Fascism? What fascism?

Abstract

There is a returning debate on the return of fascism in Europe. In the early eighties, the rise in the Netherlands of extreme right-wing parties was interpreted as the consequence of the economic crisis, which led the victims of modernization to scapegoat ethnic minorities. The historiography of fascism, produced in the past twenty years point to very different elements to explain the rise of fascism. The article surveys new insights with respect to fascism as an ideology, as a social movement and as a form of politics, and concludes that there are similarities between fascism and national socialism, and present day extreme right-wing and populist parties fierce nationalism, mobilization of a broad coalition beyond the victims of modernization and the critique of parliamentary democracy can be found then and now. However genocidal ideas are no longer voiced, and present extremists do not openly reject democracy. In this sense it is an exaggeration to talk about the return of fascism. However, the crisis of the party system was then, and could now create a serious challenge for the political system.