18 Comments
Dec 24, 2022Liked by John Ganz

"The mob, although it has appeared as a permanent political factor, does not have the strength or organization to blackjack its way into into power nor to persuade the bourgeoisie that submitting to its dictatorship is the only alternative to the end of the social order."

I'm not so sure about this. The fascism conversation tends to focus on Trump and his presidency, but the direction the far right been going since he lost, with the anti-'wokeness' panic, is an explicit fear of the end of the social order. There was for a moment a (arguably credible?) fear of revolutionary threat with the George Floyd protests, particularly the flashpoints of the Tom Cotton 'send in the troops' NYT op ed, and the unrest in Kenosha that's made Kyle Rittenhouse a conservative celebrity. You had Andrew Sullivan saying that if the choice is anarchy or fascism then he's a fascist, and Rod Dreher calling Rittenhouse a defender of civilization. You have the Matt Yglesiases and Jesse Singals of the world making their whole brand that the radical left is calling the shots and making themselves more comfortable with the IDW crowd and audience. There's a de facto alliance between Ron DeSantis and Libs of TikTok in targeting LGBTQ people for state persecution and mob violence.

I guess it's kind of a separate conversation, since Trump's own position with the coalition he created is slipping now that he's got the stench of failure accruing to him. And for now big business is siding against the Lauren Boeberts of the Republican party, as you said. But I see that as a function of Joe Biden's presidency, which is trying to keep tensions from coming to a head. I can see this changing if there is another disruptive protest movement from the left--a critical mass of worker strikes, sabotage of oil infrastructure by radicalized climate change activists, unrest from another police shooting or, say, the failure of states to keep the heat on during a record-breaking freeze.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that Trumpism didn't appear in the same kind of fraught social conditions that fascism did, but that we're a lot closer to it now than we were in 2016.

Expand full comment
Dec 23, 2022Liked by John Ganz

The way I see it "Fascism" is a convenient handle to describe any populist right-wing movement, with greater or fewer resemblances to the original model from Italy, depending on the specifics of each situation and group. Trump's following has unambiguously fascist-minded supporters (Thiel, Bannon, etc.) who sometimes are pretty blunt about what they think. But overall, supporters of Trump who have fascistic mindsets are always going to call it something else, since the term remains in disrepute.

Though Trump has been (is?) a sizable businessman (how sizable of course is a matter of some ambiguity), his primary support didn't come from "big business" but from the small-business class and white collar working class that tended to be the core support for the ur-Fascists, and for all sorts of other reactionary political formations. Is his movement Fascist? Well, I agree with you; sort of.

This next is more a response to your post No. 2 in this series, where your talked about why a ruling business class might support a fascist or similar political movement rather than trying to wield power on its own.

The U.S, business class who were the intended audience of the Powell memo very much wanted to rule more-or-less in their own right. See Rick Perlstein's recent book for much detail on the organizing efforts of the business folks he calls the "boardroom Jacobins."

In a very real sense, Ronald Reagan was a direct representative of that business class, in a way in which Mussolini or Hitler, or a military dictator like Pinochet would not be, though Pinochet in particular surely acted on behalf of his country's business class.

I think a ruling business class opts for some kind of "outside authoritarianism, such as a Fascist party or a military dictator when it no longer feels it's direct representatives can keep the political sphere in line with its interests. So far the business class as a whole, notwithstanding Thiel, Musk, Uihlein and some others, has not jumped ship, and that so far is keeping our democracy functioning, at least to a point.

Expand full comment

I feel like there’s a bit of equivocation between two senses of the word “mob” here - unruly, violent crowds on the one hand, and organised crime on the other. That is, it doesn’t seem to me that the January 6 rioters and New York crime families have much in common besides a name. But then again, I could see a theory that fascist mass parties share aspects of both of these. What’s your take here?

Expand full comment

This was really excellent, thank you! In particular the elucidation of the structural and cultural focus on S-Corps is helpful.

Expand full comment

Fascinating. I found this the strongest of the three posts.

Expand full comment

Was the Jan 6 mob declassed and struggling? They seem more in the auto dealership class to the extent I’ve seen discussion of that — not well-educated, but with plenty of money for guns and travel. I think your point about family businesses versus those governed by boards and corporate norms is a really good one, though, and a great tool for analysis.

Expand full comment