Fascism and the Masses: The Revolt Against the Last Humans, 1848–1945

442 Pages·2018·3.65 MB·English

by  Ishay Landa

Fascism and the Masses
Highlighting the “mass” nature of interwar European fascism has long
become commonplace. Throughout the years, numerous critics have
construed fascism as a phenomenon of mass society, perhaps the ultimate
expression of mass politics. This study deconstructs this long-standing
perception. It argues that the entwining of fascism with the masses is
a remarkable transubstantiation of a movement which understood and
presented itself as a militant rejection of the ideal of mass politics, and
indeed of mass society and mass culture more broadly conceived. Thus,
rather than “massifying” society, fascism was the culmination of a long
effort on the part of the élites and the middle classes to de-massify it.
The perennially menacing mass—seen as plebeian and insubordinate—
was to be drilled into submission, replaced by supposedly superior
collective entities, such as the nation, the race, or the people. Focusing
on Italian fascism and German National Socialism, but consulting fascist
movements and individuals elsewhere in interwar Europe, the book
incisively shows how fascism is best understood as ferociously resisting
what Elias referred to as “the civilizing process” and what Marx termed
“the social individual.” Fascism, notably, was a revolt against what
Nietzsche described as the peaceful, middling and egalitarian “Last
Humans.”
Ishay Landa is Senior Lecturer of History at the Israeli Open University.
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56 Fascism and the Masses
The Revolt Against the Last Humans, 1848–1945
Ishay Landa
Fascism and the Masses
The Revolt Against the Last
Humans, 1848–1945
Ishay Landa
First published 2018
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To Maria, Judith and Nomi

Contents
List of Figures viii
List of Tables ix
Acknowledgments x
Introduction: The Masses and the Fascist
Political Unconscious 1
1 The Rise of the Last Human I: The Formation
of Mass Society 29
2 The Rise of the Last Human II: The Opposition
to Mass Society 63
3 Fascism and Mass Politics 139
4 Fascism and Mass Society I: Cultural Questions 218
5 Fascism and Mass Society II: Consumption,
Leisure, Americanism 278
6 The Wandering Womb: Fascism and Gender 320
7 The Wandering Jew: National Socialism
and Antisemitism 354
8 Epilogue: Nietzsche, the Left and the Last Humans 400
Index 421
Figures
1.1 The growth in Europe’s population (not including
Russia), in town and country (1770–1980) 45
2.1 Liberty Leading the People. Eugène Delacroix
[Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons 80
3.1 “Compulsory Spontaneous Demonstration” 184
3.2 Population deterioration due to insufficient propagation
of the valuable families 203
3.3 Left illustration (Helmut 1939: 29): “The menace
of the under-man.” 204
3.4 Right Illustration (Helmut 1939: 25): “Number
of children according to profession.” 205
4.1 Katia Mann’s childhood home, Pringsheim Palace
in Munich 221
4.2 Gino Boccasile, propaganda poster 240
6.1 “Decline in matrimonial fertility” 336
6.2 The Jazz Singer (1) 346
6.3 The Jazz Singer (2) 347
7.1 “I’ve settled the fate of Jews—And of Germans” 375
7.2 “Entartete Musik” 391
Tables
1.1 Voting percentage for the German Social-Democratic
Party (SDAP) between 1871–1912, in elections
to the Reichstag 38
2.1 The political-demographic vicious cycle 89
3.1 New graduates in technical professions 162
3.2 National parliamentary elections, 1919–33 165