Interview Archive: Fascism and the Global Right
The eternal mystery of fascism is: Why did so many people buy into it?
“War evokes our sense of national identity, establishes an “us vs. them” framework and forces us to choose sides.”
Olivia B. Waxman, “What to Know About the Origins of Fascism’s Brutal Ideology,” TIME
“In the past, there was this idea that Mussolini copied Hitler, but it was actually the other way around for a very long time. Mussolini was in power 11 years before Hitler.”
PBS, Dictator’s Playbook, Mussolini
“The way Benito Mussolini got power in 1922 is a cautionary tale for the rest of the 20th century and today.”
Emma Johanningsmeier, “A New Book about Mussolini is Provoking a Debate about his Legacy”
“The history of fascism is a history of dictatorship, of leader-worship….This book is part of this phenomenon that’s resurrecting the cult of the leader.”
History Hit with Dan Snow – Mussolini and his inheritors
“He [Mussolini] was the first person to turn a democracy into a dictatorship.”
Justin Salhani, “When Bannon Visits His Far-Right Friends in Europe,” Arab Weekly
“The League is the most dangerous, anti-democratic force in Italy right now and naturally well placed to be riding the anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim wave that’s buoying the right in Europe”
Jack Smith IV, “This is fashwave, the suicidal retro-futurist art of the alt-right,” Mic
“The stability and monumentalism of these male heads and male torsos is comforting to young men as a model of a great man. A warrior — the beautiful, perfect male who is ‘European.’ The joke is that the purity never existed in these cultures, so it’s quite a fantasy, but it’s a compelling fantasy.”
Justin Salhani, “There’s a Resurgence of Far Right Groups in Italy and They’re Sponsored by Putin,” ThinkProgress
“Axis 2.0 has been shaping up for some time in Europe, with Putin in the place of Hitler as funder and instigator and United States President Donald Trump helping him and the right achieve their aim of undoing liberal democracy.”
Annalisa Merelli, “Italy’s Neo-Fascism is What Happens You Normalize Extremism,” Quartz
“the people in the fringe became the center, [in] a mainstreaming of the right.”
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