A SUBTLE KIND OF FASCISM The word fascism is used a lot, often
pejoratively. The image that immediately comes to mind is
Mussolini in a steel helmet, hands on hips, head tipped back,
jaw thrust out. It is an image that influenced other fascists.
Young Hitler was a great admirer. It is always helpful for any
discussion to define the subject carefully, a seemingly obvious
principle often ignored. What exactly is fascism? Can fascism
coexist to any extent with democratic institutions? Fascism
certainly is not the same thing as communism, although both
these systems are represented by strongmen or tyrants and the
state apparatus needed to support them. Those who like the
nomenclature of the French Revolution might say that the two
political extremes, right and left, almost meet somewhere in a
bend of political space. Private enterprise, of course, has been
regarded as incompatible with communism, although contemporary
China with its New Economic Zone begins to confuse the issue.
Things have always been quite diff