Description:

"A comprehensive study of fascism as it evolved in Italy and Germany in the 1920s and 1930s. Daniel Guerin's classic work, first published in French in 1936, shows how fascism, far from being an aberration of mass psychology, arose from the specific conditions of a social system in crisis. At first covertly, then increasing openly, layers of big business financed and promoted the fascist movements in Italy and Germany. Guerin constrasts the fascists' initially radical anticapitalist demagogy with their moves to shore up the capitalist profit system once they form the government. 'The profond causes that drove the Italian and German industrialists to bring fascism to power may produce the same effects elsewhere,' Guerin concludes.

"--Page 4 de la couverture.

Review

Daniel Guerin's Fascism and Big Business, first published in 1936 and revised through 1965, remains one of the most rigorous materialist analyses of fascism ever written. Drawing on exhaustive primary sources from both Italy and Germany, Guerin systematically demonstrates that fascism was not an ideological aberration or historical accident but a calculated instrument deployed by heavy industry and big landowners to crush organized labor, restore declining profits, and impose a "strong state" capable of emptying the pockets of the masses.

The book's architecture is methodical and devastating. Guerin begins by mapping the internal divisions of capital itself -- the conflict between heavy industry (iron, steel, mining), which demanded authoritarian labor relations and aggressive foreign policy, and light industry (textiles, finished goods), which preferred "class collaboration" and international trade. He shows how heavy industry subsidized the fascist gangs first as anti-labor militia, then launched them toward state power when economic crisis made a "strong state" the only means to artificially revive profits. Light industry, though initially reluctant, never seriously resisted, and ultimately class solidarity overrode divergent economic interests.

Guerin's analysis of the middle classes as fascism's mass base is particularly penetrating. He demonstrates how the pauperized petty bourgeoisie -- small manufacturers, shopkeepers, office workers, war veterans, unemployed youth -- were driven toward fascism not by innate reactionary character but by the failure of socialist parties to offer a revolutionary alternative. The Italian Socialist Party and German Social Democracy showed themselves "absolutely incapable" of leading revolutionary movements when historical conditions demanded it, and their paralysis pushed desperate middle classes into the arms of fascist demagogues who promised radical change while secretly serving capital.

The chapters on fascist demagogy are masterful expositions of ideological fraud. Guerin dissects how fascism's "anti-capitalism" was carefully engineered to attack loan capital while protecting industrial capital, to redirect popular anger toward the "international plutocracy" and Jews rather than domestic exploiters, and to promise corporatist "class collaboration" that its capitalist backers never intended to implement. The gulf between fascist promises and fascist reality -- on unions, strikes, corporatism, land reform, small business protection -- is documented with merciless precision.

Perhaps the book's most original contribution is its analysis of "the rise and fall of the fascist plebeians." Guerin shows how the plebeian leaders who conquered the state demanded all power for themselves, driving out the old bourgeois political staff. But once they had served their purpose in crushing the organized proletariat, the capitalist magnates demanded that the most unruly plebeians be eliminated. The purges -- culminating in Mussolini's repeated party cleansings and Hitler's Night of the Long Knives -- transformed fascism from a mass movement resting on plebeian shock troops into a military-police dictatorship leaning on the regular army and secret police.

The economic chapters demonstrate that fascist "revolution" was nothing more than sharpened guided capitalism: privatization of state enterprises, destruction of independent unions, wage cuts enforced by state power, massive armaments spending to revive heavy industry profits, and autarky that ruined small producers, consumers, and export industries alike. The very middle classes whose discontent had brought fascism to power were "simply bled white."

Writing with the urgency of someone who had witnessed the February 6, 1934 fascist riot in Paris, Guerin produced a work that transcends its historical moment. His insistence that fascism is not a local phenomenon but a systemic product of monopoly capitalism in crisis, that it cannot be fought through bourgeois democratic means alone, and that "popular fronts" which refuse to attack capitalism's material roots merely postpone the fascist danger -- these arguments retain their analytical power. The book is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the structural relationship between capital, crisis, and authoritarian politics.

Reviewed 2026-04-09

Notable Quotes

The bourgeoisie resorts to fascism less in response to disturbances in the street than in response to disturbances in their own economic system. The sickness they aim to banish is within, not without.

Opening chapter on how big business finances fascism, arguing that fascism is driven less by fear of imminent revolution than by the need to restore profits during capitalist decline — capitalism, fascism origins, economic crisis

When the economic crisis becomes acute, when the rate of profit sinks toward zero, the bourgeoisie can see only one way to restore its profits: it empties the pockets of the people down to the last centime.

Explaining why the bourgeoisie abandons democracy for fascism -- democratic liberties give the masses some means of defense against the 'great penance' of wage cuts and austerity — economic crisis, democracy, class struggle

Fascism, far from declaring itself in the service of the existing order, claims to seek its overthrow. The better to dupe the middle classes, it professes to be anti-capitalist, even revolutionary. Thus capitalism accomplishes the tour de force of channeling for its own benefit the revolt of the middle classes, which should have been directed against it.

Analyzing how the bourgeoisie subsidizes fascism as a new kind of political formation that can enlist its own victims in defense of its privileges — demagogy, middle classes, anti-capitalism

Fascism is not born solely from the desire and subsidies of capitalist magnates. The capitalist magnates could never, in spite of all their gold, have 'set marching' such human forces if the masses had not previously been in a state of instability and discontent that conditioned them for conquest.

Beginning the analysis of the middle classes as fascism's mass base, noting that fascism requires both elite funding and genuine mass discontent — mass base, middle classes, social crisis

The more they suffer, the more they cling to their existence as a class. The independent producer prefers his condition, even though it becomes more precarious every day, to that of the proletariat.

On the persistence of the middle classes despite capitalist concentration -- their desperate clinging to class status makes them susceptible to fascist promises of 'de-proletarianization' — middle classes, class consciousness, pauperization

Proletarian socialism aims straight at the heart of capitalism. It wishes to destroy its motive force -- the exploitation of labor power and the theft of surplus value. But the middle classes are not the victims of the exploitation of labor power but chiefly of competition and the organization of credit.

Distinguishing between proletarian anti-capitalism, which attacks the system as a whole, and petty-bourgeois anti-capitalism, which dreams of rolling back capitalism to a precapitalist golden age — anti-capitalism, class analysis, socialism

Fascism has no difficulty in shielding its financial backers from popular anger by diverting the anti-capitalism of the masses to the 'international plutocracy.'

On how fascism transmutes anti-capitalism into nationalism, redirecting hostility from domestic capitalists to foreign ones — nationalism, scapegoating, propaganda

When man suffers, he renounces reason, ceases to demand logical remedies for his ills, and no longer has the courage to try to save himself. He expects a miracle and he calls for a savior, whom he is ready to follow, for whom he is ready to sacrifice himself.

Analyzing fascist mysticism -- how suffering predisposes the masses to religious-style devotion to a leader cult, substituting faith for rational political analysis — mysticism, leader cult, mass psychology

Propaganda must be kept on the level of the masses, and its value should be measured only by the results obtained.

Hitler's own words quoted by Guerin to illustrate fascist propaganda's fundamental principle: contempt for the masses, using any means to manipulate them — propaganda, mass manipulation, fascist methods

Fascism has brought the methods of police repression used in modern states to the highest degree of perfection. It has made the political police a truly scientific organization.

Analyzing the fascist state's extraordinary power to survive by annihilating all opposition, through the Italian Ovra and German Gestapo as 'states within the state' — police state, repression, totalitarianism

The fascist state begins by creating conditions that will permit the slashing of wages. This means the destruction of labor unions, the end of their representation inside the factories, the abolition of the right to strike, the nullification of union contracts, and the reestablishment of the absolute rule of the employers in their businesses.

Opening the chapter on fascism taming the proletariat, laying out the systematic destruction of organized labor as the primary function of the fascist state — labor, unions, wages, class war

Stripped of all appearances, all the contradictions which dim its real face, fascism is reduced to this: a strong state intended to artificially prolong an economic system based on profit and the private ownership of the means of production.

The book's concluding distillation of fascism's essential character, using Radek's metaphor of fascism as 'the iron hoop with which the bourgeoisie tries to patch up the broken barrel of capitalism' — fascism defined, capitalism, state power

Fascism is, to be sure, a defensive reaction of the bourgeoisie, but a defense against the disintegration of its own system far more than against any nearly nonexistent proletarian offensive.

Correcting the common view that fascism is simply a response to revolutionary threat -- the working class was paralyzed, not attacking, when fascism took power — fascism origins, capitalism crisis, working class

One cannot conquer a principle except by opposing to it another principle -- a superior principle. On the plane of ideas, fascism will be defeated only on that day when we present to humanity a new form of government of men, an authentic democracy, complete, direct, in which all the producers take part in the administration of things.

From the 1945 preface, arguing that purely negative anti-fascism is inadequate -- fascism can only be defeated by offering a superior positive vision of democratic self-governance — democracy, revolution, anti-fascism

The big 'democracies' fought Hitler, not because of the authoritarian and brutal form of the National Socialist regime, but because German imperialism, at a given moment, dared to dispute with them the hegemony of the world.

From the 1945 preface, arguing that Western anti-fascism was motivated by imperialist rivalry rather than genuine opposition to fascism's authoritarian character — imperialism, anti-fascism, geopolitics

The link between fascism and big business is so intimate that the day when big business withdraws its support is the beginning of the end for fascism.

Analyzing the July 20 assassination attempt against Hitler and the July 25 overthrow of Mussolini as evidence that the capitalist ruling class was never absorbed by the totalitarian state — big business, fascism, ruling class autonomy

They demanded all posts and functions for themselves. The magnates are a little worried by these demands -- not that they have entirely failed to foresee them.

On the fascist plebeians' insistence on replacing the entire old political staff of the bourgeoisie after taking power, creating tension with their capitalist backers — plebeians, power struggle, totalitarian state

Our revolution has only begun. We have not yet attained any of our goals. They talk about a national government, a national awakening. What is all that? What matters is the socialist part of our program. We have only one more enemy to conquer: the bourgeoisie!

An SA leader at a popular meeting demanding the 'second revolution' -- the rank-and-file plebeian anger that terrified the capitalist backers and led to the June 30 purge — second revolution, plebeian demands, class conflict

The fascist 'revolution' which rested on Brown Shirt plebeians had become a military-police dictatorship.

Summarizing the transformation of National Socialism after the Night of the Long Knives -- from a mass movement to a dictatorship leaning on the army and Gestapo rather than the Storm Troops — military dictatorship, purge, state power

Fascism, outgrowth of the failure to achieve socialism, can be effectively fought and vanquished definitively only by the proletarian revolution. All 'anti-fascism' that rejects it is but vain and deceitful babbling.

The book's central political conclusion from the 1945 preface, arguing that defensive anti-fascism within the framework of bourgeois democracy is futile — anti-fascism, revolution, socialism

Nobody will believe the capitalist system has disappeared. Capital has never been so powerful and privileged as at the present time. The economy accumulates enormous profits and reserves; the workers are invited to wait. The big ones make profits, and the little ones receive drafts on the future. If that isn't capitalism, I would like to know what capitalism means.

A German worker's letter published in the Nazi Voelkischer Beobachter, directly contradicting fascist claims to have transcended capitalism — capitalism, worker consciousness, fascist fraud

Fascism will remain the reserve army of decaying capitalism.

From the 1945 preface, warning that despite the defeat of the Axis, fascism will persist under new labels wherever capitalism is in crisis and the proletarian revolution has not succeeded — fascism future, capitalism, warning

I will oppose with my last strength a second revolutionary wave. Whoever rises against the regular authority of the state, will be unceremoniously collared.

Hitler's announcement to SA and SS leaders at Bad Reichenhall in July 1933, immediately obeying his capitalist backers' demand to crush the plebeian agitation for a 'second revolution' — second revolution, capitalist control, purge

Any antifascism is a frail illusion if it confines itself to defensive measures and does not aim at smashing capitalism itself.

The book's final sentence of the conclusion, encapsulating Guerin's central argument that only the socialization of key industries and confiscation of big landholdings can permanently defeat fascism — anti-fascism, socialism, revolution