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1930s

1930s

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Events and trends

The 1930s were described as an abrupt shift to more radical lifestyles, as countries were struggling to find a solution to the global depression. In Australia, this decade was known as the Dirty Thirties. In both Central Europe and Eastern Europe, Fascism, Nazism, Stalinism, and dominated as the solution, the first two adopting war-oriented economic policies and the latter emphasizing heavy industrial development, all of them described as totalitarian regimes. In East Asia, the rise of Militarism occurred. In Western Europe, Australia and the United States, more progressive reforms occurred as opposed to the extreme measures sought elsewhere. Roosevelt's New Deal attempted to use government spending to combat large-scale unemployment and severely negative growth. Ultimately, it would be the beginning of World War II in 1939 that would end the depression.

Technology

- Jet engine invented
- Disney adopts a three-color Technicolor process for cartoons
- The photocopier is invented
- Air mail service across the Atlantic

Science

- Nuclear fission discovered by Otto Hahn, Lise Meitner and Fritz Strassmann
- Pluto, the ninth planet from the Sun, is discovered by Clyde Tombaugh
- British biologist Arthur Tansley coins term "ecosystem"
- New and safer method for blood transfusions.

War, peace and politics

- Socialists proclaim The death of Capitalism
- Rise to power of Adolf Hitler in Germany
- Under Joseph Stalin, millions die in famines. The Great Purges eliminate all Old Bolsheviks from the Soviet government, except for Molotov and Stalin himself.
- Almost all of Continental Europe moves to Authoritarianism or Totalitarianism
- Starts or continue the Estado Novo in Brazil and Portugal.
- Advent of the modern welfare state in New Zealand and Sweden.
- The Empire of Japan invades China as a precursor to Japanese invasions in Southeast Asia
- The Spanish Civil War
- Start of World War II in Asia and Europe

Economics

- Worldwide Great Depression

Culture, religion

- Radio becomes dominant mass media in industrial nations
- "Golden Age" of radio begins in U.S.
- First intercontinental commercial airline flights
- Height of the Art Deco movement in Europe and the US
- The Wizard of Oz
- "Big band" or "swing" music becomes popular (from 1935 onward)
- Superman debuts in 1938.
- Triumph of the Will

Others

- U.S. presidential candidate Huey Long assassinated
- Board of Temperance Strategy established in U.S. to fight repeal of prohibition.

People

World leaders

- Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King (Canada)
- President Chiang Kai-shek (Republic of China)
- President Lin Sen (Republic of China)
- President Paul von Hindenburg (Germany)
- Adolf Hitler (Germany)
- King Victor Emmanuel III (Italy)
- Prime Minister Benito Mussolini (Italy)
- President Mustafa Kemal Ataturk (Turkey)
- Emperor Hirohito (Japan)
- Pope Pius XI
- Joseph Stalin (Soviet Union)
- King George V (United Kingdom)
- King Edward VIII (United Kingdom)
- King George VI (United Kingdom)
- Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald (United Kingdom)
- Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin (United Kingdom)
- Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain (United Kingdom)
- President Herbert Hoover (United States)
- President Franklin D. Roosevelt (United States)
- President W.T. Cosgrave (Irish Free State)
- President Eamon de Valera (Irish Free State)
- Taoiseach Eamon de Valera (Éire)
- Prime Minister James Scullin (Australia)
- Prime Minister Joseph Lyons (Australia)
- Prime Minister Sir Earle Page (Australia)
- Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage (New Zealand)
- President Getúlio Vargas (Brazil)
- Prime Minister António de Oliveira Salazar (Portugal)

Entertainers

- Alice Brady
- Bela Lugosi
- Benny Goodman
- Bing Crosby
- Boris Karloff
- Charlie Chaplin
- Duke Ellington
- Django Reinhardt
- Edward G. Robinson
- Fats Waller
- Fred Astaire
- Ginger Rogers
- Glenn Miller and his orchestra
- Judy Garland
- Katharine Hepburn
- Louis Armstrong
- The Marx Brothers
- Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy
- Carl Stuart Hamblen

Sports figures

- Cliff Bastin (English footballer)
- Donald Bradman (Australian cricketer)
- Bill "Dixie" Dean (English footballer)
- Jack Dyer (Australian Rules Football player)
- Walter Hammond (Gloucestershire & England cricketer)
- Eddie Hapgood (English footballer)
- George Headley (West Indies cricketer)
- Alex James (Scottish footballer)
- Douglas Jardine (England cricket captain)
- Harold Larwood (Nottinghamshire & England cricketer)
- Jack Lovelock (New Zealand runner)
- Jesse Owens (American track and field athlete)
- Fred Perry (English tennis player)

External links

- [http://xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/front.html America in the 1930s]— An overview of the decade in the United States
- [http://www.mccord-museum.qc.ca/en/keys/webtours/GE_P4_1_EN.html The Dirty Thirties] — Images of the Great Depression in Canada Category:1930s ko:1930년대 ja:1930年代 simple:1930s

Great Depression

The Great Depression was a massive global economic recession (or "depression") that ran from 1929 to approximately 1939. Its primary impact was in the United States of America, the British Empire and Europe and led therein to numerous bank failures, high unemployment, as well as dramatic drops in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), industrial production, stock market share prices and virtually every other measure of economic growth. It is generally considered to have bottomed out in 1933, but it was well after the end of World War II before such indicators as industrial production, share prices and global GDP surpassed their 1929 levels. Cities around the world were hard hit, especially those based on heavy industry. What gave this downturn the name the "Great Depression" was that it was by far the largest sustained decline in industrial production and productivity in the century and a half for which economic records have been regularly kept, and the fact that its impact was felt throughout the entire industrialized world and their trading partners in less developed nations. The term Great Depression can refer to the economic event, but it can also refer to the cultural period, often called simply "The Depression", and to the political response to the economic events. Cities around the world were hard hit, especially those based on heavy industry., a mother of seven children, age thirty-two, in Nipomo, California, March 1936.]]

Causes of the Great Depression

Main Article: Causes of the Great Depression Theories from mainstream capitalist economics focus on the relationship between production, consumption and credit, as embodied in macro-economics and on personal incentives and purchasing decisions as embodied in micro-economics. In these theories attempts are made to order the sequence of events which imploded the industrialized world's monetary system and its trade relationships. Theories from Marxist economics focus on the relationships of the control of production and the concentration of wealth. One possible theory is that the Depression was caused because there was a gap between production and consumption in the US. After World War I, the United States was producing at a very high rate and ambitious Americans were spending and purchasing things they haven’t been able to afford prior to World War I. It finally came to a point where people slowed down purchasing but factories were still producing at high rates. This created a gap, a gap that led to the stop of production to lay-offs and dismals of thousands of employees. People were left without jobs and no purchasing power, so companies were left without production and fear to produce more products that would not be bought. More recently, it has been the prevailing belief among economists that the stock market crash of 1929 was not the primary cause of the Great Depression, pointing to telltale signs of an imminent economic disaster in various statistics leading up to the Depression as well as the downturn in Europe which was already in progress. Today the most widely accepted theory is the one advanced by Peter Temin: the Great Depression was caused by catastrophically poor monetary policy pursued by the United States Federal Reserve during the years leading up to the Great Depression. The policy of contracting the money supply was an attempt to restrain inflation, which exacerbated the actual problem in the economy, which was deflation.

Responses

deflation, Los Angeles, California, United States in 1930 because of the Great Depression.]] The Wall Street crash of 1929 is widely considered to be the foremost event which marked the start of the world-wide financial crisis. In fact, in the United States unemployment soared from approximately 3% to over 25%, while manufacturing output declined by one-third. Governments worldwide sought economic recovery by adopting restrictive autarkic policies such as high tariffs, import quotas and barter agreements and by experimenting with new plans for their internal economies. Economic crises due to the depression created great problems throughout the United States and much of the world. Consumers reduced their purchases of luxury products and many businesses cut production. Big businesses, such as General Motors, saw their sales drop by 50% in the late 1920s and the early 1930s. This caused businesses to cut back on the numbers they employed, with thousands of workers losing their jobs. When farm prices fell, small farmers went bankrupt and in the USA many lost their land due to bank foreclosure. By June of 1932 the American economy had shed about 55% of the work force. On July 8,1932, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged to 41.22. The United States government responded by instituting the New Deal policy which was an attempt to restore prosperity by spending on welfare and public works. After the stock market collapse, the New York based banks became concerned over the security of overseas loans and called in their loans to Germany and Austria. However, without the American money, Germany was unable to continue making World War One reparations payments to France and Britain. This chain reaction meant they in turn could not repay their war loans to America. Therefore, the depression had spread to Europe. All governments were forced to cease paying both reparations and war loan repayments. The United States government tried to protect domestic industries from foreign competition by imposing the highest import duty in American history. In retaliation, other countries raised their tariffs on imports of American goods. As a result, global industrial production declined by 36% between 1929 and 1932, while world trade dropped by 62%. In Germany unemployment increased drastically fueling widespread disillusionment and anger. The institutions of the Weimar Republic, which had already been unable to maintain order in Germany, further deteriorated in the years from 1930 to 1932, while the Chancellor and finance expert Heinrich Brüning attempted to fix the economy by drastically cutting state spending. At the time the NSDAP, or Nazi party, gained much popularity, winning the two general elections in 1932. This eventually led to the appointment of Adolf Hitler as Chancellor on January 30, 1933 (See Weimar Republic for details). In Nazi Germany, economic recovery was pursued through rearmament, conscription, and public works programs. In Benito Mussolini's Italy, the economic controls of his corporate state were tightened. In the United Kingdom, the Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald, and later the Conservative-dominated coalition "National Government", responded to the depression by imposing tariffs on all imports from outside the British Empire (arguably worsening the global situation), by cutting public spending, and by abandoning the Gold Standard which reduced the cost of British exports (see Great Depression in the United Kingdom). In the Netherlands some projects were started to give people employment and boost the economy, such as the Amsterdamse Bos, a reforestation project near Amsterdam. In Heerlen, fabric merchant Schunck commissioned a new building in 1934 for his business, the hypermodern Glaspaleis (crystal palace) the tallest building in the city at the time. In the United States, President Herbert Hoover made efforts to control the situation. However he gravely underestimated the severity of the crisis, even announcing to U.S. Congress on December 3, 1929, that the worst effects of the recent stock market crash were behind them, and that the U.S. public had regained faith in the economy. Over the following months it became apparent this was not the case, and Hoover went before Congress again on December 2, 1930 to ask for a $150 million public works program to help generate jobs. However, one of the major problems was that with deflation, the currency that you kept in your pocket could buy more goods as prices went down. Another was that there had been no federal oversight of the stock market or other investment markets, and with the collapse many stock and investment schemes were found to be either insolvent or outright frauds. Unfortunately, many banks had invested in these schemes. By the end of 1930, there had been over 1300 bank failures; in 1931 nearly 2300 more banks failed. 1932 saw the collapse of the banking system; Milton Friedman's monetary theories suggest that the inexperience of the newly-created Federal Reserve in managing the money supply exacerbated the problem. With the banking system in shambles, and people holding on to whatever currency that they had, there was minimal cash available for any activities that would cause positive change. The response of the Hoover administration helped little; instead of increasing the money supply, the Hoover administration did the exact opposite and raised interest rates, falsely believing that inflation was the real danger. Many in the Hoover administration believed that as wages fell, the cost of production would drop and, as a result, production would pick up again--the depression would be self-correcting. Nobody at that time foresaw the effects of a calamitous drop in the money supply. For this reason, they saw no need for the government to intervene in the economy, a policy which proved disastrous. Like their counterparts abroad, many Americans were disillusioned with their system of government, believing that Hoover's policies had driven the country to ruin. Shanty towns populated by unemployed people at the time were often dubbed Hoovervilles, highlighting the President's fading popularity. During this period, several alternative political movements saw a considerable increase in membership. In particular, a number of high-profile figures embraced the ideals of Communism and the Communist Party encouraged its followers to "Follow the Example of Mother Bloor", a descendent of "good Yankee stock" who embraced the movement. Radio speakers, such as Father Charles Coughlin, saw their listening audiences swell into the millions as they sought easy scapegoats for the country's woes. Upon accepting the Democratic nomination for president (July 2, 1932), Franklin D. Roosevelt promised "a new deal for the American people", a phrase that has endured as a label for his administration and its many domestic achievements. Upon being elected in 1932 he proposed the "New Deal", a platform of government programs based on Keynesian economics and intended to stimulate and revitalize the economy. The British and French governments also intervened in their economies to escape the worst effects of the depression.

Daily Life in the United States during the Depression

Keynesian]] Contrary to popular belief, the Stock Market Crash and Great Depression did not plunge all Americans into instant poverty. While the full effects of the Depression were imminent, they were not universally immediate. Indeed, following the October event on Wall Street, economists who underestimated the event felt that the crash of the market was simply a long over due, albeit major, market correction. However when the market failed to rebound, and it became apparent that even highly regarded consumer goods manufacturers were in trouble (example, Atwater-Kent Radios, Willys-Overland, etc.) the effects began to impact the economy. Not only did name-brand product manufacturers fail, but their suppliers and retailers also failed. Easy credit fuelled the consumer driven economy of the 1920s, and following the depression, credit availability began to tighten, both for business and consumers. With lenders restricting their credit availability, and moving quickly to secure their liabilities, employers who were hurt by the ripple effect of Wall Street were the first to be liquidated. As employers closed their companies, the ranks of the unemployed grew, which further complicated the banking situation by reducing income from credit lines, which cascaded into a liquidity crisis leading up to the banking panic of 1933. Consumers who had taken advantage of easy term payments offered by retailers found themselves backed against the wall if they were unable to meet those obligations. The repossession of furniture and household goods by creditors – something that had before only happened to a limited number of households became a commonplace event. Foreclosures on the American home – often seen as the safest investment that one could make – rose throughout the period, and affected people in all income brackets. Prior to the depression, foreclosure and eviction had been a mantle of shame, and closely viewed as caused by personal failure. However as the effects of the Depression dug deeper into the fabric of the nation, average Americans changed their view of foreclosure making it not a mark of shame, but as a battle of the common man against the banking industry. In the upper Midwest, the posting of foreclosure orders in working-class neighborhoods, and the forced sale of personal property, drew neighbors who attempted to disrupt the proceedings as a form of protest of the action and support of the family under the eviction notice. The angry crowds also had the effect of scaring off potential bidders for auction goods. While this allowed neighbors to pay pennies on the dollar for their neighbors' possessions (which were usually given back to the family following the sale), it also did little to reduce the debt of the family being evicted. The wealthy, who had significant investments in Wall Street, did experience losses; however those losses depended on how investments were structured. As a result, all but the very well-off curtailed their spending habits. For example, high end consumer goods providers, such as the luxury automobile industry, saw their sales number dwindle to levels far below the previous levels of the twenties, resulting in layoffs of salaried and hourly workers. The best example of this collapse was the automobile industry in Cleveland, Ohio, which had the highest concentration of luxury automobile manufacturers outside of Detroit. Between 1929 and 1934 production of Peerless, Jordan, Stearns-Knight all failed; Peerless, as a company, did survive, but did so by discontinuing automobile production and regrouping as a brewery. Purchases of even basic cars, those manufactured by the middle and entry level marques, also slowed. General Motors attempted to encourage consumers to buy cars by advertising that “the sale of one car keeps an autoworker employed for three months, allowing that worker and his family to buy goods and services with their salary.” However a sizable percentage of Americans couldn't even pay for a tank of gas, let alone a new car and the entire auto industry struggled to maintain sales at a profitable level. Drought first struck the Eastern United States in 1930. By 1931 it began moving westward where the weather pattern stalled over the Great Plains states. By 1934, the plains had been turned to desert. While weather was the catalyst for the Dust Bowl (a named coined in 1935), the root cause was poor farming and soil conservation techniques on land that was better suited to growing prairie grasses and native flowers than it was for growing corn. When the thin layer of top soil turned to a dry powder, and the winds swept through, dust storms resulted producing a filth and grime that was difficult to wash out of fabric and clean out of buildings. Once the top soil was depleted, the under layer of clay that remained proved unsuitable for cash crops, leading to farm failures and mortgage foreclosures. Those who had lost their homes and livelihoods were lured westward by advertisements for work put out by agribusiness in western states such as California. The migrants came to be called Okies, Arkies, and other derogatory names as they flooded the labor supply of the agricultural fields, driving down wages and increasing competition for jobs in areas that couldn't afford it. This story was dramatized in the famous novels The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. In the South, rural workers and share croppers migrated north by train with plans to work in auto plants around Detroit. In the Great Lakes states, farmers had been experiencing depressed market conditions for their crops and goods since the end of World War I. Family farms that had been mortgaged during the Twenties to provide money to “get through until better times” risked foreclosure when their owners failed to make payments. Unlike the dustbowl states, the midwest experienced near normal weather conditions in the 1930s, and farmers could make a living if they spent their incomes in a wise and prudent way. Unable to pay wages for hired help, families whose farms were located near railroad tracks often hired men who volunteered to work for food. However, a large percentage of the American middle class was able to survive the ordeal. Those in professions where skills and jobs were considered “depression proof” (government positions, teachers in well funded districts, doctors, lawyers, etc.) continued to work. Daily life was made more secure if these workers had little debt before the stock market crash, had liquid savings and generally lived without overt extravagances. American middle class households managed to get through the economic depression by adapting to conditions, spending wisely and avoiding unnecessary purchases. One industry that flourished in America during the 1930s was the movie industry (Hollywood). The emergence of sound films in the late 1920s, combined with the escapism that film provided to a nation down on its luck, made the film industry one of the few that produced profits throughout the 1930s. Films commonly featured rich sets and carefree characters, allowing an increasingly depression-weary nation to leave its cares behind - if only for the duration of a movie. Shirley Temple's films were leading attractions, perhaps because her characters' unwavering hopefulness in the face of trying circumstances spoke to American audiences. Conversely, the film version of Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath (see above), now considered by many to be a masterpiece of American cinema, was a commercial disappointment when it debuted - possibly because it reminded too many moviegoers of the harsh realities of their own situations. Movie genres that thrived during the 1930s were screwball comedies, lavish musicals (notably, The Wizard of Oz), Westerns and gangster movies.

International effects

Many nations experienced an economic decline, though the severity and timing differed from country to country. For example, Britain hit its trough in the third quarter of 1932, while France did not reach its low point until April of 1937. Charles P. Kindleberger has provided the best international account of the Depression so far in his book The World in Depression.

Asia

Asia was also hit by the Great Depression due to its dependence on the export of raw materials with Europe and America, predominantly rubber and tin for the automotive industry. Asian trade fell sharply as America and Europe were gripped by the depression. Firms in Asia responded by cutting their workforce and reducing wages. In Japan, unemployment and poverty rose, disproportionately affecting the lower classes; these hardships were a factor in the rise of Japanese nationalism.

End of the Great Depression

In the United States

For further details, see the main New Deal article. It was not until the U.S. entered World War II that Roosevelt's ideas for massive public expenditures and deficit spending truly began to bear fruit. Roosevelt's administration, of course, had little choice but to increase expenditures, given the war effort. Even given the special circumstances of war mobilization, New Deal policies seemed to work exactly as predicted, winning over many Republicans, who had been the New Deal's greatest opponents. When the Great Depression was brought to an end by the Second World War, it was obvious that the turnaround had been caused primarily by the reinforcement of business through government expenditure. In truth Roosevelt had foreseen from early in his Presidency that only a solution to the international trade problem would finally end the depression, and the New Deal was, to no small extent, a "holding action". However, the intensity of the economic crisis convinced him that before the world situation could be dealt with, the United States would have to put its own fiscal house back in order. His original conception was that the New Deal would restore circumstances which would allow for a return to balanced budgets and an international gold standard. It was only gradually he came to the conclusion it was essential to remake the U.S. economy in a more extensive fashion, particularly because of the "Roosevelt Recession" of 1937, when he had balanced the budget by restricting fiscal support to the economy. Thus the statement "it was World War II that ended the Depression", while often asserted by partisans as proof the New Deal "failed" is, in fact, the view that the architects of the New Deal themselves saw as the reality: as long as Europe was marching towards war, Japan was engaged in imperial conquest, and the international debt and trading system were still organized in an attempt by creditors to be paid back for World War I at pre-war values for gold, that a full solution to the economic crisis was impossible. New Deal programs sought to stimulate demand and provide work and relief for the impoverished through increased government spending, by:
- instituting regulations which ended what was called "cut throat competition" (in which large players supposedly used predatory pricing to drive out small players);
- creating regulations which would raise the wages of ordinary workers, to redistribute wealth so that more people could purchase products. The original implementation, in the form of the National Recovery Act, brought in direct unemployment relief, and allowed:
- business to set price codes;
- the NRA board to set labor codes and standards;
- the Federal government to insure the banking system and provide price supports for agriculture and mining. This is referred to as the First New Deal. It was centered around the use of the alphabet soup of agencies set up in 1933 and 1934, along with the use of previous agencies, to regulate and stimulate the economy. The theories behind the New Deal matched the later prescriptions of British economist John Maynard Keynes, who advocated increased government spending in a financial crisis. In 1929 federal expenditures constituted only 3% of the GDP. Between 1933 and 1939, federal expenditure tripled, and Roosevelt's critics accused him of turning America into a socialist, or even Stalinist state. The primary purpose of the New Deal were as follows: to prevent the economy and banking system from going into a free fall; to provide effective relief until larger economic forces would end the slump; and to prevent those factors which had exacerbated the slump. The New Deal was both a program of national recovery and of reform. An interesting insight into what motivated Roosevelt came from the transition from the Hoover administration — both men agreed that it was a global maladjustment of prices, debts and production that was causing the slump. The disagreement came over whether the US government should act first to try and negotiate an end to the root causes internationally, which was Hoover's view, or act for domestic recovery and reform until the international situation could be resolved, which was FDR's view. The New Deal was rooted in new ideas, but also in economic orthodoxy of balanced budgets, and restraint of federal power. It represented bigger and broader government than ever before, but not as big as government would later become: spending on the New Deal was far smaller than on the war effort. In short, federal expenditures went from 3% of the GDP in 1929 to about 33% in 1945. The big surprise was just how productive America became: spending financially cured the depression. Between 1939 and 1944 (the peak of wartime production), the nation's output more than doubled. Consequently, unemployment plummeted—from 19% in 1938 (already down from 1933's 24.9% peak) to 1.2% in 1944—as the labor force grew by ten million. The war economy showed just how large the fiscal stimulus required to end the downturn of the Depression was, and it led, at the time, to fears that as soon as America demobilized, that it would return to Depression conditions and industrial output would fall to its pre-war levels. There is general agreement that it was World War II which finally provided the United States Federal Government with the political will to buy its way out of the Depression and resolve the global monetary crisis by the imposition of the Bretton Woods system.

Films and TV

- The Crash of 1929 -- PBS [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/crash/index.html]
- The Grapes of Wrath, Director: John Ford, 1940
- Of Mice and Men, filmed three times - in 1939, 1981 and 1992
- They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, Director: Sidney Pollack, 1969
- The Journey of Natty Gann, 1985
- Cradle Will Rock, Director: Tim Robbins, 1999
- Dogville, Director:Lars von Trier, 2003
- Seabiscuit
- Carnivàle, Fictional account of Depression era television series produced by HBO, (2003-2005)
- Cinderella Man, Directed by the Academy Award Winner Ron Howard, Starring Academy Award Winners Russell Crowe and Renée Zellweger, 2005

Between the Alps and the Baltics

European Union According to several English-language encyclopedias, such as the Encyclopædia Britannica, the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica and the Columbia Encyclopedia, as well as the CIA World Factbook, the term Central Europe is taken to include: In the article on Europe, the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia counts Germany (that then reached east of the Baltic) but not Switzerland to Central Europe; Liechtenstein is not mentioned. In other articles of that encyclopedia, France and Switzerland are included. The notion of Alpine Countries extending to the Baltic Sea and the North Sea is not uncontroversial. While Germany without any doubt formerly has been considered a Central European land, both by Germans and by others, it has at least for the 19th and 20th century had an identity and self-image as located North of the Alps rather than in the Alps. This holds true even for Bavaria, the most Alpine of the German states, where most people live below the Alps.

Culturally Central-European

Several other countries also have regions that retain a Central European character, having historically been part of the central European kingdoms and empires such as the Holy Roman Empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Habsburg monarchy, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and Imperial Germany. They include:
- Belarus (western parts)
- Croatia
- Lithuania
- Romania
- Serbia (Vojvodina)
- Ukraine (Galicia, Volhynia, Podolia)

Central Europe behind the Iron Curtain

Following World War II, large parts of Europe that were culturally and historically Western became part of the Eastern bloc, which effectively neutralized the concept of Central Europe. Following the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and the end of the Cold War, this distinction has again come into use, often to cover those countries that had been Warsaw Pact members but are now members of NATO and the European Union, reflecting remaining differences between countries that were socialist or capitalist. The English term Central Europe was increasingly applied only to the western-most former Warsaw Pact countries (Poland to Hungary) to specify them as culturally-akin socialist countries. This usage continued after the end of the Warsaw Pact when these countries started to undergo transition. In everyday usage, this is the most common meaning of Central Europe, not least among Central Europeans for whom it is often important to point out the difference to that "Eastern Europe" that they otherwise are grouped together with. So defined, the following countries are entirely included:
- Poland
- Czech Republic
- Slovakia
- Hungary
- Romania
- Slovenia Usually excluded are:
- the Baltic countries
- Russian Orthodox and Muslim lands
- the Balkans Although Slovenia as a part of Yugoslavia was strictly speaking not a member of the Warsaw Pact, Slovenia's 20th century history has much in common with that of the other Central European countries. East Germany, on the other hand, was from 1949–1990 a loyal member of the Warsaw Pact, but would now rather be seen as the inheritors of Protestant Prussian culture than of Catholic Central Europe.

The new members of the European Union

After the enlargement of the European Union of 1 May 2004, the term Central Europe is sometimes used in a way that means "the new members of EU"— from Estonia to Malta— perhaps in particular by writers who want to avoid the term coined by Donald Rumsfeld, New Europe, which may be perceived to carry too much American ignorance of matters European. Malta and Cyprus, as well as Estonia and Latvia, are sometimes now also included, but as these new members of the EU are clearly more differentiated from most of the western EU members economically it is arguably an inaccurate construction in its own right. It can be also questioned what there is that unites the nations of a region so constructed apart from a less advanced economy. A usage that closer adheres to the common cultural traits, and also the shared experience of post-war Stalinist rule, may be less prone to cause confusion.

Remnants of the Holy Roman Empire

The German term Mitteleuropa (or alternatively its literal translation into English, Middle Europe) is sometimes used in English to refer to an area somewhat larger than most conceptions of 'Central Europe'; it refers to territories under German(ic) cultural hegemony until World War I (encompassing Austria and Germany in their interbellum-formations but usually excluding Balticum north of East Prussia). ko:중앙유럽 ja:中央ヨーロッパ

Fascism

---- Fascism (in Italian, fascismo), capitalized, was the authoritarian political movement which ruled Italy from 1922 to 1943 under the leadership of Benito Mussolini. Similar political movements, including Nazism, spread across Europe between World War I and World War II. Fascism generally attracted political support from big business, landowners, and patriotic, traditionalist, conservative, far-right, populist and reactionary individuals and groups. Classical fascism has also inspired contemporary neo-fascist organizations. There is little agreement among historians, political scientists, and other scholars concerning the exact nature of fascism. Some scholars hold that fascism as a social movement employs elements from the political left, but it eventually allies with the political right, especially after attaining state power. A few argue that fascism is a form of socialism or left corporatism. See: Fascism and ideology. There is also controversy surrounding the question of what political movements and governments belong to fascism. The most restrictive definitions of fascism include only one government - that of Benito Mussolini in Italy. The broadest definitions, on the other hand, may include every authoritarian state that has ever existed. Fascism is associated with one or more of the following characteristics: a very high degree of nationalism, economic corporatism, and, after attaining political control of a country, a powerful, dictatorial state that views the nation as superior to the individuals or groups composing it. Fascism also typically calls for the regeneration of the nation and uses populist appeals to unity. Mussolini defined fascism as being a right-wing ideology in opposition to socialism, liberalism, democracy and individualism. He said in The Political and Social Doctrine of Fascism: :"Granted that the 19th century was the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy, this does not mean that the 20th century must also be the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy. Political doctrines pass; nations remain. We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the 'right', a Fascist century. If the 19th century was the century of the individual (liberalism implies individualism) we are free to believe that this is the 'collective' century, and therefore the century of the State." [http://www.worldfuturefund.org/wffmaster/Reading/Germany/mussolini.htm] The problem of defining fascism is complicated by the fact that the word fascist, used as an epithet, became an all-purpose insult after World War II, being widely applied to people on all sides of the political spectrum. In contemporary political discourse, adherents of some political ideologies tend to associate fascism with their enemies, or define it as the opposite of their own views.

Definition

The word "fascism" comes from fascio (plural: fasci), which may mean "bundle," as in a political or militant group or a nation, but also from the fasces (rods bundled around an axe), which were an ancient Roman symbol of the authority of magistrates. The Italian 'Fascisti' were also known as Black Shirts for their style of uniform incorporating a black shirt (See Also: political colour). Merriam-Webster defines fascism as "a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition". The American Heritage Dictionary instead describes it as "A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism.". Scholar Stanley Payne's Fascism: Comparison and Definition (1980) uses a lengthy itemized list of characteristics to identify fascism, including the creation of an authoritarian state; a regulated, state-integrated economic sector; fascist symbolism; anti-liberalism; anti-communism and anti-conservatism. A similar strategy was employed by semiotician Umberto Eco in his popular essay Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt. More recently, an emphasis has been placed upon the aspect of fascist rhetoric that argues for a "re-birth" of a conflated nation and ethnic people. Fascism in practice has expressed itself in both political and economic practices, and academics have examined these elements both together and in isolation. Hannah Arendt, whose focus is largely political, argues that regimes commonly thought of as fascist, such as Nazism, belong to a larger category of totalitarianisms, including communist dictatorships, such as that of Joseph Stalin. Thayer Watkins, a professor of Economics from San Jose State University, identifies fascism as aligned with corporatism, a form of economic oppression that he argues includes most of the world's governments. Watkins considers Mussolini's Fascist regime to be one example of the corporatist states that emerged during the Great Depression, including such diverse political systems as that of Spain, Argentina and the United States. After the defeat of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany in World War II, the term has taken on an extremely pejorative meaning, largely in reaction to the crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis. Today, very few groups proclaim themselves fascist, and the term is often used to describe individuals or political groups who are perceived to behave in an authoritarian or totalitarian manner; by silencing opposition, judging personal behavior, promoting racism, or otherwise attempting to concentrate power and create hate towards the "enemies of the state".

Italian Fascism

Early history

Etymologically, the use of the word Fascism in modern Italian political history stretches back to the 1890s in the form of fasci, which were radical left-wing political factions that proliferated in the decades before World War I. One of the first of these groups were the Fasci Siciliani who were part of the first movement that consisted of the Italian working-class peasants that made real progress. The Fasci Siciliani dei lavoratori, were revolutionary socialists that were led by Giuseppe De Felice Giuffrida.

Mussolini's Fascism

Giuseppe De Felice Giuffrida As a political and economic system in Italy, fascism combined elements of corporatism, totalitarianism, nationalism, militarism and anti-Communism. In an article in the 1932 Enciclopedia Italiana, written by Giovanni Gentile and attributed to Benito Mussolini, fascism is described as a system in which "The State not only is authority which governs and molds individual wills with laws and values of spiritual life, but it is also power which makes its will prevail abroad... For the Fascist, everything is within the State and... neither individuals nor groups are outside the State... For Fascism, the State is an absolute, before which individuals or groups are only relative... Liberalism denied the State in the name of the individual; Fascism reasserts the rights of the State as expressing the real essence of the individual." It discussed other political and social doctrines of the time by describing fascism as: "the resolute negation of the doctrine underlying so-called scientific and Marxian socialism... and as rejecting (in democracy) "the absurd conventional lie of political equalitarianism, the habit of collective irresponsibility, the myth of felicity and indefinite progress". "Fascism is definitely and absolutely opposed to the doctrines of liberalism, both in the political and economic sphere. ... The Fascist State lays claim to rule in the economic field no less than in others; it makes its action felt throughout the length and breadth of the country by means of its corporate, social, and educational institutions, and all the political, economic, and spiritual forces of the nation, organised in their respective associations, circulate within the State." Another central theme of Italian fascism was the struggle against what it described as the corrupt "plutocracies" of the time, France and Britain in particular. Italian Fascism is often considered to be a proper noun and thus denoted by a capital letter "F", whereas generic fascism is conventionally represented with the lower-case character "f". Italian Fascism is considered a model for other forms of fascism, yet there is disagreement over which aspects of structure, tactics, culture, and ideology represent a "fascist minimum" or core. A Doctrine of Fascism was written by Giovanni Gentile, a neo-Hegelian philosopher who served as the official philosopher of fascism. Mussolini signed the article and it was officially attributed to him. In it, French socialists Georges Sorel, Charles Peguy, and Hubert Lagardelle were invoked as the sources of fascism. Sorel's ideas concerning syndicalism and violence are much in evidence in this document. It also quotes from Ernest Renan who it says had "pre-fascist intuitions". Both Sorel and Peguy were influenced by the Frenchman Henri Bergson. Bergson rejected the scientism, mechanical evolution and materialism of Marxist ideology. Also, Bergson promoted an elan vital as an evolutionary process. Both of these elements of Bergson appear in fascism. Mussolini states that fascism negates the doctrine of Marxist socialism and its doctrine of historical materialism. Hubert Lagardelle, an authoritative syndicalist writer, was influenced by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon who, in turn, inspired anarchosyndicalism. There were several strains of tradition influencing Mussolini. Sergio Panunzio, a major theoretician of fascism in the 1920s, had a syndicalist background, but his influence waned as the movement shed all connection to the working-class autonomy of syndicalism. The fascist concept of corporatism and particularly its theories of class collaboration and economic and social relations have similarities to the model laid out by Pope Leo XIII's 1892 encyclical Rerum Novarum. This encyclical addressed politics as it had been transformed by the Industrial Revolution, and other changes in society that had occurred during the nineteenth century. The document criticized capitalism, complaining of the exploitation of the masses in industry. However, it also sharply criticized the socialist concept of class struggle, and the proposed socialist solution to exploitation (the elimination, or at least the limitation, of private property). Rerum Novarum called for strong governments to undertake a mission to protect their people from exploitation, while continuing to uphold private property and reject socialism. It also asked Catholics to apply principles of social justice in their own lives. Seeking to find some principle to compete with and replace the Marxist doctrine of class struggle, Rerum Novarum urged social solidarity between the upper and lower classes. Its analogy of the state as being like a body working together as "one mind" had some cultural influence on the early Fascists of Catholic nations. It also indicated the state had a right to suppress "firebrands" and striking workers. Further Rerum Novarum proposed a kind of corporatism that resembled medieval guilds for an industrial age. This relates far more directly to Brazilian Integralism form of Fascism than anything in Italy. The encyclical intended to counteract the "subversive nature" of both Marxism and liberalism. Themes and ideas developed in Rerum Novarum can also be found in the ideology of fascism as developed by Mussolini. Although it also contains ideas like "the members of the working classes are citizens by nature and by the same right as the rich" or "the State has for its office to protect natural rights, not to destroy them; and, if it forbid its citizens to form associations, it contradicts the very principle of its own existence," that never fit easily with Italian Fascism. Fascism also borrowed from Gabriele D'Annunzio's Constitution of Fiume for his ephemeral "regency" in the city of Fiume. Syndicalism had a strong influence on fascism as well, particularly as some syndicalists intersected with D'Annunzio's ideas. Before the First World War, syndicalism had stood for a militant doctrine of working-class revolution. It distinguished itself from Marxism because it insisted that the best route for the working class to liberate itself was the trade union rather than the party. The Italian Socialist Party ejected the syndicalists in 1908. The syndicalist movement split between anarcho-syndicalists and a more moderate tendency. Some moderates began to advocate "mixed syndicates" of workers and employers. In this practice, they absorbed the teachings of Catholic theorists and expanded them to accommodate greater power of the state, and diverted them by the influence of D'Annunzio to nationalist ends. When Henri De Man's Italian translation of Au-dela du marxisme emerged, Mussolini was excited and wrote to the author that his criticism "destroyed any scientific element left in Marxism". Mussolini was appreciative of the idea that a corporative organization and a new relationship between labour and capital would eliminate "the clash of economic interests" and thereby neutralize "the germ of class warfare.'" Socialist thinkers, Robert Michels, Sergio Panunzio, Ottavio Dinale, Agostino Lanzillo, Angelo Oliviero Olivetti, Michele Bianchi, and Edmondo Rossoni played a part in this attempt to find a third way that rejected both capitalism and Marxism. Many historians claim that the March 23 1919 meeting at the Piazza San Sepolcro was the historic “birthplace” of the fascist movement. However, this would imply that the Italian Fascists “came from nowhere” which is simply not true. Mussolini revived his former group, Fasci d'Azione rivoluzionaria, in order to take part in the 1919 elections in response to an increase in Communist activity occurring in Milan. The Fasci di Combattimenti were the result of this continuation (not creation) of the Fascist party. The result of the meeting was that Fascism became an organized political movement. Among the founding members were the revolutionary syndicalist leaders Agostino Lanzillo and Michele Bianchi. In 1921, the fascists developed a program that called for:
- a democratic republic,
- separation of church and state,
- a national army,
- progressive taxation for inherited wealth, and
- development of co-operatives or guilds to replace labor unions. As the movement evolved, several of these initial ideas were abandoned and rejected. Mussolini capitalized on fear of a Communist revolution, finding ways to unite Labor and Capital to prevent class war. In 1926 he created the National Council of Corporations, divided into guilds of employers and employees, tasked with managing 22 sectors of the economy. The guilds subsumed both labor unions and management, and were represented in a chamber of corporations through a triad comprised of a representative from management, from labour and from the party. Together they would plan aspects of the economy for mutual advantage. The movement was supported by small capitalists, low-level bureaucrats, and the middle classes, who had all felt threatened by the rise in power of the Socialists. Fascism also met with great success in rural areas, especially among farmers, peasants, and in the city, the lumpenproletariat. Mussolini's fascist state was established nearly a decade before Hitler's rise to power (1922 and the March on Rome). Both a movement and a historical phenomenon, Italian Fascism was, in many respects, an adverse reaction to both the apparent failure of laissez-faire economics and fear of Communism. Fascism was, to an extent, a product of a general feeling of anxiety and fear among the middle class of postwar Italy. This fear arose from a convergence of interrelated economic, political, and cultural pressures. Under the banner of this authoritarian and nationalistic ideology, Mussolini was able to exploit fears regarding the survival of capitalism in an era in which postwar depression, the rise of a more militant left, and a feeling of national shame and humiliation stemming from Italy's 'mutilated victory' at the hands of the World War I postwar peace treaties seemed to converge. Such unfulfilled nationalistic aspirations tainted the reputation of liberalism and constitutionalism among many sectors of the Italian population. In addition, such democratic institutions had never grown to become firmly rooted in the young nation-state. This same postwar depression heightened the allure of Marxism among an urban proletariat who were even more disenfranchised than their continental counterparts. But fear of the growing strength of trade unionism, Communism, and socialism proliferated among the elite and the middle class. In a way, Benito Mussolini filled a political vacuum. Fascism emerged as a "third way" — as Italy's last hope to avoid imminent collapse of the 'weak' Italian liberalism, and Communist revolution. While failing to outline a coherent program, fascism evolved into a new political and economic system that combined corporatism, totalitarianism, nationalism, and anti-Communism in a state designed to bind all classes together under a capitalist system. This was a new capitalist system, however, one in which the state seized control of the organization of vital industries. Under the banners of nationalism and state power, Fascism seemed to synthesize the glorious Roman past with a futuristic utopia. Despite the themes of social and economic reform in the initial Fascist manifesto of June 1919, the movement came to be supported by sections of the middle class fearful of socialism and communism. Industrialists and landowners supported the movement as a defense against labour militancy. Under threat of a fascist March on Rome, in October 1922, Mussolini assumed the premiership of a right-wing coalition Cabinet initially including members of the pro-church Partito Popolare (People's Party). The regime's most lasting political achievement was perhaps the Lateran Treaty of February 1929 between the Italian state and the Holy See. Under this treaty, the Papacy was granted temporal sovereignty over the Vatican City and guaranteed the free exercise of Catholicism as the sole state religion throughout Italy in return for its acceptance of Italian sovereignty over the Pope's former dominions. In the 1930s, Italy recovered from the Great Depression, and achieved economic growth in part by developing domestic substitutes for imports (Autarchia). The draining of the malaria-infested Pontine Marshes south of Rome was one of the regime's proudest boasts. But growth was undermined by international sanctions following Italy's October 1935 invasion of Ethiopia (the Abyssinia crisis), and by the government's costly military support for Franco's Nationalists in Spain. International isolation and their common involvement in Spain brought about increasing diplomatic collaboration between Italy and Nazi Germany. This was reflected also in the Fascist regime's domestic policies as the first anti-semitic laws were passed in 1938. Italy's intervention (June 10 1940) as Germany's ally in World War II brought military disaster, and resulted in the loss of her north and east African colonies and the American-British-Canadian invasion of Sicily in July 1943 and southern Italy in September 1943. Mussolini was dismissed as prime minister by King Victor Emmanuel III on July 25th 1943, and subsequently arrested. He was freed in September by German paratroopers under command of Otto Skorzeny and installed as head of a puppet "Italian Social Republic" at Salo in German-occupied northern Italy. His association with the German occupation regime eroded much of what little support remained to him. His summary execution on April 28th 1945 during the war's violent closing stages by the northern partisans was widely seen as a fitting end to his regime. After the war, the remnants of Italian fascism largely regrouped under the banner of the neo-Fascist "Italian Social Movement" (MSI). The MSI merged in 1994 with conservative former Christian Democrats to form the "National Alliance" (AN), which proclaims its commitment to constitutionalism, parliamentary government and political pluralism.

Mussolini's influences

Fascism did not spring forth full-grown, and the writings of Fascist theoreticians cannot be taken as a full description of Mussolini's ideology, let alone how specific situations inevitably resulted in deviations from ideology. Mussolini's policies drew on both the history of the Italian nation and the philosophical ideas of the 19th century. What resulted was neither logical nor well defined, to the extent that Mussolini defined it as "action and mood, not doctrine". Nonetheless, certain ideas are clearly visible. The most obvious is nationalism. The last time Italy had been a great nation was under the banner of the Roman Empire and Italian nationalists always saw this as a period of glory. Given that even other European nations with imperial ambitions had often invoked ancient Rome in their architecture and vocabulary, it was perhaps inevitable that Mussolini would do the same. Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Italy had not again been united until its final unification in 1870. Mussolini desired to affirm an Italian national identity and therefore saw the unification as the first step towards returning Italy to greatness and often exploited the unification and the achievements of leading figures such as Garibaldi to induce a sense of Italian national pride. The Fascist cult of national rebirth through a strong leader has roots in the romantic movement of the 19th century, as does the glorification of war. For example, the loss of the war with Abyssinia had been a great humiliation to Italians and consequently it was the first place targeted for Italian expansion under Mussolini. Not all ideas of fascism originated from the 19th century; for example, the use of systematic propaganda to pass on simple slogans such as "believe, obey, fight" and Mussolini's use of the radio both were techniques developed in the 20th century. Similarly, Mussolini's corporate state was a distinctly 20th-century creation.

Nazism and Fascism

radio standing next to Adolf Hitler]] The extent and nature of the affinity between Fascism and Nazism has been the subject of much academic debate. Although the modern consensus sees Nazism as a type or offshoot of fascism, there are many experts who argue that Nazism was not fascist at all, either on the grounds that the differences are too great, or because they deny that fascism is generic.

Differences

Nazism differed from Fascism proper in the emphasis on the state's purpose in serving its national ideal on the basis of a national race, specifically the social engineering of culture to the ends of the greatest possible prosperity for German race at the expense of all else and all others. In contrast, Mussolini's Fascism held that cultural factors existed to serve the state, and that it wasn't necessarily in the state's interest to serve or engineer any of these particulars within its sphere. The only purpose of government under Fascism was to uphold the state as supreme above all else, and for these reasons it can be said to have been a governmental statolatry. Where Nazism spoke of "Volk", Fascism talked of "State". While Nazism was a metapolitical ideology, seeing both party and government as a means to achieve an ideal condition for certain chosen people, fascism was a squarely anti-socialist form of statism that existed as an end in and of itself. The Nazi movement, at least in its overt ideology, spoke of class-based society as the enemy, and wanted to unify the racial element above established classes. The Fascist movement, on the other hand, sought to preserve the class system and uphold it as the foundation of established and desirable culture, although this is not to say that Fascists rejected the concept of social mobility. Indeed a central tenet of the Corporate State was meritocracy. This underlying theorem made the Fascists and National Socialists in the period between the two world wars sometimes see themselves and their respective political labels as at best partially exclusive of one another, and at worst diametrically opposed to one another. This seemed to be especially the case in 1934 when Engelbert Dollfuss the Austrofascist leader of Austria was assasinated by Nazi Brown shirts, on Hitler's orders in preparation for a planned Anschluss, which prompted Mussolini to move troops to the Austrian-Italian boarder in readiness for war Hitler.

Similarities

Nevertheless, despite these differences, [http://www.cf.ac.uk/hisar/people/kp/]Kevin Passmore (2002 p.62) observes:

There are sufficient similarities between Fascism and Nazism to make it worthwhile applying the concept of fascism to both. In Italy and Germany a movement came to power that sought to create national unity through the repression of national enemies and the incorporation of all classes and both genders into a permanently mobilized nation.

Hitler and Mussolini themselves recognised commonalities in their politics. The second part of Hitler's Mein Kampf, "The National Socialistic Movement", first published in 1926, contains this passage:

I conceived the profoundest admiration for the great man south of the Alps, who, full of ardent love for his people, made no pacts with the enemies of Italy, but strove for their annihilation by all ways and means. What will rank Mussolini among the great men of this earth is his determination not to share Italy with the Marxists, but to destroy internationalism and save the fatherland from it. (p. 622)

Anti-Communism

Fascism and Communism are political systems that rose to prominence after World War I. Historians of the period between World War I and World War II such as E.H. Carr and Eric Hobsbawm point out that liberalism was under serious stress in this period and seemed to be a doomed philosophy. The success of the Russian Revolution of 1917 resulted in a revolutionary wave across Europe. The socialist movement worldwide split into separate social democratic and Leninist wings. The subsequent formation of the Third International prompted serious debates within social democratic parties, resulting in supporters of the Russian Revolution splitting to form Communist Parties in most industrialized (and many non-industrialized) countries. At the end of World War I, there were attempted socialist uprisings or threats of socialist uprisings throughout Europe, most notably in Germany, where the Spartacist uprising, led by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht in January 1919, was eventually crushed. In Bavaria, Communists successfully overthrew the government and established the Munich Soviet Republic that lasted from 1918 to 1919. A short lived Hungarian Soviet Republic was also established under Béla Kun in 1919. The Russian Revolution also inspired attempted revolutionary movements in Italy with a wave of factory occupations. Most historians view fascism as a response to these developments, as a movement that both tried to appeal to the working class and divert them from Marxism. It also appealed to capitalists as a bulwark against Bolshevism. Italian Fascism took power with the blessing of Italy's king after years of leftist-led unrest led many conservatives to fear that a communist revolution was inevitable. Throughout Europe, numerous aristocrats, conservative intellectuals, capitalists and industrialists lent their support to fascist movements in their countries that emulated Italian Fascism. In Germany, numerous right-wing nationalist groups arose, particularly out of the post-war Freikorps, which were used to crush both the Spartacist uprising and the Munich Soviet. With the worldwide Great Depression of the 1930s, it seemed that liberalism and the liberal form of capitalism were doomed, and Communist and fascist movements swelled. These movements were bitterly opposed to each other and fought frequently, the most notable example of this conflict being the Spanish Civil War. This war became a proxy war between the fascist countries and their international supporters — who backed Francisco Franco — and the worldwide Communist movement allied uneasily with anarchists and Trotskyists — who backed the Popular Front — and were aided chiefly by the Soviet Union. Initially, the Soviet Union supported a coalition with the western powers against Nazi Germany and popular fronts in various countries against domestic fascism. This policy was largely unsuccessful due to the distrust shown by the western powers (especially Britain) towards the Soviet Union. The Munich Agreement between Germany, France and Britain heightened Soviet fears that the western powers were endeavoring to force them to bear the brunt of a war against Nazism. The lack of eagerness on the part of the British during diplomatic negotiations with the Soviets served to make the situation even worse. The Soviets changed their policy and negotiated a non-aggression pact known as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in 1939. Vyacheslav Molotov claims in his memoirs that the Soviets believed this was necessary to buy them time to prepare for an expected war with Germany. Stalin expected the Germans not to attack until 1942, but the pact ended in 1941 when Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa. Fascism and communism reverted to being lethal enemies. The war, in the eyes of both sides, was a war between ideologies.

Fascism and religion

Some expressions of fascism have been closely linked with religious political movements. This combination is referred to as Clerical fascism, a prime example of which is the Ustashe in Croatia.

Fascism and the Catholic Church

A controversial topic is the relationship between fascist movements and the Catholic Church. As mentioned above, Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical, Rerum Novarum included doctrines that fascists used or admired. Forty years later, the corporatist tendencies of Rerum Novarum were underscored by Pope Pius XI's May 25, 1931 encyclical Quadragesimo Anno restated the hostility of Rerum Novarum to both unbridled competition and class struggle. The criticism of both socialism and capitalism in these encyclicals was not fascist per se, but by weakening support for either alternative such writings arguably opened the door to fascism. In the early 1920s, the Catholic party in Italy (Partito Popolare) was in the process of forming a coalition with the Reform Party that could have stabilized Italian politics and thwarted Mussolini's projected coup. On October 2, 1922, Pope Pius XI circulated a letter ordering clergy not to identify themselves with the Partito Popolare, but to remain neutral, an act that undercut the party and its alliance against Mussolini. Following Mussolini's rise to power, the Vatican's Secretary of State met Il Duce in early 1923 and agreed to dissolve the Partito Popolare, which Mussolini saw as obstacle to fascist rule. In exchange, the fascists made guarantees regarding Catholic education and institutions. In 1924, following the murder of the leader of the Socialist Party by fascists, the Partito Popolare joined with the Socialist Party in demanding that the King dismiss Mussolini as Prime Minister, and stated their willingness to form a coalition government. Pius XI responded by warning against any coalition between Catholics and socialists. The Vatican ordered all priests to resign from the Partito Popolare and from any positions they held in it. This led to the party's disintegration in rural areas where it relied on clerical assistance. The Vatican subsequently established Catholic Action as a non-political lay organization under the direct control of bishops. The organization was forbidden by the Vatican to participate in politics, and thus was not permitted to oppose the fascist regime. Pius XI ordered all Catholics to join Catholic Action. This resulted in hundreds of thousands of Catholics withdrawing from the Partito Popolare, and joining the apolitical Catholic Action. This caused the Catholic Party's final collapse. When Mussolini ordered the closure of Catholic Action in May 1931, Pius XI issued an encyclical, Non abbiamo bisogno. This document stated the Catholic Church's opposition to the dissolution, and argued that the order "unmasked the 'pagan' intentions of the Fascist state". Under international pressure, Mussolini decided to compromise, and Catholic Action was saved. For Catholics, the encyclical's disapproval of any system that puts the nation above God or humanity remains doctrine. Aside from certain ideological similarities, the relationship between the Church and fascist movements in various countries has often been close. An early example is Austria which developed a quasi-fascist authoritarian Catholic regime some call the "Austro-fascist" Ständestaat between 1934 and 1938. There is little debate over Slovakia, where the fascist dictator was a Catholic monsignor; and the Independent State of Croatia, where the fascist Ustashe identified itself as a Catholic movement. The Iron Guard in Romania identified itself as an Eastern Orthodox movement (with no connection to Roman Catholicism), and had particularly strong leanings toward clerical fascism. (See also Involvement of Croatian Catholic clergy with the Ustaša regime.) The Vichy regime in France was also deeply influenced by the reactionary Catholic-influenced ideology of the Action Française. This group had actually been led by an agnostic and condemned by the Catholic Church in 1926. Many of its members were reactionary Catholics so this condemnation damaged the group, but then in 1938 the condemnation was lifted. Conversely, many Catholic priests were persecuted under the Nazi regime, and many Catholic laypeople and clergy played notable roles in sheltering Jews during the Holocaust.

Fascism and the Protestant churches

Protestantism in Italy and Spain was not as significant as Catholicism. The connection between the German form of Fascism, Nazism, and Protestantism has long been debated, with some saying that the Protestant denominations, especially the German Lutheran Church, was close. According to some scholars, especially Richard Steigman-Gall (The Holy Reich: Protestantism and the Nazi Movement, 1920-1945) the relationship was collaborationist. Hitler, in his manifesto, Mein Kampf, listed Martin Luther as one of Germany's great historic reformers. In Luther's 1543 book On the Jews and Their Lies, Luther advocated the burning of synagogues and schools, the deportation of Jews, and many other measures that resemble the actions later taken by the Nazis. The overwhleming majority of Protestant church leaders in Germany made no comment on the Nazis' growing anti-Jewish activities. Many Protestants opposed the governments of the Weimar Republic in the 1920s which they saw as coalitions between the Socialists and the Catholic Centre party. In 1932, many German Protestants joined together to form the German Christian Movement which enthusiastically supported Nazi propaganda, and sought to join Church and State. 3,000 of the 17,000 Protestant pastors in Germany were to join the movement. Hitler wished to unite a Protestant church of 28 different federations into one nationalist body. Pastor Ludwig Muller, the leader of the German Christian Movement, was soon appointed Hitler's advisor on religious affairs. He was elected Reich's Bishop in charge of the German Protestant churches in 1933. An "Aryan Paragraph" was introduced to the constitution which stated that no one of non-Aryan background, or married to anyone of non-Aryan background, could serve as either a pastor or church official. Pastors and officials who had married a non-Aryan were to be dismissed. Much of the Lutheran and Methodist establishment in Germany had fallen behind Hitler in his promise to oppose Bolshevism and instability. The new measures began to raise some opposition to the German Christians from a minority of Lutherans and Evangelicals who had become increasingly disillusioned with unethical practices of the Nazies and disliked state interference in church affairs. Dietrich Bonhoffer, a Lutheran pastor (though arguably of a liberal theological persuasion), was vocal in his opposition of the Nazis. Though there is some debate as to his actual involvement in planning the assassination attempt of Hitler, he was found guilty and executed for his alleged part in the conspiracy. A small group of Protestant clergy under Martin Niemoeller and Dietrich Bonhoffer separated from the main churches to form the Confessing Church. The group had limited effect, however, as it was forced to meet secretly and was dispersed by the Nazis by 1939, and the effect of Protestantism on inhibiting Nazism in Germany was limited at best.

Fascism as an international phenomenon

It is often a matter of dispute whether a certain government is to be characterized as fascist, authoritarian, totalitarian, or a police state. Regimes that are alleged to have been either fascist or sympathetic to fascism include: Austria (1933-1938) - Austro-fascism: Dollfuß dissolved parliament and established a clerical-fascist dictatorship which lasted until Austria was incorporated into Germany through the Anschluss. Dollfuß's idea of a "Ständestaat" was borrowed from Mussolini. Italy (1922-1943) - The first fascist country, it was ruled by Benito Mussolini (Il Duce) until he was dismissed and arrested on the 25 July 1943. Mussolini was then rescued from prison by German troops, and set up a short lived puppet state named "Repubblica di Salò" in northern Italy under the protection of the German army. Germany (1933-1945) - Ruled by the Nazi movement of Adolf Hitler (der Führer). In the terminology of the Allies, Nazi Germany was as their chief enemy the mightiest and best-known fascist state. See above for a discussion on the differences and similarities between Nazism and fascism. Spain (1936-1975) - After the 1936 arrest and execution of its founder José Antonio Primo de Rivera during the Spanish Civil War, the fascist Falange Española Party was allied to and ultimately came to be dominated by Generalísimo Francisco Franco, who became known as El Caudillo, the undisputed leader of the Nationalist side in the war, and, after victory, head of state until his death over 35 years later. However, it was best described as an autocracy based on the Falangist fascist principles in its early years. By the mid-50s, the Spanish Miracle and the rise of the Opus Dei in the Franco regime led to Falangist fascism being discarded and fascists minimized in importance. Portugal (1932-1974) - Although less restrictive than the Italian, German and Spanish regimes, the Estado Novo regime of António de Oliveira Salazar was quasi-fascist. However, it was closer to the Spanish example of paternal authoritarianism than the Italian fascist or German Nazi model. Greece - Joannis Metaxas' 1936 to 1941 dictatorship was not particularly ideological in nature, and might hence be characterized as authoritarian rather than fascist. The same can be argued regarding Colonel George Papadopoulos' 1967 to 1974 military dictatorship, which was supported by the United States. Brazil (1937-1945) - Many historians have argued that Brazil's Estado Novo under Getúlio Vargas was a Brazilian variant of the continental fascist regimes. For a period of time, Vargas' regime was aligned with Plínio Salgado's Integralist Party, Brazil's fascist movement. However, it also showed great affinity with organized labour and leftist ideas, leaving its classification open to interpretation. Belgium (1940-1945) - The violent Rexist movement and the Vlaamsch-Nationaal Verbond party achieved some electoral success in the 1930s. Many of its members assisted the Nazi occupation during World War II. The Verdinaso movement, too, can be considered fascist. Its leader, Joris Van Severen, was killed before the Nazi

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