The evolving faces of fascism

The dawn of the age of enlightenment helped Western civilization separate politics from religion and shifted the process of wealth creation away from land owners towards industrialists.

The social consequence of this was the rise of individualism, erosion of thousands of years old tribal structures and weakening of family bonds. As a result, this empowered and freed the European individual and led to the evolution of democracy and decline of monarchy, as the dominant political system.

However, a polarizing consequence of this distinct separation of power, wealth and religion within the Western civilization was the introduction of a systemic and constant struggle between conservative and liberal ideologies, right-wing and leftist political parties and rise of popular activism within Western democracies.

Democracy enabled the common citizen to voice her/his concerns and cast a vote in elections but this new form of ideological and polarized struggle between the leftist and the rightist centers of power was unfortunately neither intellectual nor ensured that its ways, means and ends always remain peaceful. Popular politics has been cleverly exploited by totalitarian rulers like Hitler and Mussolini in Europe, ultra-nationalists like Modi in India and ambitious individuals in Pakistan to gain and later monopolize power.

These individuals used several aspects of fascism, a term once considered as a taboo in mainstream politics, which once again helps one understand contemporary politics within certain societies as a form of popular distortion of social contract by shifting power away from the nation by sophisticated exploitation of information and perception building to concentrate power in an individual, within electoral democracies.

The 21st century has witnessed the revival of a modern and more sophisticated form of neo-fascism as a political strategy, based on effective exploitation of social media and globalization. This is done to gain domestic popularity and build an international image in order to protect oneself from accountability for selfish and totalitarian pursuit of power, at the cost of public interest and while blaming state institutions.

There are several common features in the political strategy of those who depend upon fascist approaches to promote their self-interest, dominate public discourse and monopolize power within a conservative democratic political system. The key aspects of this political strategy is to first gain popularity, rise to power through electoral politics, use conservative ideas to justify unequal distribution of power, dominate public discourse through media, demonize and isolate political opponents, in order to eliminate accountability and criticism to allow unchallenged decision-making, for eventual and total consolidation of power within a charismatic individual.

Once popularity has been successfully translated into unchecked and unshared individual power, personal agendas are justified through conservative and Utopian ideas and popular historical references which appeal to the people, ranging from ‘the promised land’, ‘the chosen race’, ‘Hindu superpower’ to the recent concept of ‘Riyasat-e-Madina’.

A very interesting aspect and common feature of these fascist political strategies is that many such leaders boldly and confidently promise a national rebirth through exotic narratives such as ‘Shining India’, ‘Make America Great Again’ and ‘Naya Pakistan’. They try to inspire their naive, emotional and simple followers to dream big without offering any practical plan regarding how to realistically achieve those lofty ideal goals, despite complex international and domestic challenges and constraints.

In addition, these individuals not only try to ideologically justify the unequal global distribution of wealth and resources, and reduce space for dissenting views and criticism but also try to replace social tolerance with hatred in order to demonize and humiliate their political opponents. They prefer popular street politics and large and frequent gatherings of cult followers and starry-eyed fans who are blinded by their personal charisma and disdainful of dispassionate parliamentary politics which implies a practical pursuit of public interest, based on pragmatism and compromise with political opponents and international community.

They also cleverly weaponize public frustration and street sentiments by converting these into raw street power and passionate mob politics, which is very useful once they are out of power to act as a pressure group to coerce governments and state institutions and attract media attention. Obviously, while this entire scheme of things is played out in the public eye, it is at the cost of public interest and sometimes also endangers international peace and security as we saw when some of these individuals instigated the most tragic and bloody wars in human history in the form of the First and Second World Wars, to fulfil their personal ambitions.

In the South Asian context, Indian PM Modi forced the Indian air force to endanger peace and stability in South Asia by ordering a failed air strike against its nuclear armed neighbor in February 2019, to help him gain anti-Muslim and anti-Pakistan votes in the subsequent elections. Thankfully, the Pakistan Air Force was ready to defeat the Indian Air Force militarily and embarrass Modi diplomatically.

The fate of such unrestrained and power hungry individuals offers useful lessons for all of us. Once Hitler failed to fulfill his individual dream and rejected all avenues of compromise, he was left with no choice but to commit suicide. Mussolini was shot dead along with his ministers. It is one of the greatest ironies of history that despite such blatant misuse of public office and trust, tragic political disasters and futile global conflicts, today some people still seek inspiration from the examples of such fascist leaders.

That is why learning the costly and bitter lessons of history is critical, not to deprive us from our national dreams but to sceptically hold our public representatives accountable whenever they try to sell their constituencies political and economic nightmares in the garb of dreams, minus any practical and realistic plan of how to achieve those.

On the night between October 27 and 28 in 1922, thirty thousand fascist activists gathered in Rome and demanded the resignation of liberal Italian prime minister Luigi Facta and the appointment of a fascist government. Italian King Victor Emmanuel III, who was the supreme military commander, refused the liberal government’s request to declare martial law and save the government. This left PM Facta with no choice but to resign and enabled Mussolini to gain power through sheer mob politics and political coercion. Mussolini also enjoyed sympathy within the military and support among the Italian industrial and landed elite.

The king’s main concern was to avoid a civil war. Therefore, he felt handing over power to Mussolini would help restore law and order and return political stability to the country. However, the king failed to anticipate that handing over power to Mussolini would enable him to rise as Europe’s most famous fascist and totalitarian leader and a threat to the Italian nation, European and African continents and world peace.

The events of May 9, 2023 which unfolded on the streets and near military installations in Rawalpindi, Lahore, Mianwali, Peshawar and Islamabad have a dangerous similarity with how Mussolini grabbed power, through sheer popular coercion of state institutions and mob politics.

One hopes and prays that the Pakistani government, state institutions and the nation have the wisdom to reflect and learn from the tragic mistakes of other nations and great civilizations, which despite much greater power, glory, knowledge and wealth, tolerated the popular rise of fascism within their societies. This led them to not only destroy themselves but also became a threat to world peace and security which forced large-scale foreign military interventions.

Most importantly, such individuals reduced their countries and nations, despite their immense international contributions and achievements, to an eternal and unforgivable chapter in world history, literature and philosophy, which humanity continues to condemn and will continue to condemn.

The writer is an international policy analyst with 28 years of experience in writing, teaching and speaking on global, regional and national political, security and strategic issues.