Fascist governments have commonly held a Social Darwinist view of nation, race and society, arguing that nations and races must purge themselves of socially and biologically inferior people, while simultaneously promoting the creation of a super race (Payne, 1995: 485-486). In Nazi Germany Social Darwinism was used to advocate the superior Aryan race and the need to be victorious in a race struggle from an ongoing conflict between races. This belief in exterminating the weaker races lead to Holocaust, which involved the genocide of approximately six million Jews during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi Germany, led by Adolf Hitler throughout Nazi-occupied territory (Niwyk, 2000: 45). Furthermore it is believed in total between 11 million and 17 million people were killed including Jews, Poles, Freemasons, Slovenes, Homosexuals, Jehovah’s witnesses and the disabled, this occurred despite if this people were of German or non-German ethnic origin (ibid: 45-52).
Militarism is the belief of a government or people that a country should maintain a strong military capability and be prepared to use it aggressively to defend or promote national interests. Nazism embraced militarism for the belief that to become a power nation, the nation must have superior army to neighbouring European nations. Nazi Germany’s aggressive militarism lead to World War II (1939-1945), one of the most destructive wars of the modern age. The impact of the war was devastating with an estimated 60 million people killed in the war, including about 40 million civilians and 20 million soldiers. Many civilians died due to disease, starvation, massacres, bombings and deliberate genocides (Lightbody,2004: 268).
Socialism is an economic system characterised by state ownership and control of the means of production and mutual management of the economy (Festenstein, Kenny, 2005: 175-182). Socialism as an ideology was most prominent during the Soviet Union era (1917-1991), however since the collapse of the Soviet Union socialism has declined worldwide. Implementation of socialist ideology throughout Soviet Russia had destructive consequences for the people of Russia. This will be demonstrated through analyses of the Soviet Russian policies of War Communism, Collectivisation, and Dekulakisation.
War Communism was a political and economic system that was introduced after the Bolshevik seizure of power that aimed to introduce a communist society and assist in consolidating Bolshevik power during the Russian Civil War (1917-1921). War communism involved the socialist ideology being implemented for example all industry was nationalised and centralised management was introduced, state monopoly on foreign trade was introduced, the state took control of railroads, agricultural surpluses were requisitioned from peasants for distribution among the remaining population, and most importantly private property was illegalised (Pipes, 1995: 193). Once implemented, War Communism had destructive consequences both economically and socially. Economically it caused the rouble to collapse, replacing it with a bartering system, and by the early 1920s, industry had fallen to output levels of 20% of those in 1913 and 90% of all wages were paid with goods. Coal production decreased from 27.5 million tons in 1913 to 7 million tons by 1920. Furthermore grain harvest dropped dramatically from 75 million tons in 1913 to 45 million tons by 1920 (Christian, 1994: 200-207). Socially War Communism caused worker’s strikes and peasant uprisings, most notable was the Kronstadt mutiny in February 1921 where sailors turned against the communist government (ibid: 220).
Collectivisation was a policy introduced by Stalin between 1928-1940. Collectivisation implemented the socialist ideology of state ownership which involved the state usurping individual farms and turning them into collective farms. It was also believed by Stalin that the creation of collective farms would increase food supply for urban populations, the supply of raw materials, and agricultural exports. However implementing this socialist concept proved to be a disaster. The human costs were horrifying, with material standards falling sharply in the towns, and even more rapidly in the countryside (Christian, 1994: 248). The economic historian, Alec Nove (1992: 213), describes this period as ‘the culmination of the most precipitous peacetime decline in living standards known in record history.’ While grain harvests declined significantly, state requisitions continued to rise. In the Ukraine, Volga provinces and Central Asia, the imposing of excessive requisition quotas created a terrible famine in the winter of 1932-33. According to Wheatcroft (1993: 284) estimates suggest that four to six million people may have died in these man-made famines.
Simultaneously with collectivisation came dekulakisation, which purpose was to build socialism in the countryside. This campaign involved the persecution of wealthier peasants (kulaks) as they were considered a class enemy to the working class. Dekulakusation involved wealthier peasants being arrested, exiled, executed, and being forced into labour camps. Conditions in the camps were extremely terrible leading to large numbers died of hunger or overwork or from brutal camp discipline. This combination of dekulakisation and collectivisation, and other repressive policies lead to mass starvation throughout parts of the Soviet Union and to the death of at least 14.5 million peasants in 1930-1937 (Conquest, 1986: 121).
Therefore as has been demonstrate with fascism and socialism, ideologies have the potential to be destructive and dangerous, causing people to be killed all in the name of ideology. While there are many benefits to ideology such as promoting rights and preserving institutions, these negatives produce by ideologies such as socialism and fascism far outweigh the positives produced.
Bibliography
Blamires, C., World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopaedia, Volume 1, ABC-CLIO, California, 2006
Christian, D., Power and Privilege – The Russian Empire, The Soviet Union and the Challenge of Modernity, 2nd Edition, Longman Cheshire, Melbourne, 1994
Conquest, R., The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivisation and the Terror-Famine, Oxford University Press, USA, 1986
Festenstein, M., Kenny, M., Political Ideologies, Oxford University Press, New York, 2005
Lightbody, B., The Second World War, Routledge London, 2004
Niewyk, D., The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust, Columbia University Press, New York, 2000
Nove, A., An Economic History of the USSR, 3rd Edition, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1992
Payne, S., A History of Fascism: 1914-1945, Routledge, Oxon, 1995
Pipes, R., A Concise History of the Russian Revolution, First Vintage Books, New York, 1995
Robert, P., The Anatomy of Fascism, First Vintage Books, New York, 2005
Turner, H., Reappraisals of Fascism, New Viewpoints, New York, 1975
Wheatcroft, S., ‘More light on the scale of Repression and excess Mortality in the Soviet Union in the 1930s’, in Getty, J., Manning, R. (eds), Stalinist Terror: New Perspective, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1993
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