure to take fascism seriously makes it more difficult to understand how this ultimately corrosive ideology took hold. He concludes by tracing the resurgence in recent years of openly fascist political parties and the proliferation of ``Holocaust denial'' material, noting grimly that ``the fascist tradition remains very much alive and kicking.'' An important contribution to the subject, useful to both the general reader and the specialist. -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage Books
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0099441918
• ISBN 13: 9780099441915
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352