There is a constant harangue from left-wing politicians and complicit media that Trump and his administration are fascists and that MAGA, ICE, and anyone else they don’t like are Nazis.  

When you ask Gemini A.I., Duck A.I., and Wikipedia, “Is fascism right-wing?”, the answer is yes; fascism is considered right-wing.  Co-pilot says yes, it is right-wing, and then says it has left-wing aspects as well, and then concludes that it is right-wing.  What?

A Wikipedia Overview via A.I. comes up with this: “Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology ...”

Dinesh D’Souza said on a PragerU video that the Nazi regime was redefined after WWII from left-wing to right-wing.  His reasoning, summarized, is that political and academic leaders wanted to ensure that their collectivist (socialist) beliefs were separated from the horrors of Hitler’s regime.  It appears the redefining was successful.

Emmanuel Rincón wrote “There’s No Denying the Socialist Roots of Fascism” in 2021.  This article looks at fascism not as a list of words, but through the actions of the fathers of fascism: Benito Mussolini and Giovanni Gentile.  Together they wrote the “doctrine of fascism.”  Gentile said, “Fascism is a form of socialism; in fact, it is its most viable form.”  The Fascist Party broke with the Italian Socialist Party, but mainly in rhetoric.  They moved steadily toward the collective.  The fascist Italian government first nationalized the arms industry.  Private property in practice was eliminated.  They did not own the means of production or fully control the economy, but they dominated it.  Businesses were run by individuals, but to keep that business, the business had to serve the state.

It was Mussolini’s fascist dictatorship that inspired Hitler and the Nazi party to move forward with their own fascist plans.

The Road to Serfdom, published by Routledge and University of Chicago in 1944, by  Austrian-British economist and philosopher Friedrich Hayek, is like taking a step back in time.  Hayek’s lifespan was 1899 to 1992.  This enabled him to observe WWI, WWII, the rise of Stalin, and the rise of socialist thought across Europe.  Socialism ideals had begun to mutate away from Marx’s revolution; the Social Democrats believed that collectivist socialism could be achieved via government actors.  Writers like Marx and the socialist revisionist Bernstein believed that socialism was a natural progression from capitalism.  Hayek argued against this; he called Social Democracy utopian and

impossible. He believed that Germany went from capitalist ideals to socialist ideals, and it was this move to socialism that led to fascism.

The capitalist principles that preceded the years of the fascist reign had evaporated in Germany.  Hayek witnessed the change as socialism showed up in writings and socialist political parties were formed.  As the populace began to take the progress made by a market economy for granted, they forgot what had created the success they were experiencing.  This is where Hayek states that the success of democracy and capitalism opened the door to their own demise.

In the introduction of The Road to Serfdom, Hayek wrote, “Few are ready to recognize that the rise of fascism and Nazism was not a reaction against the socialist trends of the preceding period, but the necessary outcome of those tendencies.”  He also observed that despite seeing the clear similarities between Stalin’s communism in Russia and Germany’s National Socialism, intellectual leaders and academics still promoted the very experiment that led to the despotism of the Nazi movement.

Social planning was progressively applied to society as Hitler consolidated power.  Once a central faction dictated economic and social decisions, they began to silence resistance by fear and confusion.  This ultimately led to a controlling state.  The Nazi regime determined what the people could say and do.  Judgments were made by the state as to whether someone was a “good” German, with egregious consequences if not.  Within a year and half of Chancellor Hitler, any opposition to his authority was removed, and he declared himself Führer, the exclusive leader of Germany.

The only social order accepted by the Nazi regime was fascism.  All other groups were dismantled to create a single ruling party.  The Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda saturated education, the arts, and the media with the Nazi message.  The Fascist Party also chose the winners and losers in the country, favoring certain people over others.  Anyone or anything that did not promote the new Nazi Germany was silenced or worse.  This treatment included socialists, communists, capitalists, Slavs, Roma, and Christians who did not agree with the Nazi way, and in particular the horrific treatment of millions of Jewish people.  To eliminate all opposition, coerce the support of the governed, and even just to fund the war economy, a centralized, strong state was required.

Fascism, according to Hayek, is a collectivist ideology that eventually — through state control deep into everyday life, monopolies to serve the state, and propaganda to ensure acceptance — will, out of necessity, lead to a totalitarian state.  In direct contrast, the principles of Individual freedom, a strong independent market economy, and democracy are the monikers of U.S. right-wing politics.

Is fascism right-wing?  No, it is not.

Blindly tossing insults for political purposes dilutes the tragedy of Germany’s fascist dictatorship.  It dismisses the loss of millions of innocent lives and shows a scary ignorance of history.

The Road to Serfdom is a warning.  Hayek saw the socialist trends in the U.K. and America at the very time WWII was raging, and they did not slow throughout his life.  It is important to understand real fascism and the dangers of collectivist ideologies to ensure we do not repeat Germany’s error.

Image: Benito Mussolini.  Credit: Wikimedia Commons, public domain.