Mine is a system of governance that interprets the state's legal monopoly as violence as a legal means.
Concepts like due process, precedent, fairness become irrelevant and the use or threat of violence, not as a last resort, but as primary tool of policy, is the defining feature. Sometimes this is initially cloaked in a legal veneer, but this inexorably changes from "for what crimes should we sanction violence" to "what crimes can we create to justify violence".
In my reading of the foundation texts of communism, there are few references to using violence to control the population. I don't deny for a second that in the Soviet Union, Korea, Kampuchea such means were employed, but the defining feature is a different economic model. Whereas fascist states, for example early 20C Italy and Germany were built on the rhetoric of using violence against out groups.
I'm not giving "communism" a pass. It's possible such an economic system *requires* authoritarianism that is indistinguishable from fascism, but I see it peripheral to the ideology rather than central
We do better to understand fascism as a product of a particular time and place. Understanding it in its historical context will better empower us to deal with the authoritarianism that threatens us today.
Thanks, Marci. That was a terrific lecture (this from a just retired literature professor). I appreciated your taking the time to set your own social scene at the beginning because it rhymed with the sociability of Fascist circles you describe later, especially via Ionesco. Like the fascist contagion, resistance happens human to human. The social contexts enriched the intellectual history. Anyway, a tour de force!
Thank you. I read your introduction to "Here in Our Auschwitz" last night, excellent. This book is a gem. Thank you for providing links for this weeks reading. Best regards
The flaws of Obama's presidency would be the unfortunate fate of the African American leadership foundation. Knowing the racism that is common in America's being, he should have been a great president instead of a mediocre one. His mediocrity came out from his lack of courage standing up to the corruption in the system where the majority of Americans are now noticing. He capitulated to the racist rightwing where they can't stand his presence let alone wanting to work with him. He could have been a great president if he had courage in his heart not just intellect in his head.
Well said. If Obama after the 2008 Financial Crisis had taken the steps to reform the financial system, we'd all be better off today. Instead, he bailed out a broken system, leading to the mess the US faces today.
While I respect and admire President Obama, there is a direct line between Obama’s handling of the financial crisis and DJT. Yes, he bailed out the institutions that perpetrated the crime and left the little guys to not only lose their homes, but also had Wall Street benefit on both ends with private equity and institutional investors like Blackstone buy up their homes and rent them out. This is what I hear most from these communities even today.
This was present in elements of his foreign policy as well: engaging in lofty rhetoric on there being an uncrossable “red line” in Syria with no follow through.
Obama was reelected with a comfortable margin in 2012. In 2016, an election with only 60 percent turnout, Hillary still won the popular vote by 3 million, and trump won the electoral vote with only 46.1 percent of the popular vote.
Dr Shore! In the course of an (apparently improvised!) lecture, to provide such extremely helpful condensed accounts of enlightenment, romanticism and liberalism before launching into antisemitism and fascism from the - to me - unexpected starting point of Romania, is gold. I will listen again, to make sure I haven't missed any other isms or ists. Thank you so much.
It very much is. Tho I can think of few authoritarian regimes that aren't fascist. Sure, Stalin would have rejected the label, but I would reject his rejection! It had all the trappings of a fascist state without the label.
At first I was put off by the nervous laughter as she settled into the topic, but the lecture got more and more fascinating and stellar as she spoke. I was in Austria in 1970 in a junior-year-abroad program. I was taking philosophy classes, and struggling with Kant and Hegel. The war was still very very vivid. This is the best lecture I have heard since that year, to begin to explain what happened in the mid 20th century. I am truly grateful for the asides, the insightful sociological observations, the analogy to racism in the US instead of religious persecution of cultural Jews in the Hapsburg empire, and how empire and liberalism set up the backlash to people who do not like that 2+2=4, and prefer to live by an alternative fantasy backed-up and reinforced by cruelty and violence. The idea that desire is more important than the belief in human reason is truly a dark cloud, getting bigger as we lose community and trust, and face increasing violence and romantic nationalism.
Enjoyed this lecture very much. I'd like to add one book to the reading list, Jason Stanley's "Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future" (2026), which I read earlier this year. It is an excellent companion to his "How Fascism Works."
Exceptional lecture. I found it fascinating to see how the purveyors of Project 2025 formulated their hysteria. They simply stole it.
I’ve been reading about this era for years, but not within collegiate studies. I’m fascinated that you are offering this. I greatly appreciate your dedication.
They simply stole it because of the normalizing process used by the Heritage Foundation and the Koch brothers to subtly wear down the American people by their ignorance of how their propaganda was being internalized. One example of a recent bombardment of this pablum being force fed to cities and town councils was a playbook for better government through "best practices" that could be implemented to 'save money' by adopting it. This was more than a year before Trump returned to office. Portsmouth, Virginia was visited by a representative that asked that the entire elected city council to each read through a copy of this 'playbook' over a weekend and then vote on it the following Tuesday when they next met. A local television reporter got wind of it, took a copy of the playback, (a very large volume btw, a Koch funded project in essence) and went out and did man on the street interviews downtown with citizens to see what they thought of it. Most said it couldn't be read through and digested in a month much less be fully discussed in depth in a weekend. Plus no citizens input?
No period set aside for a referendum. Rush. Rush. Read it and vote it in. (As it was also a tailored volume referencing how the sections complied within Virginia State codes seemingly meant that groups of these fascism adoring idiots had gone through all 50 States and custom made each a volume indicating there was a lot of money bring thrown at it)
REJECT! City Council smelled it for what it was, realized their autonomy would be diminished...
Because of a sharp eyed journalist was alerted and reported it locally the public became aware. I saw it on an evening broadcast and thought it to be a Koch Bro sham.
The city 'playbook' was a Project2025 test balloon. When that fiasco was released before the election I downloaded the entire Project2025 on PDF and both smelled alike. Fascism has a unique smell. Blood and money. Your blood, their money.
Fascism Is Corporatism because it is the merger of state power with corporate power. Corporatism is fanatically devoted to money and power and violently opposed to unions and working people and always has had the direct connection to the Republican Party, thus the Republican Party is the American Fascist Party.
To quote Benito Mussolini when he was asked what fascism was:
"Fascism should be more properly callled Corporatism because it is the merger of state power and corporate power."
Mike, do you follow Timothy Snyder? Today he presented the third, of what will be ten installments on Fascism. It is free, exemplary. I highly recommend it.
And here is the definition that I use: ""A politico-economic system in which there is: total executive branch control of both the legislative and administrative powers of government and the military; no independent judiciary; no Constitution that embodies the Rule of Law standing above the people who control the government/instruments of state power; no inherent personal rights or liberties; a single national ideology based on some combination of: racism, misogyny, religious bigotry and authoritarianism, homophobia, xenophobia, and imperialist expansionism, that first demonizes and then criminalizes all political, religious, and ideological opposition to it; the massive and regular use of hate, fear, racial and religious prejudice, there is a State propaganda machine, massively using the Big Lie Technique (as well as the Little Lie Technique, a peculiar contribution of Donald Trump to the genre); mob psychology, mob actions and ultimately individual and collective violence, to achieve political and economic ends; a capitalist/corporate economy, with the economic ruling class' control of State power and thus, economic, fiscal, political, and regulatory policy and policies; all to establish and maintain the control of a capitalist ruling class over the politics and economy of the nation.”
Is anyone troubled by the beginning personal anecdotes the professor relates—about canvassing in the 2016 election and how trump is the bad guy and how do you tell your kids he won, etc etc?
I loathe trump and fascism, but … this feels like such a polarizing attitude to begin with, assuming that no attendees or viewers could possibly not support Hillary Clinton or share the orofessor’s specific politics.
I mean, the White House could just broadcast this opening as Exhibit A for the case against woke, prejudice elite universities.
There must be a way to educate folks across the political spectrum about fascism without turning away those who might need to hear it the most.
Surely we can discuss the history and definition of fascism and give contemporary trump examples etc without starting from a point that seems to condemn folks who didn’t understand this in 2016 (and maybe dont get it yet today).
I had the same reaction. No offense to Dr. Shor but my interest was in the lecture topic and not in how she, her family and friends processed the 2016 election. I wish that she had used that time to expand further on her excellent presentation on the posted lecture topic.
In medical history-taking, it matters to find out as much as possible about the person, because some small piece of information may lead us to the diagnosis, when the case seems totally mysterious and it is not easy to parse. As I listened to the history she starts with, I began to see the way she intended to separate liberalism from democracy, as she experienced it. In philosophical circles, it is sometimes hard to get down from the abstract to the particulars, and link it to the social events. While she was speaking, I thought of Madame Thenardier, in Les Miserables, as she knitted her way through the French revolution. We can never discount the mean, cruel and greedy people who wreck the glorious thoughts which inspire us to what seems a revolution to save mankind. Her ability to show us various ways to see the actual vs the exalted verbiage, was astute.
I loved this! I’m learning so much and happily filling in gaps of my own education. Thank you. I’m in a small cabin in Montana this summer with limited WiFi and cannot do the reading, but I believe I have enough background to follow along. I will challenge myself to do the reading when we get home.
What I've seen of this lecture series seems regrettably unfocused and scattered. As you well know, Fascism, Communism, Leninism and Stalinism are deadly serious topics, that deserve the closest study. In the main, I have seen description of the results of these systems, and not how they originated, were engineered and financed, not how they engaged in the political, financial and violent ascents to power, much less their perpetuation. I hope that the readings, discussion sessions and examinations will emphasize what the lectures have not.
WE have the people of South Carolina to thank for Lindsey Graham. It's part of the nonthinking electorate that supports the fascist Republicans...it's obscene. Red states are responsible for the moral decline of America.
Moral Decline In America?
Morality of a society goes beyond political party, power, or money.
What happens to a society that governs itself and it excuses the inexcusable? What happens when the largest sex trafficking in American history is dismissed to protect the guilty? What happens when your Congressional representative allows a person who denies a leader’s electoral victory? And what happens when a society votes for a liar to be the leader of the country? What happens when a group in a society accepts that their leader is immorally fit for office? What happens when the institution that supports the laws decides that morality is not important? And what happens when people decide elections can be bought?
If that is the society WE the People believe WE have then WE are doomed. MSM may not cover the morality of the US but by polling WE are incensed with what OUR country has become. WE can decide and I would submit that outraged Americans expect more from those who expect to lead our country.
WE expect accountability of OUR government or those representing us will be voted out of office. WE will not accept $$$ to buy elections just because it’s expedient. America is at a moral tipping point when OUR decisions go beyond political party. Voting is how WE the People will correct our moral compass. And WE will use OUR sphere of influence to help make OUR course change because that’s not who WE are.
You put that very well. I agree: we are at a moral tipping point in our society that goes beyond mere party affiliation. The right is descending into lunacy and that never ends well.
Many definitions are possible.
Mine is a system of governance that interprets the state's legal monopoly as violence as a legal means.
Concepts like due process, precedent, fairness become irrelevant and the use or threat of violence, not as a last resort, but as primary tool of policy, is the defining feature. Sometimes this is initially cloaked in a legal veneer, but this inexorably changes from "for what crimes should we sanction violence" to "what crimes can we create to justify violence".
Isn't what you wrote an excellent definition of authoritarianism in general, of which fascism is one specific variety?
I could also restate the same thing as a description for communism though no?
In my reading of the foundation texts of communism, there are few references to using violence to control the population. I don't deny for a second that in the Soviet Union, Korea, Kampuchea such means were employed, but the defining feature is a different economic model. Whereas fascist states, for example early 20C Italy and Germany were built on the rhetoric of using violence against out groups.
I'm not giving "communism" a pass. It's possible such an economic system *requires* authoritarianism that is indistinguishable from fascism, but I see it peripheral to the ideology rather than central
We do better to understand fascism as a product of a particular time and place. Understanding it in its historical context will better empower us to deal with the authoritarianism that threatens us today.
Thanks, Marci. That was a terrific lecture (this from a just retired literature professor). I appreciated your taking the time to set your own social scene at the beginning because it rhymed with the sociability of Fascist circles you describe later, especially via Ionesco. Like the fascist contagion, resistance happens human to human. The social contexts enriched the intellectual history. Anyway, a tour de force!
Thank you. I read your introduction to "Here in Our Auschwitz" last night, excellent. This book is a gem. Thank you for providing links for this weeks reading. Best regards
The flaws of Obama's presidency would be the unfortunate fate of the African American leadership foundation. Knowing the racism that is common in America's being, he should have been a great president instead of a mediocre one. His mediocrity came out from his lack of courage standing up to the corruption in the system where the majority of Americans are now noticing. He capitulated to the racist rightwing where they can't stand his presence let alone wanting to work with him. He could have been a great president if he had courage in his heart not just intellect in his head.
Well said. If Obama after the 2008 Financial Crisis had taken the steps to reform the financial system, we'd all be better off today. Instead, he bailed out a broken system, leading to the mess the US faces today.
While I respect and admire President Obama, there is a direct line between Obama’s handling of the financial crisis and DJT. Yes, he bailed out the institutions that perpetrated the crime and left the little guys to not only lose their homes, but also had Wall Street benefit on both ends with private equity and institutional investors like Blackstone buy up their homes and rent them out. This is what I hear most from these communities even today.
I completely agree. I was so disappointed in Obama on his issue and still am.
This was present in elements of his foreign policy as well: engaging in lofty rhetoric on there being an uncrossable “red line” in Syria with no follow through.
Obama was reelected with a comfortable margin in 2012. In 2016, an election with only 60 percent turnout, Hillary still won the popular vote by 3 million, and trump won the electoral vote with only 46.1 percent of the popular vote.
Americans love Obama btw
Dr Shore! In the course of an (apparently improvised!) lecture, to provide such extremely helpful condensed accounts of enlightenment, romanticism and liberalism before launching into antisemitism and fascism from the - to me - unexpected starting point of Romania, is gold. I will listen again, to make sure I haven't missed any other isms or ists. Thank you so much.
well said!
It very much is. Tho I can think of few authoritarian regimes that aren't fascist. Sure, Stalin would have rejected the label, but I would reject his rejection! It had all the trappings of a fascist state without the label.
At first I was put off by the nervous laughter as she settled into the topic, but the lecture got more and more fascinating and stellar as she spoke. I was in Austria in 1970 in a junior-year-abroad program. I was taking philosophy classes, and struggling with Kant and Hegel. The war was still very very vivid. This is the best lecture I have heard since that year, to begin to explain what happened in the mid 20th century. I am truly grateful for the asides, the insightful sociological observations, the analogy to racism in the US instead of religious persecution of cultural Jews in the Hapsburg empire, and how empire and liberalism set up the backlash to people who do not like that 2+2=4, and prefer to live by an alternative fantasy backed-up and reinforced by cruelty and violence. The idea that desire is more important than the belief in human reason is truly a dark cloud, getting bigger as we lose community and trust, and face increasing violence and romantic nationalism.
Enjoyed this lecture very much. I'd like to add one book to the reading list, Jason Stanley's "Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future" (2026), which I read earlier this year. It is an excellent companion to his "How Fascism Works."
Exceptional lecture. I found it fascinating to see how the purveyors of Project 2025 formulated their hysteria. They simply stole it.
I’ve been reading about this era for years, but not within collegiate studies. I’m fascinated that you are offering this. I greatly appreciate your dedication.
They simply stole it because of the normalizing process used by the Heritage Foundation and the Koch brothers to subtly wear down the American people by their ignorance of how their propaganda was being internalized. One example of a recent bombardment of this pablum being force fed to cities and town councils was a playbook for better government through "best practices" that could be implemented to 'save money' by adopting it. This was more than a year before Trump returned to office. Portsmouth, Virginia was visited by a representative that asked that the entire elected city council to each read through a copy of this 'playbook' over a weekend and then vote on it the following Tuesday when they next met. A local television reporter got wind of it, took a copy of the playback, (a very large volume btw, a Koch funded project in essence) and went out and did man on the street interviews downtown with citizens to see what they thought of it. Most said it couldn't be read through and digested in a month much less be fully discussed in depth in a weekend. Plus no citizens input?
No period set aside for a referendum. Rush. Rush. Read it and vote it in. (As it was also a tailored volume referencing how the sections complied within Virginia State codes seemingly meant that groups of these fascism adoring idiots had gone through all 50 States and custom made each a volume indicating there was a lot of money bring thrown at it)
REJECT! City Council smelled it for what it was, realized their autonomy would be diminished...
Because of a sharp eyed journalist was alerted and reported it locally the public became aware. I saw it on an evening broadcast and thought it to be a Koch Bro sham.
The city 'playbook' was a Project2025 test balloon. When that fiasco was released before the election I downloaded the entire Project2025 on PDF and both smelled alike. Fascism has a unique smell. Blood and money. Your blood, their money.
Fascism Is Corporatism because it is the merger of state power with corporate power. Corporatism is fanatically devoted to money and power and violently opposed to unions and working people and always has had the direct connection to the Republican Party, thus the Republican Party is the American Fascist Party.
To quote Benito Mussolini when he was asked what fascism was:
"Fascism should be more properly callled Corporatism because it is the merger of state power and corporate power."
Mike, do you follow Timothy Snyder? Today he presented the third, of what will be ten installments on Fascism. It is free, exemplary. I highly recommend it.
You are very hard to understand.
And here is the definition that I use: ""A politico-economic system in which there is: total executive branch control of both the legislative and administrative powers of government and the military; no independent judiciary; no Constitution that embodies the Rule of Law standing above the people who control the government/instruments of state power; no inherent personal rights or liberties; a single national ideology based on some combination of: racism, misogyny, religious bigotry and authoritarianism, homophobia, xenophobia, and imperialist expansionism, that first demonizes and then criminalizes all political, religious, and ideological opposition to it; the massive and regular use of hate, fear, racial and religious prejudice, there is a State propaganda machine, massively using the Big Lie Technique (as well as the Little Lie Technique, a peculiar contribution of Donald Trump to the genre); mob psychology, mob actions and ultimately individual and collective violence, to achieve political and economic ends; a capitalist/corporate economy, with the economic ruling class' control of State power and thus, economic, fiscal, political, and regulatory policy and policies; all to establish and maintain the control of a capitalist ruling class over the politics and economy of the nation.”
Is anyone troubled by the beginning personal anecdotes the professor relates—about canvassing in the 2016 election and how trump is the bad guy and how do you tell your kids he won, etc etc?
I loathe trump and fascism, but … this feels like such a polarizing attitude to begin with, assuming that no attendees or viewers could possibly not support Hillary Clinton or share the orofessor’s specific politics.
I mean, the White House could just broadcast this opening as Exhibit A for the case against woke, prejudice elite universities.
There must be a way to educate folks across the political spectrum about fascism without turning away those who might need to hear it the most.
Surely we can discuss the history and definition of fascism and give contemporary trump examples etc without starting from a point that seems to condemn folks who didn’t understand this in 2016 (and maybe dont get it yet today).
I had the same reaction. No offense to Dr. Shor but my interest was in the lecture topic and not in how she, her family and friends processed the 2016 election. I wish that she had used that time to expand further on her excellent presentation on the posted lecture topic.
In medical history-taking, it matters to find out as much as possible about the person, because some small piece of information may lead us to the diagnosis, when the case seems totally mysterious and it is not easy to parse. As I listened to the history she starts with, I began to see the way she intended to separate liberalism from democracy, as she experienced it. In philosophical circles, it is sometimes hard to get down from the abstract to the particulars, and link it to the social events. While she was speaking, I thought of Madame Thenardier, in Les Miserables, as she knitted her way through the French revolution. We can never discount the mean, cruel and greedy people who wreck the glorious thoughts which inspire us to what seems a revolution to save mankind. Her ability to show us various ways to see the actual vs the exalted verbiage, was astute.
"There must be a way to educate folks across the political spectrum about fascism without turning away those who might need to hear it the most."
Excellent point - 'those who might need to hear it the most'! Perfect.
I loved this! I’m learning so much and happily filling in gaps of my own education. Thank you. I’m in a small cabin in Montana this summer with limited WiFi and cannot do the reading, but I believe I have enough background to follow along. I will challenge myself to do the reading when we get home.
What I've seen of this lecture series seems regrettably unfocused and scattered. As you well know, Fascism, Communism, Leninism and Stalinism are deadly serious topics, that deserve the closest study. In the main, I have seen description of the results of these systems, and not how they originated, were engineered and financed, not how they engaged in the political, financial and violent ascents to power, much less their perpetuation. I hope that the readings, discussion sessions and examinations will emphasize what the lectures have not.
WE have the people of South Carolina to thank for Lindsey Graham. It's part of the nonthinking electorate that supports the fascist Republicans...it's obscene. Red states are responsible for the moral decline of America.
Moral Decline In America?
Morality of a society goes beyond political party, power, or money.
What happens to a society that governs itself and it excuses the inexcusable? What happens when the largest sex trafficking in American history is dismissed to protect the guilty? What happens when your Congressional representative allows a person who denies a leader’s electoral victory? And what happens when a society votes for a liar to be the leader of the country? What happens when a group in a society accepts that their leader is immorally fit for office? What happens when the institution that supports the laws decides that morality is not important? And what happens when people decide elections can be bought?
If that is the society WE the People believe WE have then WE are doomed. MSM may not cover the morality of the US but by polling WE are incensed with what OUR country has become. WE can decide and I would submit that outraged Americans expect more from those who expect to lead our country.
WE expect accountability of OUR government or those representing us will be voted out of office. WE will not accept $$$ to buy elections just because it’s expedient. America is at a moral tipping point when OUR decisions go beyond political party. Voting is how WE the People will correct our moral compass. And WE will use OUR sphere of influence to help make OUR course change because that’s not who WE are.
You put that very well. I agree: we are at a moral tipping point in our society that goes beyond mere party affiliation. The right is descending into lunacy and that never ends well.