An Analysis of American Fascism

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Fascism: An economic and political state of society under a capitalist mode of economic development in which there is a full annexation of the state apparatus by capital interest. Resulting in corporate/plutocratic control of a country, usually through a puppet autocrat, and rendering the people of said country to non-persons whose sole purpose is subservience to the state. In simpler terms, fascism exists at a state level when value extraction becomes the primary state function.

Capitalism: An economic system marked by the private ownership of the means of production, for the purpose of producing profit.

After the American revolution and the end of rule by traditional monarchy the founders of the United States were tasked with evolving the economic and political order in a way that would allow them to maintain all of their current power; while simultaneously convincing the masses that the system they were creating was free and fair. Luckily due to the social caste system already in place under the mercantile capitalist system black people were already subjugated as slaves, and women were largely considered property in all but name. Although the suggestion that only land owners should be allowed to vote was removed from the table it was a clear indication of what this new system would be. The mere suggestion that such a provision should exist as well as the consistent argument against the "tyranny of the majority" as if the concept of regular people being able to determine what is best for themselves is absurd; showed that while this would no longer be a system ruled by a king it would still be a system where the desires and pleasures of the few would outweigh the material needs of the many. The "American Experiment" has not been an exercise in freedom and justice for all. It is not a beacon of liberty. It is, and always has been the progenitor of modern fascism as an institutionalized social structure, and it's entire history has been an exercise in broadening the influence of capital and owning class rule. The relatively small social progress that has been achieved under these conditions such as the granting of more rights to women, or the reduction of racial discrimination has been made in spite of these things not as a result of them.

The United States of the present day is in many ways simply a manifestation of the greed and inhumanity that rot the foundations of this country's principles. Truthfully it is shameful that a country would declare that human beings have a right to life but do nothing to create or grant a right to the resources that sustain life in the first place, and in many cases actively circumvent efforts to create such a standard of living. Such a circumvention confirms that this supposed right to "life" is in fact only a right to starve in material reality. The ability to survive is only guaranteed through participation in a system which atomizes the individual and renders them to a raw material for economic production. Returning to them only a fraction of the value added by their labor.

With the rising dawn of the industrial capitalist economic system even with the benefit of slave labor from both white women, and black people under chattel slavery expansion of territory for production was required. Throughout the 1800s the United States established control of a significant portion of the north american continent, and made careful efforts to systematically exterminate the native populations there in order to prevent future uprisings in a campaign proudly called "Manifest Destiny". The United States was justified of course. The good white men just had to destroy those "savages" that were slightly upset at being invaded by a hostile military force. These expansions and the oppression of these various peoples supplied a modicum of stability for the general masses, and guaranteed vast exploitative gains to owning classes.

After the end of the civil war, and the abolition of chattel slavery the fundamental economic contradictions were exacerbated due to the loss of unpaid slave labor in economies that required it for the production of products like Cotton (60% of US exports in 1860) and Tobacco. During this time period immigrants from places such as China were brought to the country for projects such as the trans-continental railroad. They were also exploited for their labor, and then subject to discrimination by the legal system which denied them the right to citizenship.

Correspondingly, it was during this same time period in the mid 1800s when we saw the rise of "Black codes". Arbitrary laws were passed to criminalize the existence of black people so that they could be thrown into the growing industry of the prison system after being released from slavery. Many prison programs in the south had now been privatized by previous slave owners often using their plantations previously worked by slaves as work camps for prisoners. And in other cases they were leasing prisoners out in order to exploit massive profits from the labor. The land of opportunity indeed but only if you happened to be white, a man, and usually also already somewhat wealthy.

Although probate records from the Colonial Era show that the vast majority of wealth in the United States has always been largely concentrated within the hands of about 10% of the population; approaching the late 1800s wealth was beginning to concentrate even further. In 1890 the Sherman Act birthed anti-trust laws in an attempt to "preserve competition" and prevent the capitalist system from collapsing in on itself. However these reforms could not stop the fundamental goal of the game. Which is to centralize all of the wealth in the world. An economy based on competition must by implication eventually have a winner, and the many lost along the way are simply collateral damage. By the early 1900s the developed world had moved to a global industrial capitalist economy. With bank trusts developing and the next stage of the industrial revolution in full swing, the expansion of private equity worldwide either by hook or by crook became the paramount focus of owning classes.

Monopoly:

the exclusive possession or control of the supply of or trade in a commodity or service.

In 1890 in an attempt to mitigate the damage to the economy wealth concentration was beginning to cause the Sherman Act was passed. It's purpose was to define monopolies in a legal sense and illegalize them in order to protect the "free market". However it was discovered fairly quickly that the act was too broad and did not offer adequate protections. As a result the Clayton Act was passed in 1914 as another stop gap measure. The Clayton Act's purpose was to define and illegalize certain practices that could cause or be the result of monopolies.

It's at this point we see some of The United States' most crucial developments including the still defining characteristic of it's foreign and domestic policy which is Anti-Communism. Post WWI would bring a new economic era to The United States in the form of the roaring 20s. Simultaneously as WWI drew to a close in 1917 the Bolshevik Revolution would occur in Russia. Taking advantage of instability in the region and overthrowing the oppressive Tsarist State. The workers of Russia organized by the proletarianized (relegated to cogs on a wheel, dependent upon a company for existence due to only having their labor to sell) industrial sector would move forward attempting to achieve a future Communist society through the establishment of Socialism as an economic base.

As these words are often misused in conversation, and some terms have different colloquial definitions than the terms used when discussing Political Theory in this exercise these terms are defined as such.

Communism: A stateless, classless, moneyless state of society in which the means of production are owned by the community (people). The economy operates in a post capital environment with the goal of providing for the needs of all, and innovating for the collaborative best interest of all. This is a description of what would be considered an ideal societal state, and a society is defined as communist when it states that this form of society is it's ultimate organizational goal utilizing Socialism as it's economic and political basis.

Socialism: an economic and political organization system in which the workers own the means of production, and trade is regulated by a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Under this economic system the social good is prioritized over potential individual profit, and housing, healthcare, education, food, water, and other basic needs of humanity are not considered commodities, they are considered human rights.

As a result of the Bolshevik revolution large speculative business interests in various imperial (Engaging in the act of economic imperialism, a parasitic process within capitalist economics involving the expropriation of land, labor and resources of value from a host country back to the imperial country) countries such as Great Britain, France and The United States were compromised. The most notable interest compromised in the United States being that of the Russo-Asiatic Mining Company which was partially owned by Herbert Hoover. The loss of exploitable labor and raw materials in ventures such as this represented a large blow to Capital interests as a whole. Thus in response to the revolution the United States cut trade with Russia, and initiated a devastating embargo and trade blockade. Shortly thereafter the budding USSR would be invaded by a collection of western capitalist powers including The United States, Great Britain, and France. These immediate interventions severely handicapped them in the global economic market, and resulted in the early death of their ideal socialist system. By 1918 the system would be dubbed "State Capitalism" due to interference from capitalist nations, and a need to work within the parameters of what authors such as Michael Parenti refer to as "Siege Socialism". They would never truly escape siege, and regardless of the many (both valid and invalid) criticisms that can be leveled at the experiment the social welfare programs of what would become the USSR set a new regional standard for healthcare, education, and overall quality of life. It's social policies directly influenced the overarching geographical region, and although long dissolved at this point still influence them today.

Moving back to the United States during the 1920s while the Clayton Act was supposed to help eliminate monopolistic business practices it was rarely enforced, and is still rarely enforced to this day. Banks were largely unregulated businesses that the Clayton Act let slip through the cracks during this time period, and capitalism and it's tendency towards wealth centralization eventually lead to market exhaustion, and the need for debt as a method of further transferring wealth upwards. As a result banks were in a position to wreak havoc as a stock option that was only traded locally and under the radar to any larger oversight. Throughout the 1920s banks bought each other out at record pace centralizing and monopolizing. And as wealth inequality rose the banks saw an opportunity to lure lower income people into the debt phase of capitalism. New forms of credit were introduced and handed out like candy in order to fuel stock market speculation. Problematically however the banks did not have the funds to guarantee the loans they were giving out. In the event of a crash the bank owners and controlling interests would be protected but those who trusted them with their savings would become collateral damage. This practice further enriched the top income bracket off the backs of the working class who were buying banking services they thought would lead to financial security in the future on credit they thought would never overwhelm them. While In reality these unethical and irresponsible banking practices created an economic bubble that was impossible to sustain, and a collapse was inevitable.

The stock market crash of 1929, and the proceeding decade that became known as The Great Depression was the first large scale example of what happens to the capitalist economic system as it accelerates itself into the ground. And the damage was not contained only to the United States. The crash negatively impacted the economy on a worldwide scale. The Gold Standard being the operating monetary economic standard praised for it's "stability" (mostly due to being an easily centralized store of value) ended up spreading the depression like cancer. America and France had centralized most of the world's gold stock. This resulted in countries with lower reserves being forced to deflate their economies in order to survive the downturn and keep their exports competitive. They were also forced to cut imports to maintain their meager gold reserves. The resulting race to the bottom sent shockwaves throughout the world economy with the United States at the rotten core of it and the ultra wealthy revelling in the spoils they had won playing this game. They celebrated their places of "high society" while 200,000 vagrant children wandered the streets, while entire families lived in sewer pipes, and while regular people just trying to make a life died of hunger in the streets of the "land of opportunity". This was the cost of capitalism. That the many must live in squalor so that the few may have their excesses. And it is a cost that continues to be paid by the regular people of The United States to this day.

The stock market crash of 1929 and the resulting Great depression, staggering wealth inequality, and mass poverty were all situations that Franklin Roosevelt would encounter upon his election to the Presidency in 1932. Labor Forces were beginning to mobilize, and a potential social revolution would be lurking in the distance if something was not done. Luckily the Unites States had been designed from the top down for just such a situation. The "Black codes" as well as various other racial laws and practices instituted during the process of abolishing chattel slavery had already given the racially homogenous majority in the United States an economic scapegoat to fear. A sentiment that Hitler had to engineer with massive amounts of targeted propaganda against Jewish people. Lynchings in the south which had been on the decline for the past decade saw a sharp rise, and fear of foreigners "taking" the precious few jobs capable of sustaining a meager living escalated. Ultimately resulting in the deportation of a large amount of people who had immigrated from Mexico. This engineered infighting among the working class by institutionalizing practices such as racism and sexism at a base societal level is what has allowed the United States to maintain largely repressive, and definitionally Fascist policies throughout its existence without a people's revolution occurring.

In 1933 Roosevelt would smooth over the people's fears by instituting the New Deal. Sweeping economic reforms that would cut slightly into the profits of the United States' owning class of the time in exchange for their continued peace and security. By making small concessions and slightly reducing their obscene share of the wealth in the country they could retain the majority of their opulence and privilege. However there is no freedom in the abstract. The maintenance cost of the "freedom" of the owning class in this era was State Sanctioned Apartheid at the behest of Roosevelt's administration in the form of "Redlining" in housing districts. Housing loans would only be given to White people. With Black people specifically (although other marginalized groups were affected as well) forced into impoverished urban housing projects lacking education or many gainful employment opportunities. Racial violence would continue to escalate and expand throughout WWII and into the 1950s. And the New Deal which would eventually usher in a "Golden Era" for the white working class assisted by hard won labor reforms spearheaded by those sympathetic to labor forces; would conversely usher in a new era of persecution and destitution for minorities in the United States. It was these conditions created under Roosevelt that precipitated the Civil Rights movements of the 1960s.

While Roosevelt was accused of being a Socialist by reactionaries at the time it becomes notable that his social policy was ultimately not unlike that of Hitler in Nazi Germany. Much like Hitler, Roosevelt encountered a destitute people and crumbling economy. And much like Hitler, he took action which would improve conditions for some temporarily. While simultaneously creating a situation that would result in furthering a system of absolute corporate control of economic and governmental policy, as well as a racially charged sense of Nationalism. These policies would be combined with McCarthyism. A massive propaganda campaign against Socialism and Communism in the United States started towards the end of WWII (and continuing even today) to cause the "Red Scare". To exacerbate the situation Nazi asylum seekers took refuge in the United States, and worked their way into several high ranking positions post WWII including Presidential Cabinets. Cementing their influence, or rather reaching their true home in a much better executed fascist regime than Hitler himself could have possibly imagined.

Over the next few decades the United States would commit countless human rights violations in the name of "protecting the free market" by mercilessly destroying anyone participating in the market that they disliked. Since the formation of the CIA in the early 1950s the United States has directly overthrown upwards of 70 entirely democratic nations, and in many cases assisted in the installation of dictators who better represent it's business interests. Most recently the region known as the Middle East has been repeatedly systematically destabilized for more than two decades to support resource extraction (There were no WMDs in Iraq. Only massive reserves of Oil ripe for the taking. Saddam Hussein had previously been a poster boy for the "success" of CIA operations. His regime was in fact initially funded by the United States, and our tax dollars. When he refused to play ball with United States business as he was supposed to then, and only then was he considered a tyrant by the United States despite having already committed horrific atrocities) and the benefit of US "defense" Contractors (who had far more personnel on the ground in Afghanistan at any given time than the United States Military did, and those contractors were paid handsomely with our tax dollars). All these things aside the people of the United States remain certain they are free. In the country with the worst medical outcomes despite the most money spent. In a country that consistently ranks among the top 5 highest incarceration rates in the world. The country where over half the population lives paycheck to paycheck rationing themselves for the next three days saying "shall I get gas or eat today". While our dumpsters overfill with food, and we have enough vacant homes to house every homeless person and not even put a dent in the available market. Free so long as we continue to "think for ourselves" without thinking critically. Free so long as we keep reading without comprehending (often on purpose). Free so long as we don't exercise, and cause the chains to shake.