The origin of the Racist Laws under fascism. Aproblem of historiography

Abstract

Why did the fascist regime adopt racial laws in the 1930s? The laws were aimed first atnon-Europeans and people of mixed race in the colonies, and then at the Jews. This article reviews recent studies on the racial laws, which took a variety of forms, within which the specificity of the anti-Semitic legislation has to be acknowledged even though the legislation against the Jews came at much the same time as the other racial legislation. Were these laws an attempt to imitate Nazi Germany, and hence in some form an off-shoot of foreign policy? Or were there seeds of racism already present in Italian politics and society that found fulfillment in the racial laws? These issues have for some time been the subject of major debate, in which different historiographical traditions have come into conflict, while attention has been drawn to the need to counter attempts to blame others for what remains the responsibility ofItalians.     

Exploitation,fascist violence and social cleansing: a study of Franco's concentration camps from a comparative perspective

One of the most noticeable topics within recent Spanish historiography is the analysis of processes of mass violence. Salient among these were the Franco concentration camps, a violent re-educational system made up of more than 180 camps, 104 of which were permanent. The camps operated from 1936 until 1947, under the control of Franco's army, with its corresponding regime of forced labour and exploitation of prisoners of war. Half a million Spaniards and Europeans experienced first hand the Spanish version of the fascist concentration-camp system. This article offers an analysis of the inside history of Franco's concentration camps and then locates them comparatively within a theoretical and empirical Fascist model of internment, exploitation and violence.     

A Call to Action: New Party Candidates and the 1931 General Election*

Sir Oswald Mosley established his New Party in early 1931. It proposed to cut across the party and class divides, with the objective of providing a ‘national’ solution to the economic crisis of the time. According to Mosley, the ‘old parties’– meaning the Labour, Conservative and Liberal Parties – had revealed themselves unable to adapt to the post‐war age. In their place, he argued, a modern organisation, based on youth, vitality and a scientifically reasoned economic plan, was needed to save Britain from terminal decline. Few heeded his call, and the party ultimately paved the way for the British Union of Fascists to emerge in 1932. Nevertheless, the New Party fought the general election of 1931, offering an unsuccessful but suitably intriguing challenge to the National coalition and Labour Party. This article will assess the New Party's election campaign, concentrating on those who briefly rallied to Mosley's appeal only to fall foul of the ballot box. In other words, it provides a case study of those who contributed to a dramatic electoral failure, and traces a significant stage along Mosley's journey to fascism.     

Estonian Swedish Ethnic Survival – Examples from Nuckö in the Interwar Period

Abstract

A long-term perspective is important in studies of ethnic groups and their opportunities for survival. This case study deals with the Swedish population in Nuckö (Noarootsi), Estonia, during the interwar period. Even though the Swedish population declined as a whole, some villages succeeded in maintaining their Swedish affiliation. Settlement patterns and varying opportunities to own land are important factors behind these differences. The Estonian–Swedish cultural awakening in the interwar period made it easier for people to show their Swedish ethnic identity more openly. Inhabitants in villages that already at the end of the nineteenth century had a large proportion of Estonians in their population, reacted more positively to the state's request that people change their surname as part of the assimilation policy of the 1930s. Even though people in some villages chose to register a change in ethnic status, a change of surname, and even changed their use of language, they may nonetheless have remained committed to their former Swedish ethnicity on a private level. It is crucial to combine different kinds of data, such as church records, censuses and interviews, in order to illustrate the complexities of ethnic identity from a variety of different angles.     

Max Weber,charisma and nationalist leadership1

ABSTRACT. One of Max Weber's most well‐known achievements was the formulation of three concepts of legitimate authority: traditional, legal‐rational and charismatic. However, there are particular problems with the last of these, which is not historically grounded in the manner of the other two concepts. The charisma concept originated with Weber's sociology of religion, was pressed into service in pre‐war writing on the sociology of domination, shifted focus in his wartime political writings and changed meaning again in his post‐war writing on basic sociological concepts. To use the concept in historical‐political analysis, I argue, one must distinguish between a pre‐modern and modern form of charismatic domination. I argue that doing this enables us to understand features of the leadership of colonial nationalist and fascist movements.     

战前日本的极端民族主义——以“国体明征运动”为中心的考察

“国体”是战前日本的民族主义的重要保证和推动力量,因此亦可称之为“国体民族主义”。与“国体”的结合,体现了日本民族主义的独特性。本文即以日本极端民族主义的典型体现——1935年的“国体明征运动”为例,指出“国体”意识形态作为共同体的一种防御机制,其作用不在于是什么,而是在于它的绝对价值特征可以用来确保民族认同、统合民众。于是每当体制有动摇之虞时就出现国体论的高潮,在这个意义上,“国体”与民族主义的结合是结构性的。     

Indian student protests and the nationalist–neoliberal nexus

This article discusses the wider relevance of recent, 2014 and onwards, student protests in Indian higher education institutions, with the global neoliberal reorganisation of the sector in mind. The argument is tracked from specific high-profile junctures of student protests toward their grounding in the national/state level situation and then their ultimate bearing on the prevailing global condition. In particular, this article considers present-day management practices and their relationship with projects to embed conservative and authoritarian norms in the higher education sector.     

The Development of Comparative Judicial Politics

Abstract

Much of the scholarly debate over the Heidegger controversy has endeavored to either connect or free his philosophy from fascism. Against both these tendencies, I argue that the central concepts of Heidegger's philosophy are politically underdetermined. Throughout both his late and early periods, Heidegger's primary ambition remained the illumination of the question of being, a project that I argue made his ontological framework inherently relativistic.     

SVEN OLOV LINDHOLM AND THE LITERARY INSPIRATIONS OF SWEDISH FASCISM

Very little research has been done into the leader of the most prominent Swedish fascist party of the interwar period, the leader of the Nationalsocialistiska Arbetarepartiet, Sven Olov Lindholm, in spite of extensive source material in his personal archive. This article explores the literary influences on his politics, which Lindholm cited in his private documents and interviews, both contemporary and post-war. The immediate impact of notable Swedish writers, poets especially, such as Verner von Heidenstam, Viktor Rydberg, Esaias Tegnér, and Bertel Gripenberg, is demonstrated. These authors, largely of the Swedish Romantic tradition, are shown to be parts of one major Scandinavian cultural current in particular, namely Gothicism (göticism), manifested through a centuries-long interest in the Old Nordic heritage. In Sweden, the influence of new far-Right ideas that made their way into the country in the 1920s intersected with Gothicism in unique ways, which gave Swedish fascists a peculiar relationship to both fascism and their national heritage. Ultimately, these literary Gothicist influences allowed a particular naturalizing codification of Swedish fascism in the 1930s. Under the influence of, above all, contemporary Finno-Swedish health specialist Are Waerland, Lindholm is shown to have actively shaped Swedish fascism in line with his literary exemplars.