The context in which these political categories originated was always historical. The European Right, initially, was monarchist, seeking to preserve as much of the traditions that predated democracy as was feasible. The Left was republican and anti- clerical, trying to eliminate the influence of the aristocracy and the Church in favor of democracy and modernization.
With the rise of socialism, the Left became defined by its interest in using the mechanisms of the State to pursue egalitarian ends. The traditionalist Right continued, and sometimes showed paternalistic tendencies, as in the social legislation pursued by Bismark. A new sort of Right arose, however, as socialism eschewed classical liberalism, which had originally been a Left wing phenomenon. This Right was primarily capitalist, democratic, but protective of minority rights, including the rights of property holders. The capitalist Right was especially prevalent in the United States, which had no aristocratic traditions to preserve.
Communism was a radical Left- wing movement dedicated to the use of force to pursue an long- term egalitarian agenda.Most totalitarian states have been Communist.
Fascism arose as the traditional Right faded after the First World War, as a way of defending nationalism and "folkways" against what were considered the corrosive effects both of international capitalism, and international communism. Fascists tended to hate both capitalism and communism equally, but also to have contempt for the traditional right, with its nostalgia and inability to combat these hostile foreign forces.
Only libertarians consider Fascism to be Left- wing, given their ahistorical tendency to divide things into "statist- antistatist". On the other hand, only socialists consider Fascism to be an outgrowth of the capitalist Right, theorizing that it is a defensive move to thwart socialist change, backed by business interests. The truth is, Fascism was a right- wing populist movement seeking to exalt the "Volk" as the harbinger of values, and therefore to validate its traditions while permitting room for evolution and modernization. It was, so to speak, the "democratic" version of the traditional Right.
Anyway, the Right as it has developed in this country, has been mainly a continuation of what was considered liberalism in the 19th century: capitalist, pro- civil liberties, protective of minority rights, suspicious of concentrations of power,and so on........
I should say that when I refer to Fascism as the "democratic" version of the traditional right, I do not mean that the mechanisms of democracy are respected, I mean that national traditions are presumed to be forged by the national majority, whose will is interpreted by the Leader..... |
