BENITO MUSSOLINI
(1932)
(This article, co-written by Giovanni Gentile, is considered to be the most complete articulation of Mussolini's political views. This is the only complete official translation we know of on the web, copied directly from an official Fascist government publication of 1935, Fascism Doctrine and Institutions, by Benito Mussolini, Ardita Publishers, Rome, pages 7-42. This translation includes all the footnotes from the original.)
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Like all sound political conceptions, Fascism is
action and it is thought; action in
which doctrine is immanent, and doctrine arising from a given system of
historical forces in which it is
inserted, and working on them from within (1).
It has therefore a form correlated to contingencies of time and space; but it
has also an ideal content which makes it
an expression of truth in the higher region of the history of thought (2).
There is no way of exercising a spiritual influence in the world as a human will dominating
the will of others, unless one has a conception both of the transient
and the specific reality on which that
action is to be exercised, and of
the permanent and universal reality in which the transient dwells and has
its being. To know men one must know man; and to know man one must be
acquainted with reality and its
laws. There can be no conception of the State which is not fundamentally a
conception of life: philosophy or
intuition, system of ideas evolving within the framework of logic or concentrated in a vision or
a faith, but always, at least
potentially, an organic conception of the world.
Thus many of the practical expressions of
Fascism such as party organization, system of education, and
discipline can only be understood when considered in relation to
its general attitude toward life.
A spiritual attitude (3). Fascism sees in the world not only those superficial, material
aspects in which man appears as an
individual, standing by himself, self-centered, subject to natural
law, which instinctively urges
him toward a life of selfish momentary
pleasure; it sees not only the
individual but the nation and the country; individuals and generations bound together by a
moral law, with common traditions and a mission which suppressing the instinct for life closed in a brief circle of
pleasure, builds up a higher life,
founded on duty, a life free from
the limitations of time and space, in which the individual, by self-sacrifice, the renunciation of
self-interest, by death itself, can achieve that purely spiritual existence in
which his value as a man consists.
The
conception is therefore a spiritual one, arising from the general reaction of
the century against the materialistic positivism of the XIXth century.
Anti-positivistic but positive; neither skeptical nor agnostic; neither
pessimistic nor supinely optimistic as are, generally speaking, the doctrines
(all negative) which place the center of life outside man; whereas, by the
exercise of his free will, man can and must create his own world.
Fascism wants man to be active and to engage in
action with all his energies; it wants him to be manfully aware of the difficulties besetting him and ready to face
them. It conceives of life as a
struggle in which it behooves a man to win for himself a really worthy place, first
of all by fitting himself (physically, morally, intellectually) to become
the implement required for winning it.
As for the individual, so for the nation, and so for mankind (4). Hence the high value of culture in all its forms (artistic, religious,
scientific) (5) and the outstanding importance of education.
Hence also the essential value of
work, by which man subjugates nature and creates the human world (economic,
political, ethical, and intellectual).
This positive conception of life
is obviously an ethical one.
It invests the whole field of
reality as well as the human activities which master it. No action is exempt from moral judgment; no activity can be despoiled of
the value which a moral purpose
confers on all things. Therefore
life, as conceived of by the
Fascist, is serious, austere, and religious; all its manifestations are poised in a world
sustained by moral forces and subject
to spiritual responsibilities. The
Fascist disdains an “easy"
life (6).
The Fascist conception of life is a religious one
(7), in
which man is viewed in his immanent relation to a higher law, endowed
with an objective will transcending the individual and raising him to conscious membership
of a spiritual society. "Those who
perceive nothing beyond opportunistic considerations in the religious
policy of the Fascist regime fail to
realize that Fascism is not only a system of government but also and above all a
system of thought.
In the Fascist conception of history, man
is man only by virtue of the spiritual
process to which he contributes as
a member of the family, the social
group, the nation, and in function
of history to which all nations bring their contribution. Hence the great value of tradition in records,
in language, in customs, in the
rules of social life (8). Outside history man is a nonentity. Fascism is
therefore opposed to all
individualistic abstractions based on eighteenth century materialism; and it is
opposed to all Jacobinistic utopias and
innovations. It does not believe in the
possibility of "happiness" on earth as conceived by the economistic literature of the XVIIIth century, and it therefore rejects the theological
notion that at some future time the human family will secure a final settlement of all its
difficulties. This notion runs
counter to experience which teaches that life is in continual flux and in process of
evolution. In politics
Fascism aims at realism; in practice it desires to deal only with those problems
which are the spontaneous product of
historic conditions and which find or suggest their own solutions (9). Only by entering
in to the process of reality and
taking possession of the forces at work within it, can man act on man and
on nature (10).
Anti-individualistic, the
Fascist conception of life stresses the importance of the State and
accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of
the State, which stands for the conscience and the universal, will of man as a historic entity (11). It is opposed to classical liberalism which arose as a reaction to absolutism
and exhausted its historical function when the State became the
expression of the conscience and will of
the people. 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 (12). And if
liberty is to he the attribute of living men and not of abstract dummies invented by
individualistic liberalism, then Fascism stands for liberty, and for the
only liberty worth having, the liberty of the State and of the individual within the State (13). The Fascist conception of the State is all
embracing; outside of it no human or
spiritual values can exist, much less have value. Thus understood, Fascism, is totalitarian, and the
Fascist State
No individuals or groups (political parties,
cultural associations, economic unions, social classes) outside the State
(15). Fascism is
therefore opposed to Socialism to which unity within the State (which amalgamates classes into
a single economic and ethical reality) is unknown, and which sees in history nothing but the class struggle.
Fascism is likewise opposed to
trade unionism as
a class weapon. But when
brought within the orbit of the State, Fascism recognizes the real needs which gave rise to socialism and
trade unionism, giving them due weight in the guild or
corporative system in which divergent interests are coordinated and harmonized
in the unity of the State (16).
Grouped according to their several interests,
individuals form classes; they form trade-unions when organized according
to their several economic activities; but first and foremost they form the
State, which is no mere matter of numbers, the suns of the individuals forming
the majority. Fascism is therefore opposed
to that form of democracy which equates a nation to the majority,
lowering it to the level of the largest
number (17); but it is the purest form of democracy
if the nation be considered as it should
be from the point of view of quality
rather than quantity, as an idea, the mightiest because the most ethical, the
most coherent, the truest, expressing
itself in a people as the conscience
and will of the few, if not, indeed, of one, and ending to express itself in the conscience and
the will of the mass, of the whole group ethnically molded by natural
and historical conditions into a
nation, advancing, as one conscience and one will, along the self same
line of development and spiritual formation
(18). Not a
race, nor a geographically defined
region, but a people, historically perpetuating itself; a multitude unified by an idea and
imbued with the will to live, the
will to power, self-consciousness, personality (19).
In so far as it is
embodied in a State, this higher personality becomes a nation. It is not the nation which generates the State; that is an antiquated
naturalistic concept which afforded a basis for XIXth
century publicity in favor of
national governments. Rather is it
the State which creates the nation,
conferring volition and therefore real life on a people made aware of their moral
unity.
The right to national
independence does not arise from any
merely literary and idealistic form of self-consciousness; still less from a more or less passive and
unconscious de facto
situation, but from an active,
self-conscious, political will
expressing itself in action and ready to prove its rights. It arises, in short, from the existence, at least
in fieri, of a
State. Indeed, it is the State
which, as the expression of a
universal ethical will, creates the right to national independence (20).
A nation, as expressed in the
State, is a living, ethical entity
only in so far as it is progressive. Inactivity is death. Therefore the State is not only Authority which
governs and confers legal form and
spiritual value on individual
wills, but it is also Power which
makes its will felt and respected
beyond its own frontiers, thus affording practical proof of the universal
character of the decisions necessary to ensure its development. This implies organization and expansion, potential if not actual.
Thus the State equates itself
to the will of man, whose development cannot he checked by obstacles and which, by achieving
self-expression, demonstrates its infinity (21).
The Fascist
State Fascist State
Fascism, in short, is not only a law-giver and a
founder of institutions, but an educator and a promoter of spiritual
life. It aims at refashioning not only the forms of
life but their content -
man, his character, and his faith. To achieve
this propose it enforces discipline and uses authority, entering into the soul
and ruling with undisputed sway. Therefore it has chosen as its emblem the Lictor’s rods, the symbol of unity, strength, and
justice.
POLITICAL AND SOCIAL
DOCTRINE
When in the now distant March of 1919,
speaking through the columns of the
Popolo d'Italia I summoned to Milan the surviving interventionists who had
intervened, and who had followed me
ever since the foundation of the Fascist of revolutionary action in January
1915, I had in mind no specific doctrinal program. The only doctrine of which I
had practical experience was that of socialism, from until the winter of 1914 -
nearly a decade. My experience was that both of a follower and a leader but it
was not doctrinal experience. My doctrine during that period had been the
doctrine of action. A uniform, universally accepted doctrine of Socialism had
not existed since 1905, when the revisionist movement, headed by Bernstein,
arose in Germany, countered by the formation, in the see-saw of tendencies, of a
left revolutionary movement which in Italy never quitted the field of phrases, whereas, in the case of
Russian socialism, it became the
prelude to Bolshevism.
Reformism, revolutionism, centrism, the very echo of that terminology is dead, while in the great river of Fascism
one can trace currents which had
their source in Sorel, Peguy, Lagardelle of the
Movement Socialists,
and in the cohort of
Italian syndicalist who from 1904 to 1914 brought a
new note into the Italian socialist environment - previously emasculated and chloroformed by
fornicating with Giolitti's party - a note sounded in Olivetti's Pagine Libere,
Orano's Lupa, Enrico Leone's
Divenirs Socials.
When the war ended in
1919 Socialism, as a doctrine, was
already dead; it continued to exist only as a grudge, especially in
Italy
The Popolo d'Italia
described itself in its subtitle
as the daily organ of fighters and producers. The word producer was already the expression of a mental trend.
Fascism was not the nursling of a doctrine previously drafted at a desk; it was born of the need of action,
and was action; it was not a party but, in the first two years, an anti-party and a movement. The name I gave the organization fixed its
character.
Yet if anyone
cares to reread the now crumpled sheets of those days giving an account of the meeting at
which the Italian Fasci di combattimento were founded, he will find not a doctrine but a series of pointers,
forecasts, hints which, when freed
from the inevitable matrix of contingencies, were to develop in a few years time into
a series of doctrinal positions
entitling Fascism to rank as a political doctrine differing from all others, past or
present.
“If the bourgeoisie - I then said - believe that they have found in us their
lightening-conductors, they arc mistaken. We must go towards the people... We
wish the working classes to accustom
themselves to the responsibilities of management so that they may realize that it is no
easy matter to run a business... We
will fight both technical and spiritual rear-guirdism... Now that the succession of the regime is open we must not be fainthearted.
We must rush forward; if the present regime is to be
superseded we must take its place.
The right of succession is ours, for we urged the country to enter the war and we led it to
victory... The existing forms of
political representation cannot satisfy us; we want direst representation of the several
interests... It may be objected that this program implies a return to
the guilds (corporazioni).
No matter!. I therefore hope this assembly will accept the economic claims
advanced by national syndicalism
…
Is it not strange that from the
very first day, at Piazza San Sepolcro, the word "guild" (corporazione)
was pronounced, a word which, as the Revolution
developed, was to express one of the
basic legislative and social creations of the regime?
The years preceding the March on
Rome
Fascism is now clearly defined not only as
a regime but as a doctrine. This means that
Fascism, exercising its critical
faculties on itself and on others, has studied from its own special standpoint and judged by its own
standards all the problems affecting the material and intellectual
interests now causing such grave anxiety to
the nations of the world, and is
ready to deal with them by its own policies.
First of all, as regards the future
development of mankind, and quite apart from
all present political considerations. Fascism does not, generally speaking, believe in
the possibility or utility of
perpetual peace. It therefore
discards pacifism as a cloak for
cowardly supine renunciation in contradistinction to self-sacrifice.
War alone keys up all human energies to their maximum tension and
sets the seal of nobility on those peoples who have the courage to face it. All other tests are substitutes which never place
a man face to face with himself
before the alternative of life or death. Therefore all doctrines which postulate peace
at all costs are incompatible with
Fascism. Equally foreign to the
spirit of Fascism, even if accepted as useful in meeting special political
situations -- are all internationalistic or
League superstructures which, as history
shows, crumble to the ground whenever the heart of nations is deeply
stirred by sentimental, idealistic or
practical considerations. Fascism carries this anti-pacifistic attitude into the
life of the individual. "
I don't care a damn „ (me ne frego) - the proud motto of the fighting squads scrawled by a
wounded man on his bandages, is not only an
act of philosophic stoicism, it sums
up a doctrine which is not merely political: it is evidence of a fighting
spirit which accepts all risks.
It signifies new style of Italian
life. The Fascist accepts and loves life; he rejects and despises
suicide as cowardly. Life as
he understands it means duty, elevation, conquest; life must be lofty and full, it must be
lived for oneself but above all for others, both near bye and far off,
present and future.
The population policy of the regime is the
consequence of these premises.
The Fascist loves his neighbor, but
the word neighbor “does not stand for some vague and unseizable
conception. Love of one's neighbor does not exclude necessary educational
severity; still less does it exclude differentiation and rank. Fascism will have nothing to do with universal embraces; as a member of the
community of nations it looks other
peoples straight in the eyes; it is vigilant and on its guard; it follows others in
all their manifestations and notes
any changes in their interests; and it does not allow itself to be deceived by mutable
and fallacious appearances.
Such a conception of life makes Fascism the
resolute negation of the doctrine
underlying so-called scientific and Marxian socialism, the doctrine of
historic materialism which would explain the
history of mankind in terms of the class struggle and by changes in the
processes and instruments of
production, to the exclusion of all else.
That
the vicissitudes of economic life - discoveries of raw materials, new technical processes, and
scientific inventions - have their
importance, no one denies; but that they suffice to explain human history to the exclusion
of other factors is absurd. Fascism believes now and always in sanctity and heroism, that is to say in acts in
which no economic motive - remote or
immediate - is at work. Having denied historic materialism, which sees in
men mere puppets on the surface of
history, appearing and disappearing
on the crest of the waves while in the depths the real directing forces move and work, Fascism also
denies the immutable and irreparable character of the class struggle
which is the natural outcome of this economic conception of history; above all it denies that the class
struggle is the preponderating agent in social transformations. Having thus struck a blow at socialism in the two main points
of its doctrine, all that remains of it is the sentimental aspiration-old as
humanity itself-toward social relations in which the sufferings and sorrows of
the humbler folk will be alleviated. But here again Fascism rejects the economic
interpretation of felicity as something to be secured socialistically, almost
automatically, at a given stage of economic evolution when all
will be assured a maximum of material comfort. Fascism denies the materialistic
conception of happiness as a possibility, and abandons it to the economists of
the mid-eighteenth century. This means that Fascism denies the equation:
well-being = happiness, which sees in men mere animals, content when they can
feed and fatten, thus reducing them to a vegetative existence pure and
simple.
After
socialism, Fascism trains its guns on the whole block of democratic ideologies, and rejects both
their premises and their practical
applications and implements. Fascism
denies that numbers, as such, can be the determining factor in human
society; it denies the right of numbers to
govern by means of periodical
consultations; it asserts the irremediable and fertile and beneficent
inequality of men who cannot be leveled by
any such mechanical and extrinsic device as universal suffrage. Democratic
regimes may be described as those under
which the people are, from time to
time, deluded into the belief that they exercise sovereignty, while all the time real sovereignty resides in and
is exercised by other and sometimes
irresponsible and secret forces. Democracy is a kingless regime infested by many
kings who are sometimes more exclusive, tyrannical, and destructive than one, even if he be a tyrant.
This explains why Fascism -
although, for contingent reasons, it was
republican in tendency prior to 1922 - abandoned that stand before the March on Rome, convinced that the form
of government is no longer a matter
of preeminent importance, and because
the study of past and present monarchies and past and present republics shows that neither
monarchy nor republic can be judged
sub specie aeternitatis, but that each stands for a form of government expressing the
political evolution, the history, the
traditions, and the psychology of a
given country.
Fascism has outgrown the dilemma: monarchy
v. republic, over which democratic regimes too long dallied, attributing all insufficiencies to the former and
proning the latter as a regime of perfection, whereas
experience teaches that some
republics are inherently reactionary and absolutist while some monarchies accept the most daring
political and social experiments.
In one
of his philosophic Meditations Renan - who had prefascist intuitions remarks, "Reason and science are the products of mankind,
but it is chimerical to seek reason
directly for the people and through
the people. It is not essential to the existence of reason that all should be familiar with it; and
even if all had to be initiated, this
could not be achieved through democracy which seems fated to lead to the
extinction of all arduous forms of
culture and all highest forms of learning. The maxim that society exists only for the
well-being and
freedom of the individuals
composing it does not seem to be in conformity with nature's plans, which
care only for the species and seem ready to sacrifice the
individual. It is much to be feared that the last word of
democracy thus understood (and let me hasten to add that it is susceptible
of a different interpretation) would
be a form of society in which a
degenerate mass would have no thought beyond that of enjoying the ignoble pleasures of the
vulgar ".
In rejecting
democracy Fascism rejects the absurd
conventional lie of political equalitarianism, the habit of collective
irresponsibility, the myth of felicity and indefinite progress. But if democracy be
understood as meaning a regime in
which the masses are not driven back to the margin of the State, and then the writer of
these pages has already defined
Fascism as an organized, centralized, authoritarian democracy.
Fascism is definitely and
absolutely opposed to the doctrines of
liberalism, both in the political and the economic sphere. The importance of liberalism in the XIXth century
should not be exaggerated for present day polemical
purposes, nor should we make of one
of the many doctrines which
flourished in that century a
religion for mankind for the present
and for all time to come. Liberalism really flourished for fifteen years only.
It arose in 1830 as a reaction to the Holy Alliance which
tried to force
Europe
to recede further back than 1789; it
touched its zenith in 1848 when even Pius IXth was a
liberal. Its decline began immediately after that year.
If 1848 was a year of light and poetry, 1849 was a year of
darkness and tragedy. The Roman Republic
France
In 1851
Napoleon III made his illiberal
coup d'etat and
ruled
France
Germany
The liberal century, after piling up innumerable Gordian Knots, tried to cut them with the sword of the
world war. Never has any religion
claimed so cruel a sacrifice. Were
the Gods of liberalism thirsting for
blood?
Now liberalism is preparing to close the doors
of its temples, deserted by the
peoples who feel that the agnosticism it professed in the sphere of economics
and the indifferentism of which it
has given proof in the sphere of politics and morals, would lead the world to ruin
in the future as they have done in
the past.
This explains
why all the political experiments of our day are anti-liberal, and it is supremely
ridiculous to endeavor on this
account to put them outside the pale of history, as though history were a preserve set aside for
liberalism and its adepts;
as though liberalism were the last word in
civilization beyond which no one can go.
The Fascist
negation of socialism, democracy, liberalism, should not, however, be interpreted as implying a
desire to drive the world backwards to positions occupied prior to 1789, a year commonly referred to as that which
opened the demo-liberal century.
History does not travel
backwards. The Fascist doctrine has
not taken De Maistre as its prophet. Monarchical absolutism is of the past, and
so is ecclesiolatry. Dead and done
for are feudal privileges and the
division of society into closed, uncommunicating
castes. Neither has the Fascist
conception of authority anything in
common with that of a police
ridden State.
A party governing a nation “totalitarianly" is a
new departure in
history. There are no points of reference nor of comparison. From
beneath the ruins of liberal, socialist, and democratic doctrines, Fascism
extracts those elements which are
still vital. It preserves what may be described as "the acquired facts" of
history; it rejects all else. That is to say, it rejects the idea of a
doctrine suited to all times and to
all people. Granted that the XIXth century was the century of socialism, liberalism,
democracy, this does not mean that
the XXth 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 XIXth 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. It is quite logical for a
new doctrine to make use of the still vital elements of other doctrines. No doctrine was
ever born quite new and bright and unheard of.
No doctrine can boast absolute
originality. It is always connected, it only historically, with those which preceded it
and those which will follow it. Thus
the scientific socialism of Marx links up to the utopian socialism of the Fouriers, the Owens, the Saint-Simons ; thus
the liberalism of the XIXth century traces its
origin back to the illuministic movement of the XVIIIth, and the doctrines of democracy to those of the Encyclopaedists. All doctrines aim at directing the activities of men towards a given
objective; but these activities in their turn react
on the doctrine, modifying and adjusting it
to new needs, or outstripping it. A doctrine must therefore be a vital act and
not a verbal display. Hence the
pragmatic strain in Fascism, it’s will to power, its will to live, its attitude
toward violence, and its value.
The keystone of the Fascist doctrine is
its conception of the State, of its essence, its functions, and its aims. For
Fascism the State is absolute, individuals
and groups relative. Individuals and groups are admissible in so far
as they come within the State.
Instead of directing the game and
guiding the material and moral progress of the community, the liberal State restricts its activities
to recording results. The
Fascist
State
At the first quinquennial assembly of the regime, in 1929, I
said “The
Fascist State is not a night
watchman, solicitous only of the personal safety of the citizens; not
is it organized exclusively for the
purpose of guarantying a certain degree of material prosperity and relatively peaceful
conditions of life, a board of
directors would do as much. Neither is it exclusively political, divorced from practical
realities and holding itself aloof
from the multifarious activities of the citizens and the nation. The State, as conceived
and realized by Fascism, is a
spiritual and ethical entity for securing the political, juridical, and economic
organization of the nation, an
organization which in its origin and growth is a manifestation of the spirit.
The State guarantees the internal
and external safety of the country,
but it also safeguards and transmits
the spirit of the people, elaborated down the ages in its language, its customs,
its faith. The State is not only the present; it is also the past and
above all the future. Transcending the individual's brief spell of life,
the State stands for the immanent conscience
of the nation. The forms in which it finds expression
change, but the need for it remains. The State educates the citizens to civism,
makes them aware of their mission, urges them to unity; its justice harmonizes their divergent
interests; it transmits to future
generations the conquests of the mind in the fields of science, art, law, human
solidarity; it leads men up from primitive tribal life to that highest
manifestation of human power, imperial
rule. The State hands down to future generations the memory of those who
laid down their lives to ensure its safety
or to obey its laws; it sets up as
examples and records for future ages the names of the captains who enlarged its territory and of
the men of genius who have made it famous. Whenever respect for the State declines and the disintegrating and
centrifugal tendencies of individuals
and groups prevail, nations are headed for decay".
Since 1929 economic and political development have everywhere
emphasized these truths. The
importance of the State is rapidly
growing. The so-called crisis can only be settled by State action and within the orbit of
the State. Where are the shades of
the Jules Simons who, in the early
days of liberalism proclaimed that the "State should endeavor to render itself useless and prepare to
hand in its resignation "? Or
of the MacCullochs who, in the second half of last century, urged that the State
should desist from governing too much? And what of the English Bentham who considered that all industry asked of
government was to be left alone, and
of the German Humbolt who expressed the opinion that the best
government was a lazy " one? What would they say now to the unceasing,
inevitable, and urgently requested
interventions of government in
business? It is true that the second generation of economists was less
uncompromising in this respect than the first, and that even Adam Smith left the door ajar
- however cautiously - for government intervention in
business.
If liberalism spells individualism, Fascism spells
government. The
Fascist State
Fascism desires the State to
be strong and organic, based on broad foundations of popular support. 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 corporative, social, and educational institutions, and all the
political, economic, and spiritual forces of the nation, organized in
their respective associations, circulate
within the State. A State based on millions of individuals who recognize
its authority, feel its action, and are
ready to serve its ends is not the tyrannical state of a mediaeval lordling. It has nothing in common with the despotic States
existing prior to or subsequent to 1789.
Far from crushing the individual, the
Fascist State
The Fascist State
The Fascist State Fascist State
The Fascist State
But imperialism implies discipline, the
coordination of efforts, a deep
sense of duty and a spirit of self-sacrifice. This explains many aspects of the
practical activity of the regime, and the direction taken by many of the forces
of the State, as also the severity
which has to be exercised towards those who would oppose this spontaneous and
inevitable movement of XXth century Italy by agitating
outgrown ideologies of the XIXth century,
ideologies rejected wherever great
experiments in political and social transformations are being dared.
Never before have the
peoples thirsted for authority, direction, order, as they do now. If each age has its doctrine, then innumerable symptoms indicate that the
doctrine of our age is the Fascist.
That it is vital is shown by the
fact that it has aroused a faith;
that this faith has conquered souls
is shown by the fact that Fascism can point to its fallen heroes and its martyrs.
Fascism has now acquired throughout the world that
universally which belongs to all doctrines which by achieving self-expression represent a moment in the
history of human
thought.
1. Philosophic conception
(1) If
Fascism does not wish to die or, worse still, commit suicide, it must now provide itself with a doctrine. Yet
this shall not and must not be a
robe of Nessus clinging to us for all eternity, for
tomorrow is some thing mysterious and
unforeseen. This doctrine shall be a
norm to guide political and individual action in our daily life.
I who have I dictated this
doctrine, am the first to realize that the modest tables of our laws and program the
theoretical and practical guidance of
Fascism should be
revised, corrected, enlarged,
developed, because already in parts they have suffered injury at the hand of time. I believe the essence and
fundamentals of the doctrine are
still to be found in the postulates which throughout two years have acted as a
call to arms for the recruits of Italian Fascism. However, in taking those first fundamental
assumptions for a starting point, we
must proceed to carry our program into a vaster field.
Italian Fascists, one and all, should cooperate in
this task, one of vital importance to Fascism, and more especially those
who belong to regions
where with and
without agreement
peaceful coexistence has been achieved between two antagonistic
movements.
The word I am about to use is a great one, but
indeed I do wish that during the two months which are still to elapse before our
National Assembly meets, the
philosophy of Fascism could be created. Milan
It is not merely a question of gathering
elements for a program, to be used as
a solid foundation for the constitution of a party which must inevitably arise from the Fascist movement;
it is also a question of denying the
silly tale that Fascism is all made up of violent men. In point of fact among Fascists there are many men
who belong to the restless but meditative class.
The new course taken by Fascist activity will in
no way diminish the fighting spirit typical of Fascism. To furnish the mind with doctrines and
creeds does not mean to disarm, rather it signifies to strengthen our power of action, and make us ever more
conscious of our work. Soldiers who
fight fully conscious of the cause make the best of warriors. Fascism
takes for its own the twofold device of Mazzini :
Thought and Action u. (Letter to Michele Bianchi, written on August 27, 1921, for the opening of the School of Fascist Culture
and Propaganda in Milan, in Messaggi e Proclami,
Milano, Libreria
d'Italia, 1929, P. 39).
Fascists must be placed in contact with one
another; their activity must be an
activity of doctrine, an activity of the spirit and of thought
Had our adversaries been present at our meeting,
they would have been convinced that
Fascism is not only action, but thought as well (Speech before the National Council of the
Fascist Party, August 8, 1924, in
La Nuova Politica dell'Italia, Milano, Alpes, 1928, p. 267).
(2) Today I hold that Fascism as an idea, a
doctrine, a realization, is
universal; it is Italian in its particular institutions, but it is universal in
the spirit, nor could it be otherwise. The spirit is universal by reason
of its nature. Therefore anyone may foresee
a Fascist Europe.
Drawing inspiration for her institutions
from the doctrine and practice of Fascism; Europe , in other words, giving a Fascist turn to
the solution of problems which beset the modern State, the
Twentieth
Century State
2.
Spiritualized conception
(3) This political
process is flanked by a philosophic process. If it be true that matter was on
the altars for one century, today it is the spirit which takes its place.
All manifestations peculiar to the
democratic spirit are consequently
repudiated: easygoingness,
improvisation, the lack of a personal
sense of responsibility, the exaltation of numbers and of that mysterious divinity called
n The People a. All creations of the spirit starting with that religious are coming
to the fore, and nobody dare keep up the attitude of anticlericalism
which, for several decades, was a favorite
with Democracy in the Western world. By saying that God is returning, we mean
that spiritual values are returning.
(Da the parte va it mondo, in Tempi della Rivoluzione
Fascista, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 34).
There is a field reserved more to meditation upon
the supreme ends of life than to a
research of these ends. Consequently science starts from experience, but
breaks out fatally into philosophy and, in my opinion, philosophy alone can enlighten science and lead to the
universal idea. (To the Congress of
Science at Bologna del
In order to understand the Fascist movement one
must first appreciate the underlying
spiritual phenomenon in all its vastness and depth. The manifestations of the movement have been of a
powerful and decisive nature, but
one should go further. In point of
fact Italian Fascism has not only
been a political revolt against weak and incapable governments who had allowed State authority to
decay and were threatening to arrest
the progress of the country, but also a spiritual revolt against old ideas which had corrupted the
sacred principles of religion, of
faith, of country. Fascism, therefore, has been a revolt of the people. (Message to the British people; January 5, 1924,
in Messaggi e Proclami,
Milano, Libreria d' Italia,
1929, p. 107).
(3) Positive
conception of life as a struggle
(4) Struggle is at the origin of all things, for life is full of contrasts: there is love and hatred, white and black, day and night, good and evil; and until these contrasts achieve balance, struggle fatefully remains at the root of human nature. However, it is good for it to be so. Today we can indulge in wars, economic battles, conflicts of ideas, but if a day came to pass when struggle ceased to exist, that day would be tinged with melancholy; it would be a day of ruin, the day of ending. But that day will not come, because history ever discloses new horizons. By attempting to restore calm, peace, tranquility, or. A would be fighting the tendencies of the present period of dynamism.Ore Trieste September 20, 1920 ; in Discorsi Politici,
Milano, Stab. Tipografico
del
(4) Struggle is at the origin of all things, for life is full of contrasts: there is love and hatred, white and black, day and night, good and evil; and until these contrasts achieve balance, struggle fatefully remains at the root of human nature. However, it is good for it to be so. Today we can indulge in wars, economic battles, conflicts of ideas, but if a day came to pass when struggle ceased to exist, that day would be tinged with melancholy; it would be a day of ruin, the day of ending. But that day will not come, because history ever discloses new horizons. By attempting to restore calm, peace, tranquility, or. A would be fighting the tendencies of the present period of dynamism.
(5) For me the honor of
nations consists in the contribution they have severally made to human civilization.
(E. Ludwig, Talks with Mussolini, London, Allen and
Unwin, 1932,
p. 199)
4. Ethical
conception
I called the organization Fasci Italiani Di combat tin onto. This hard metallic name compromised the
whole program of Fascism as I dreamed it. Comrades, this is still our program:
fight.
Life for the
Fascist is a continuous, ceaseless fight, which we accept with ease, with great courage, with the
necessary intrepidity. (C n the VIIth anniversary of the Foundation of the Fasci, March 2E, 1926, in Discorsi del 1926, Milano, Alpes,
1927, P. 98).
You touch the core of Fascist philosophy. When recently a Finnish philosopher asked me to expound to him the
significance of Fascism in one
sentence, I wrote in German: ((We are against the “easy, lift! a. (E. Ludwig: Talks with Mussolini, London, Allen and Unwin, 1932,
p. 190).
5. Religious conception
(7) If Fascism were not a creed how could it endow its
followers with courage and stoicism
only a creed which has soared to the
heights of religion can inspire such words as passed the lips, now lifeless alas, of Federico Florio. (Legami di Sangue, in
Diuturna, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 256).
6. Historical and realistic
conception
(8) Tradition certainly is one of the greatest spiritual
forces of a people, inasmuch as
it is a successive and constant creation of their
soul. (Breve Preludio,
in Tempi della Rivoluzione
Fascista, Milano,
Alpes, 1930, P- 13)
(9) Our temperament leads us to appraise the concrete
aspect of problems, rather than
their ideological or mystical sublimation. Therefore we easily regain our balance. (Aspetti del Dramma,
in Diuturna, Milano,
Alpes, 1930, p. 86).
Our battle is an ungrateful one, yet it is a
beautiful battle since it compels us to count only upon our own forces.
Revealed truths we have torn to shreds, dogmas we have spat upon, we have
rejected all theories of paradise, we have baffled charlatans white, red, black
charlatans who placed miraculous drugs on
the market to give a happiness n to mankind. We do not believe in program, in plans, in saints
or apostles, above all we believe not in happiness, in salvation, in the
Promised Land. (Diuturna, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 223).
We do not
believe in a single solution, be it economical, political or moral, a linear
solution of the problems of life, because of illustrious choristers from all the
sacristies life is not
linear and can never be reduced to a
segment traced by primordial needs. (Navigare necesse, in
Diuturna, Milano, Alpes,
1930, p.
233).
(10) We are not and do not wish to
be motionless mummies, with faces
perpetually turned towards the same horizon, nor do we wish to shut
ourselves up within the narrow hedges of subversive bigotry, where formulas, like prayers of a professed
religion, are muttered mechanically. We are men, living men, who wish to
give our contribution, however 'modest, to
the creation of history. (Audacia, in Diu turna, Milano,
Alpes, 1930, p. ')
We uphold moral
and traditional values which Socialism neglects or despises; but, above all,
Fascism has a horror of anything implying an arbitrary mortgage on the
mysterious future. (Dopo due anni, in Diuturna, Milano,
Alpes, 1930, p.
242).
In spite of the theories of
conservation and renovation, of tradition and progress expounded by the right and the left,
we do not cling desperately to the
past as to a last board of salvation: yet we do not dash headlong into the seductive mists of the
future. (Breve preludio, in
Diuturna, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 14). `negation, eternal
immobility, mean damnation. I am all for motion. I am, one who marches on (E. Ludwig, Talks with Mussolini, Lot
Jon, Allen and Unwin, 1932, p. 203).
7. The individual and liberty
(11) We were the first to state, in the
face of demo liberal individualism, that the individual exists only in so far as
he is within the State and subjected to the
requirements of the state and that, as civilization assumes aspects which
grow more and more complicated, individual freedom becomes more and more
restricted. (To the General staff Conference of Fascism, in Discorsi del 1929, Milano, Alpes, 1930,
p. 280).
The sense of the state grows within the
consciousness of Italians, for they feel that the state alone is the
irreplaceable safeguard of their unit and independence; that the state alone
represents continuity into the future
of their stock and their history. (Message on the VIIth all anniversary, October 25, 1929, Discorsi del 1929, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 3oo).
If, in the course of the past eight years, we have
made such astounding progress, you may well think suppose and foresee
that in the course of the next fifty or
eighty years the onward trend of Italy
Italy
Fascism has restored to the State its sovereign
functions by claiming its absolute
ethical meaning, against the egotism of classes and categories; to the Government of the state, which was
reduced to a mere instrument of
electoral assemblies, it has restored dignity, as representing the personality of the state and its
power of Empire. It has rescued
State administration from the weight of factions and party interests (To the
council of state, December 22, 1928, in Discorsi Del
1928, Milano, Alpes, 1929
p.328).
(12) Let no one think of denying the moral character
of Fascism. For I
should be ashamed to speak from this tribune if I did not feel that I represent the moral and spiritual powers
of the state. What would the state be if it did not possess a spirit
of its own, and a morality of its
own, which lend power to the laws in virtue of which the state is obeyed by its citizens?
The Fascist state
claims its ethical character: it is Catholic but above all it is Fascist, in fact it is
exclusively and essentially Fascist.
Catholicism completes Fascism, and this we openly declare, but let no one
think they can turn the tables on us, under cover of metaphysics or philosophy.
(To the Chamber of Deputies, May 13, 1929, in Discorsi del 1929, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 182).
A State which is fully aware of its mission
and represents a people which are marching on; a state which necessarily
transforms the people even in their
physical aspect. In order to be something more than a mere administrator, the State must
utter great words, expound great
ideas and place great problems before this people (Di scorsi del 1929, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 183).
(13) The concept of freedom is not absolute because nothing is ever absolute in life. Freedom is not a right, it is a duty. It is not a gift, it is a conquest; it is not equality, it is a privilege. The concept of freedom changes with the passing of time. There is a freedom in times of peace which is not the freedom of times of war. There is a freedom in times of prosperity which is not a freedom to be allowed in times of poverty. (Fifth anniversary of the foundation of the Fasci di Contbattimento, March 24, 1924, in La nuova politica dell'Italia, vol. III, Milano, Alpes, 1925, p. 30).
(13) The concept of freedom is not absolute because nothing is ever absolute in life. Freedom is not a right, it is a duty. It is not a gift, it is a conquest; it is not equality, it is a privilege. The concept of freedom changes with the passing of time. There is a freedom in times of peace which is not the freedom of times of war. There is a freedom in times of prosperity which is not a freedom to be allowed in times of poverty. (Fifth anniversary of the foundation of the Fasci di Contbattimento, March 24, 1924, in La nuova politica dell'Italia, vol. III, Milano, Alpes, 1925, p. 30).
In our state the individual is not
deprived of freedom. In fact, he has greater liberty than an isolated man,
because the state protects him and he
is part of the State. Isolated man is without defence. (E. Ludwig, Talks with Mussolini, London, Allen and Unwin, 1932, P.
129).
(14) Today we may tell the world of the creation of the powerful united State of Italy, ranging from the Alps to Sicily; this State is expressed by a well-organized, centralized, Unitarian democracy, where people circulate at case. Indeed, gentlemen, you admit the people into the citadel of the State and the people will defend it, if you close them out, the people will assault it. (speech before the Chamber of Deputies,May 26, 1927 , in Discorsi
del
(14) Today we may tell the world of the creation of the powerful united State of Italy, ranging from the Alps to Sicily; this State is expressed by a well-organized, centralized, Unitarian democracy, where people circulate at case. Indeed, gentlemen, you admit the people into the citadel of the State and the people will defend it, if you close them out, the people will assault it. (speech before the Chamber of Deputies,
In the Fascist regime the unity of classes, the
political, social and
coral unity of the Italian people is realized
within the state, and only within the
Fascist state. (speech before the Chamber of Deputies,
December 9, 1928 , in Discorsi
del
8. Conception of a corporative
state
(15) We have created the
united state of Italy remember that
since the Empire Italy had not been
a united state.
Here I wish to reaffirm
solemnly our doctrine of the State. Here I
wish to reaffirm with no weaker energy, the formula I expounded at the scala in Milan everything in the state, nothing against the
State, nothing outside the state.
(speech
before the Chamber of Deputies, May 26, 1927
, Discorsi del
(16) We are, in other words, a state which controls all forces acting in nature. We control political forces, we control moral forces we control economic forces, therefore we are a full-blown Corporative state. We stand for a new principle in the world, we stand for sheer, categorical, definitive antithesis to the world of democracy, plutocracy, free-masonry, to the world which still abides by the fundamental principles laid down in 1789. (Speech before the new National Directory of the Party, April 7, 1926, in Discorsi del 1926, Milano, Alpes, 1927, p. 120).
(16) We are, in other words, a state which controls all forces acting in nature. We control political forces, we control moral forces we control economic forces, therefore we are a full-blown Corporative state. We stand for a new principle in the world, we stand for sheer, categorical, definitive antithesis to the world of democracy, plutocracy, free-masonry, to the world which still abides by the fundamental principles laid down in 1789. (Speech before the new National Directory of the Party, April 7, 1926, in Discorsi del 1926, Milano, Alpes, 1927, p. 120).
The Ministry of Corporations is not a
bureaucratic organ, nor does it wish
to exercise the functions of syndical organizations
which are necessarily independent,
since they aim at organizing, selecting and improving the members of
syndicates. The Ministry of
Corporations is an institution in virtue of which, in the centre and
outside, integral
corporation becomes an accomplished
fact, where balance is achieved between interests and forces of the economic
world. Such a glance is only possible within the sphere of the
state, because the state alone
transcends the contrasting interests of groups and individuals, in view of
co-coordinating them to achieve higher aims. The achievement of these aims is speeded up by the
fact that all economic organizations, acknowledged, safeguarded and supported by
the Corporative State, exist within
the orbit of Fascism; in other terms they accept the conception of Fascism in theory and in
practice. (speech at the opening of the Ministry of Corporations,
July 31, 1926, in Discorsi del 1926, Milano, Alpes, 1927, p.
250).
We have constituted a Corporative and Fascist
state, the state of national society, a State which concentrates,
controls, harmonizes and tempers the
interests of all social classes, which are thereby protected in equal measure. Whereas, during the
years of demo-liberal regime, labour looked with
diffidence upon the state, was, in fact, outside the State and against the state, and considered
the state an enemy of every day and
every hour, there is not one working Italian today who does not seek a place in his Corporation or
federation, who does not wish to be
a living atom of that great, immense, living organization which is the national Corporate State
of Fascism. (On the Fourth
Anniversary of the March on Rome, October 28, 1926, in Discorsi del
1926, Milano, Alpes, 1927, p.
340).
9. Democracy
(17) The war was
revolutionary, in the sense that with
streams of blood it did away with the century of Democracy, the century
of number, the century of majorities and of quantities. (Da the pane va it Mondo, in
Tempi della Rivoluzione Fascista, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p.
37)
(19)
Race: it is a feeling and not a reality; 95 %, a feeling. (E. Ludwig, Talks
with Mussolini, London, Allen and Unwin, 1932, p.
75).
10. Conception of the
state
(20)
A nation exists inasmuch as it is a
people. A people rise inasmuch as they are numerous,
hard working and
well regulated.
Power is the outcome of this
threefold principle. (To the General Assembly of the Party, March lo, 1929, in
Discorsi del 1929, Milano, Alpes, 1930, p.
24).
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