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    <h1>The Doctrine of Fascism</h1>
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<p>From the <a href="http://www.worldfuturefund.org/wffmaster/Reading/Germany/mussolini.htm" target="_blank">original article</a> in 1932. Authors: Benito Mussolini, Giovanni Gentile (co-author).</p>
  <p>Like all sound political conceptions, Fascism is action and it is thought;
action in which doctrine is immanent, and doctrine
arising from a given system of historical forces in which
it is inserted, and working on them from within <a href="#1">(1)</a>.
It has therefore a form correlated to contingencies of time and space; but it
has also an ideal content which makes it
an expression of truth in the higher region of the history of
thought <a href="#3">(2)</a>. There is no way of exercising a
spiritual influence in the world as a
human will dominating the will of others, unless one has a conception
both of the transient and the specific
reality on which that action is to be exercised,
and of the permanent and universal reality in which the transient dwells
and has its being. To know men one must
know man; and to know man one must be acquainted with
reality and its laws. There can be no conception of the
State which is not fundamentally a conception of life: philosophy
or intuition, system of ideas evolving within the framework
of logic or concentrated in a vision or a faith,
but always, at least potentially, an organic conception of the
world.</p>
  <h3>Spiritual view of life</h3>
<p>
Thus
many of the practical expressions of Fascism such
as party organization, system of
education, and discipline can only
be understood when considered in relation to its general attitude
toward life.  
A spiritual attitude <a href="#3">(3)</a>.
Fascism sees in the
world not only those superficial, material aspects in which
man appears as an individual, standing by himself, self-centered, subject
to natural law, which instinctively
urges him toward a life of selfish
momentary pleasure; it sees not only
the individual but the nation and the country; individuals
and generations bound together by a moral law, with common traditions and
a mission which suppressing the instinct
for life closed in a brief circle of pleasure, builds
up a higher life, founded on duty, a life free from
the limitations of time and space, in which the individual, by
self-sacrifice, the renunciation of self-interest, by death itself, can achieve
that purely spiritual existence in which his value as a man consists.</p>
<p>
The
conception is therefore a spiritual one, arising from the general reaction of
the century against the materialistic positivism of the XIXth century. Anti-positivistic
but positive; neither skeptical nor agnostic; neither pessimistic nor supinely
optimistic as are, generally speaking, the doctrines (all negative) which place
the center of life outside man; whereas, by the exercise of his free will, man
can and must create his own world.</p>
<p>
Fascism wants man to be active and to engage in action with all his
energies; it wants him to be manfully aware of the
difficulties besetting him and ready to face them. It conceives
of life as a struggle in which it behooves a man to
win for himself a really worthy place, first of all by fitting himself
(physically, morally, intellectually) to become the implement
required for winning it. As for the individual, so for
the nation, and so for mankind <a href="#4">(4)</a>.
Hence the high value of
culture in all its forms (artistic, religious, scientific) <a href="#5">(5)</a>
and the outstanding importance of
education. Hence also the essential
value of work, by which man subjugates nature and creates the human world
(economic, political, ethical, and intellectual).</p>
<p>
This
positive conception of life is obviously an ethical one.
It invests the whole field of
reality as well as the human activities which master it. No
action is exempt from moral
judgment; no activity can be despoiled of the value which
a moral purpose confers on all things. Therefore
life, as conceived of by the
Fascist, is serious, austere, and religious;
all its manifestations are poised in a world sustained by
moral forces and subject to spiritual responsibilities. The
Fascist disdains an “easy&quot; life (6).</p>
<p>
The
Fascist conception of life is a religious one <a href="#7">(7)</a>,
in which man is viewed in his
immanent relation to a higher law, endowed with an objective will transcending
the individual and raising him to
conscious membership of a spiritual society. &quot;Those
who perceive nothing beyond opportunistic
considerations in the religious policy of the Fascist
regime fail to realize that Fascism is not only a system
of government but also and above all a system of thought.</p>
<h3>The importance of tradition</h3>
<p>In
  the Fascist conception of history, man is man only by
  virtue of the spiritual process to which he contributes as
  a member of the family, the social
  group, the nation, and in function
  of history to which all nations bring their contribution.
  Hence the great value of tradition
  in records, in language, in customs,
  in the rules of social life <a href="#8">(8)</a>. Outside
  history man is a nonentity.</p>
<h3>Rejection of individualism and the importance of the state</h3>
<p>Fascism is
therefore opposed to all
individualistic abstractions based on eighteenth century materialism; and it is
opposed to all Jacobinistic utopias and
innovations. It does not believe in the
possibility of &quot;happiness&quot;
on earth as conceived by the economistic literature
of the XVIIIth century, and it therefore rejects the
theological
notion that at some future time the human family
will secure a final settlement of all its difficulties. This
notion runs counter to experience which teaches that life
is in continual flux and in process of evolution. In
politics Fascism aims at realism; in practice it desires to deal only
with those problems which are the spontaneous product
of historic conditions and which find or suggest their
own solutions <a href="#9">(9)</a>. Only
by entering in to the process of
reality and taking possession of the forces at work within it, can man
act on man and on nature <a href="#10">(10)</a>.</p>
<p>Anti-individualistic,
  the Fascist conception of life stresses the importance of the State and
  accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of
  the State, which stands for the conscience and the universal, will of man
  as a historic entity <a href="#11">(11)</a>. It is opposed to
  classical liberalism which arose as a
  reaction to absolutism and exhausted its historical function when the
  State became the expression of the
  conscience and will of the people. Liberalism denied the State in the
  name of the individual; Fascism reasserts the
  rights of the State as expressing the real essence of the individual
  <a href="#12">(12)</a>. And
  if liberty is to he the attribute of living men
  and not of abstract dummies invented by individualistic liberalism, then
  Fascism stands for liberty, and for the only liberty worth having, the liberty
  of the State and of the individual within
  the State <a href="#13">(13)</a>. The Fascist conception of the State
  is all embracing; outside of it no human or
  spiritual values can exist, much less have value. Thus
  understood, Fascism, is totalitarian,
  and the 
  Fascist 
    State
  - a
  synthesis and a unit inclusive of all
  values - interprets, develops, and
  potentates the whole life of a people <a href="#14">(14)</a>.</p>
<p>
  No
  individuals or groups (political parties, cultural associations, economic
  unions, social classes) outside the State <a href="#15">(15)</a>. Fascism
  is therefore opposed to Socialism to which unity within
  the State (which amalgamates classes into a single economic and ethical
  reality) is unknown, and which sees in
  history nothing but the class struggle. Fascism is likewise opposed
  to trade unionism
  as a class weapon. But when brought
  within the orbit of the State, Fascism recognizes the
  real needs which gave rise to socialism and trade
  unionism, giving them due weight in
  the guild or corporative system in which divergent interests are coordinated and
  harmonized in the unity of the State <a href="#16">(16)</a>.</p>
<p>
  Grouped
  according to their several interests, individuals form classes; they form
  trade-unions when organized according to their several economic activities; but
  first and foremost they form the State, which is no mere matter of numbers, the
  suns of the individuals forming the majority. Fascism
  is therefore opposed to that form of democracy which equates a nation to
  the majority, lowering it to the level of
  the largest number <a href="#17">(17)</a>; but
  it is the purest form of democracy if the nation be considered as
  it should be from the point of view
  of quality rather than quantity, as an idea, the mightiest because the most
  ethical, the most coherent, the
  truest, expressing itself in a people as the conscience
  and will of the few, if not, indeed, of one, and ending
  to express itself in the conscience and the will of the mass, of the whole group
  ethnically molded by natural and
  historical conditions into a nation, advancing, as one conscience and one
  will, along the self same line of development
  and spiritual formation <a href="#18">(18)</a>. Not
  a race, nor a geographically defined
  region, but a people, historically perpetuating
  itself; a multitude unified by an idea and imbued with the
  will to live, the will to power, self-consciousness,
  personality <a href="#19">(19)</a>.</p>
<p>
  In
  so far as it is embodied in a State, this higher personality
  becomes a nation. It is not the
  nation which generates the State;
  that is an antiquated naturalistic concept which afforded a basis for XIXth
  century publicity in favor of
  national governments. Rather is it
  the State which creates the nation,
  conferring volition and therefore real life on
  a people made aware of their moral unity.</p>
<p>
  The
  right to national independence does not arise from any
  merely literary and idealistic form of self-consciousness; still
  less from a more or less passive and unconscious de
  facto situation, but from an
  active, self-conscious, political will
  expressing itself in action and ready to prove its rights. It
  arises, in short, from the existence, at least in
  fieri,
  of a
  State. Indeed, it is the State
  which, as the expression of a
  universal ethical will, creates the right to national independence
  <a href="#20">(20)</a>.</p>
<p>
  A
  nation, as expressed in the State, is a living, ethical entity
  only in so far as it is active. Inactivity
  is death. Therefore
  the State is not only Authority which governs
  and confers legal form and spiritual value on individual 
  wills, but it is also Power which makes its
  will felt and respected beyond its
  own frontiers, thus affording practical proof of the universal character of the
  decisions necessary to ensure its development. This
  implies organization and expansion,
  potential if not actual. Thus the
  State equates itself to the will of man, whose development cannot he
  checked by obstacles and which, by achieving self-expression,
  demonstrates its infinity <a href="#21">(21)</a>.</p>
  <h3>Fascist state as a spiritual force</h3>
<p>The
  Fascist 
  State, as a higher and more powerful expression
  of personality, is a force, but a spiritual one. It
  sums up all the manifestations of the moral and intellectual life
  of man. Its functions cannot therefore be limited to those of enforcing
  order and keeping the peace, as the liberal doctrine had it. It
  is no mere mechanical device for defining the sphere within which the
  individual may duly exercise his supposed
  rights. The 
  Fascist 
    State
  is an inwardly accepted
  standard and rule of conduct, a discipline of the whole person;
  it permeates the will no less than the intellect. It
  stands for a principle which becomes
  the central motive of man as a member
  of civilized society, sinking deep down into
  his personality; it dwells in the heart of the man of action and of the thinker,
  of the artist and of the man of science: soul of the soul <a href="#22">(22)</a>.</p>
<p> Fascism,
  in short, is not only a law-giver and a founder of institutions, but an
  educator and a promoter of spiritual life. It
  aims at refashioning not only the forms of life but their content -
  man,
  his character, and his faith. To achieve this propose it enforces discipline and
  uses authority, entering into the soul and ruling with undisputed sway.
  Therefore it has chosen as its emblem the Lictor’s
  rods, the symbol of unity, strength, and justice.</p>
<h3>Political and social doctrine - evolution from socialism</h3>
<p>When
  in the now distant March of 1919, speaking through
  the columns of the Popolo d'Italia
  I summoned to Milan
  the surviving interventionists who had intervened, and
  who had followed me ever since the foundation of the Fasci
  of revolutionary action in
  January 1915, I had in
  mind no specific doctrinal program. The only doctrine of which I had
  practical experience was that of socialism, from until the winter of 1914 - nearly a
  decade. My experience was
  that both of a follower and a leader but
  it was not doctrinal experience. My doctrine during that period had been
  the doctrine of action. A uniform,
  universally accepted doctrine of
  Socialism had not existed since 1905, when the revisionist movement,
  headed by Bernstein, arose in Germany, countered by the formation, in the
  see-saw of tendencies, of a left revolutionary movement which in Italy never
  quitted the field of phrases, whereas, in
  the case of Russian socialism, it
  became the prelude to Bolshevism.</p>
<p>
  Reformism, revolutionism, centrism, the very echo of that
  terminology is dead, while in the
  great river of Fascism one can trace
  currents which had their source in Sorel, 
  Peguy,
  Lagardelle of the Movement
  Socialists, and in the cohort
  of Italian syndicalist who from 1904 to 1914 brought
  a new note into the Italian socialist environment - previously
  emasculated and chloroformed by fornicating with Giolitti's
  party - a note sounded in Olivetti's Pagine
  Libere, 
  Orano's
  Lupa,
  Enrico
  Leone's Divenirs Socials.</p>
<p>
  When
  the war ended in 1919 Socialism, as a doctrine, was
  already dead; it continued to exist only as a grudge, especially
  in 
  Italy
  where its only chance lay in inciting to reprisals
  against the men who had willed the war and who were
  to be made to pay for it.</p>
<p>The Popolo d'Italia described itself in its subtitle
  as the daily organ of fighters and producers. The word producer was
  already the expression of a mental trend. Fascism was not the nursling of
  a doctrine previously drafted at a desk; it
  was born of the need of action, and was action; it was not a party but,
in the first two years, an anti-party and a movement. The name I gave the organization fixed its character.</p>
<p>
Yet
if anyone cares to reread the now crumpled sheets of
those days giving an account of the meeting at which the
Italian Fasci
di combattimento were
founded, he will find not a doctrine
but a series of pointers, forecasts, hints which,
when freed from the inevitable matrix of contingencies,
were to develop in a few years time into a series of
doctrinal positions entitling Fascism to rank as a political doctrine
differing from all others, past or present.</p>
<p>
“If
the bourgeoisie - I then said -
believe that they have found in us
their lightening-conductors, they arc mistaken. We must go towards the people...
We wish the working classes to accustom
themselves to the responsibilities of management
so that they may realize that it is no easy matter
to run a business... We will fight both technical and spiritual rear-guirdism...
Now that the succession of the re­gime is
open we must not be fainthearted. We
must rush forward; if the present
regime is to be superseded we must take
its place. The right of succession is ours, for we urged the
country to enter the war and we led it to victory... The
existing forms of political representation cannot satisfy us;
we want direst representation of the several interests... It may be
objected that this program implies a return to the
guilds (corporazioni).
No matter!.
I  therefore hope this assembly
will accept the economic claims advanced by national
syndicalism …</p>
<p>
Is
it not strange that from the very first day, at Piazza San Sepolcro, the word 
&quot;guild&quot; (corporazione)
was pronounced,
a word which, as the Revolution developed, was to
express one of the basic legislative and social creations of the regime?</p>
<p>
The years preceding the march on Rome cover a period during which the
need of action forbade delay and careful doctrinal elaborations. Fighting was
going on in the towns and villages. There
were discussions but... there was some­thing
more sacred and more important... death... Fascists knew how to die. A
doctrine - fully elaborated, divided up
into chapters and paragraphs with annotations, may have been
lacking, but it was replaced by something far more
decisive,
- by a faith. All
the same, if with the help of books, articles, resolutions passed at
congresses, major and minor
speeches, anyone should care to revive the memory of
those days, he will find, provided he knows how to seek and
select, that the doctrinal foundations were laid while the battle was still
raging. Indeed, it was during those years
that Fascist thought armed, refined itself, and proceeded
ahead with its organization. The
problems of the individual and the State; the problems of authority and liberty;
political, social, and more especially national problems were discussed;
the conflict with liberal, democratic, socialistic,
Masonic doctrines and with those of the Partito Popolare,
was carried on at the same time
as the punitive expeditions. Nevertheless,
the lack of a formal system was used
by disingenuous adversaries as an argument for proclaiming
Fascism incapable of elaborating a doctrine at the very time when that
doctrine was being formulated - no matter
how tumultuously, - first, as is the
case with all new ideas, in the guise
of violent dogmatic negations; then in
the more positive guise of constructive theories, subsequently
incorporated, in 1926, 1927, and
1928, in the laws and institutions of
the regime.</p>
<p>
Fascism
is now clearly defined not only as a regime but as a doctrine. This
means that Fascism, exercising its critical
faculties on itself and on others, has studied from its
own special standpoint and judged by its own standards all the problems
affecting the material and intellectual interests
now causing such grave anxiety to the nations of the world,
and is ready to deal with them by its own policies.
<h3>Rejection of pacifism</h3>
<p>First
  of all, as regards the future development of mankind, and
  quite apart from all present political considerations. Fascism
  does not, generally speaking, believe in the
  possibility or utility of perpetual peace. It
  therefore discards pacifism as a
  cloak for cowardly supine renunciation in contradistinction to self-sacrifice.
  War alone keys up
  all human energies to their maximum tension and sets the seal of nobility
  on those peoples who have the courage to
  face it. All other tests are
  substitutes which never place a man
  face to face with himself before the alternative of life or death. Therefore
  all doctrines which postulate peace at
  all costs are incompatible with Fascism. Equally
  foreign to the spirit of Fascism, even if accepted as useful in meeting special
  political situations -- are all internationalistic
  or League superstructures which, as history
  shows, crumble to the ground whenever the heart of nations is deeply
  stirred by sentimental, idealistic or
  practical considerations. Fascism carries
  this anti-pacifistic attitude into the life of the individual.
  &quot; I don't care a damn „
  (me ne frego) - the
  proud motto of the fighting squads scrawled
  by a wounded man on his bandages, is not
  only an act of philosophic stoicism,
  it sums up a doctrine which is not merely political: it is evidence of a
  fighting spirit which accepts all risks.
  It signifies new style of Italian
  life. The Fascist accepts
  and loves life; he rejects and despises suicide as cowardly.
  Life as he understands it means duty, elevation, conquest;
  life must be lofty and full, it must be lived for oneself but above all
  for others, both near bye and far off, present and future.</p>
<p>
  The
  population policy of the regime is the consequence of
  these premises. The Fascist loves his
  neighbor, but the word
  neighbor does not stand for some vague
  and unseizable
  conception. Love of one's neighbor does not exclude necessary educational
  severity; still less does it exclude differentiation and rank. Fascism
  will have nothing to do with
  universal embraces; as a member of the community of
  nations it looks other peoples straight in the eyes; it is vigilant
  and on its guard; it follows others in all their manifestations
  and notes any changes in their interests; and it
  does not allow itself to be deceived
  by mutable and fallacious appearances.</p>
  <h3>Rejection of marxism</h3>
<p>Such
  a conception of life makes Fascism the resolute negation
  of the doctrine underlying so-called scientific and Marxian socialism,
  the doctrine of historic materialism which would
  explain the history of mankind in terms of the class struggle and by changes in
  the processes and instruments of
  production, to the exclusion of all else.
</p>
<p>
  That
  the vicissitudes of economic life - discoveries
  of raw materials, new technical
  processes, and scientific inventions - have
  their importance, no one denies; but that they suffice
  to explain human history to the exclusion of other factors is absurd.
  Fascism believes now and always in sanctity
  and heroism, that is to say in acts in which no economic motive - remote
  or immediate - is at work. Having
  denied historic materialism, which sees in men mere puppets
  on the surface of history, appearing and disappearing
  on the crest of the waves while in the depths the real directing
  forces move and work, Fascism also denies the immutable and irreparable
  character of the class struggle which is the natural outcome of this economic
  conception of history; above all it denies
  that the class struggle is the preponderating agent in social
  transformations. Having thus struck
  a blow at socialism in the two main points of its doctrine, all that remains of
  it is the sentimental aspiration, old as humanity itself-toward social relations
  in which the sufferings and sorrows of the humbler folk will be alleviated. But
  here again Fascism rejects the economic interpretation of felicity as something
  to be secured socialistically, almost automatically, at a given stage of
  economic evolution when all will be assured a maximum of material comfort. Fascism denies the
  materialistic conception of happiness as a possibility, and abandons it to the
  economists of the mid-eighteenth century. This means that Fascism denies the
  equation: well-being = happiness, which sees in men mere animals, content when
  they can feed and fatten, thus reducing them to a vegetative existence pure and
  simple.</p>
  <h3>Rejection of parliamentary democracy as a sham and a fraud</h3>
<p>After
  socialism, Fascism trains its guns on the whole 
  block of democratic ideologies, and rejects both their premises
  and their practical applications and implements. Fascism
  denies that numbers, as such, can be the determining factor in human
  society; it denies the right of numbers to govern
  by means of periodical consultations; it asserts the irremediable and
  fertile and beneficent inequality of men who cannot
  be leveled by any such mechanical and extrinsic device
  as universal suffrage. Democratic regimes may be described
  as those under which the people are, from time to
  time, deluded into the belief that they exercise sovereignty, while
  all the time real sovereignty resides in and is exercised
  by other and sometimes irresponsible and secret forces. Democracy
  is a kingless regime infested by many kings who are sometimes more
  exclusive, tyrannical, and destructive than
  one, even if he be a tyrant. This explains why Fascism
  - although, for contingent reasons,
  it was republican in tendency prior to 1922 - abandoned that stand before
  the March on Rome, convinced that the form of government
  is no longer a matter of preeminent importance, and
  because the study of past and present monarchies and past
  and present republics shows that neither monarchy nor republic
  can be judged sub specie aeternitatis,
  but that each stands for a form
  of government expressing the political evolution,
  the history, the traditions, and the psychology of a
  given country.</p>
<p>
  Fascism
  has outgrown the dilemma: monarchy v. republic, over which democratic
  regimes too long dallied, attributing all
  insufficiencies to the former and proning the latter
  as a regime of perfection, whereas experience teaches that
  some republics are inherently reactionary and absolutist
  while some monarchies accept the most daring political and social
  experiments.</p>
<p>
  In
  one of his philosophic Meditations Renan - who
  had prefascist intuitions remarks, 
  &quot;Reason
  and science are the products of mankind, but it
  is chimerical to seek reason directly for the people and through
  the people. It is not essential to the existence of reason
  that all should be familiar with it; and even if all had
  to be initiated, this could not be achieved through democracy which seems fated
  to lead to the extinction of all arduous
  forms of culture and all highest forms of learning. The
  maxim that society exists only for the well-being
  and freedom of the individuals
  composing it does not seem to be in conformity with nature's plans, which
  care only for the
  species and seem ready to sacrifice the individual. It
  is much to be feared that the last
  word of democracy thus understood (and let me hasten to add that it is
  susceptible of a different
  interpretation) would be a form of society in which
  a degenerate mass would have no thought beyond that
  of enjoying the ignoble pleasures of the vulgar.&quot;</p>
  <h3>Rejection of egalitarianism</h3>
<p>In rejecting democracy, Fascism
  rejects the absurd conventional lie
  of political equalitarianism, the habit of collective irresponsibility, the myth
  of felicity and indefinite progress.</p>
<h3>Definition of fascism as real democracy</h3>
<p>But if democracy be understood as meaning
a regime in which the masses are not driven back to the
margin of the State, and then the writer of these pages has
already defined Fascism as an organized, centralized, authoritarian
democracy.</p>
<h3>Rejection of economic liberalism - admiration of bismarck</h3>
<p>Fascism
  is definitely and absolutely opposed to the doctrines
  of liberalism, both in the political and the economic sphere. The
  importance of liberalism in the XIXth century
  should not be exaggerated for present
  day
  polemical purposes, nor should we
  make of one of the many doctrines
  which flourished in that century a
  religion for mankind for the present
  and for all time to come. Liberalism
  really flourished for fifteen years only. It
  arose in 1830 as a reaction to the
  Holy Alliance which tried to force Europe
  to recede further back than 1789; it
  touched its zenith in 1848 when even Pius IXth was a
  liberal. Its decline
  began immediately after that year. If
  1848 was a year of light and poetry,
  1849 was a year of darkness and tragedy.
  The 
  Roman 
  Republic
  was killed by a sister republic,
  that of 
  France. In
  that same year Marx, in his famous Communist
  Manifesto, launched the gospel of socialism.</p>
<p>
  In
  1851
  Napoleon III made his illiberal coup d'etat
  and ruled 
  France  until 1870 when he was turned out by a popular
  rising following one of the severest military defeats known
  to history. The victor was Bismarck
  who never even knew the whereabouts
  of liberalism and its prophets. It
  is symptomatic that throughout the XIXth century the
  religion of liberalism was completely unknown to so highly civilized
  a people as the Germans but for one parenthesis which
  has been described as the “ridiculous
  parliament of Frankfort &quot;
  which lasted just one season. 
  Germany attained her
  national unity outside liberalism and in opposition to liberalism,
  a doctrine which seems foreign to the German temperament, essentially
  monarchical, whereas liberalism is the
  historic and logical anteroom to anarchy. The
  three stages in the making of German
  unity were the three wars of 1864,
  1866, and 1870, led by such &quot;liberals&quot;
  as Moltke
  and Bismarck. And
  in the upbuilding of Italian unity liberalism
  played a very minor part when compared to the contribution
  made by Mazzini and Garibaldi who were not liberals.
  But for the intervention of the illiberal
  Napoleon III we should not have had
  Lombardy, and without that of the
  illiberal Bismarck at Sadowa and at Sedan very probably
  we should not have had Venetia in 1866 and in
  1870 we should not have entered Rome. The
  years going from 1870 to 1915 cover a
  period which marked, even in the
  opinion of the high priests of the new creed, the
  twilight of their religion, attacked by decadentism
  in literature and by activism in practice. Activism:
  that is to say nationalism,
  futurism, fascism.</p>
<p>The
liberal century, after piling up innumerable Gordian Knots,
tried to cut them with the sword of the world war. Never
has any religion claimed so cruel a sacrifice. Were
the Gods of liberalism thirsting for
blood?</p>
<p>Now
  liberalism is preparing to close the doors of its temples,
  deserted by the peoples who feel that the agnosticism
  it professed in the sphere of economics and the indifferentism
  of which it has given proof in the sphere of politics
  and morals, would lead the world to ruin in the future
  as they have done in the past.
</p>
<p>
  This
  explains why all the political experiments of our day
  are anti-liberal, and it is supremely ridiculous to endeavor on
  this account to put them outside the pale of history, as
  though history were a preserve set aside for liberalism and its
  adepts; as though liberalism were
  the last word in civilization beyond which no one can go.</p>
  <h3>The fascist totalitarian vision of the future</h3>
<p>
The
Fascist negation of socialism, democracy, liberalism, should
not, however, be interpreted as implying a desire to drive the world backwards
to positions occupied prior to 1789,
a year commonly referred to as that which opened
the demo-liberal century. History
does not travel backwards. The
Fascist doctrine has not taken De Maistre as
its prophet. Monarchical absolutism
is of the past, and so is ecclesiolatry. Dead
and done for are feudal privileges and
the division of society into closed, uncommunicating
castes. Neither has the Fascist
conception of authority anything in
common with that of a police ridden
State.</p>
<p>
A
party governing a nation “totalitarianly&quot;
is a new departure
in history. There
are no points of reference nor of comparison. From
beneath the ruins of liberal, socialist,
and democratic doctrines, Fascism extracts those elements
which are still vital. It preserves what may be described
as &quot;the acquired facts&quot; of history;
it rejects all else.
That is to say, it rejects the idea of a doctrine suited to
all times and to all people. Granted that the XIXth century
was the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy, this
does not mean that the XXth century must also be the
century of socialism, liberalism,
democracy. Political doctrines
pass; nations
remain. We are free to believe that this
is the century of authority, a century tending to the &quot;
right &quot;, a
Fascist century. If the XIXth century was the
century of the individual (liberalism implies individualism)
we are free to believe that this is the &quot;collective&quot;
century, and therefore the century of
the State. It is quite logical for a
new doctrine to make use of the still vital
elements of other doctrines. No doctrine was ever born quite new and bright and
unheard
of. No doctrine can boast absolute
originality. It is always connected, it only
historically, with those which preceded it and those which will follow
it. Thus the scientific socialism of Marx links
up to the utopian socialism of the Fouriers, the Owens,
the Saint-Simons ; thus
the liberalism of the XIXth
century traces its origin back to the illuministic movement
of the XVIIIth, and the doctrines of democracy
to those of the Encyclopaedists. All doctrines aim
at directing the activities of men
towards a given objective; but
these activities in their turn react on the doctrine, modifying and
adjusting it to new needs, or outstripping it. A doctrine must therefore be a
vital act and not a verbal display. Hence
the pragmatic strain in Fascism, it’s will to power, its will to live, its
attitude toward violence, and its value.</p>
<h3>The absolute primacy of the state</h3>
<p>The keystone of the Fascist
  doctrine is its conception of the State, of its essence, its functions, and its
  aims. For Fascism the State is absolute,
  individuals and groups relative. Individuals
  and groups are admissible in so far as they
  come within the State. Instead of directing the game and
  guiding the material and moral progress of the community,
  the liberal State restricts its activities to recording results. The 
  Fascist State
 is wide awake and has a will of its own. For
this reason it can be described as &quot;
ethical &quot;.</p>
<p>
At
the first quinquennial assembly of the regime, in
1929, I said “The
Fascist State is not a night watchman,
solicitous only of the personal
safety of the citizens; not is it organized exclusively
for the purpose of guarantying a certain degree of
material prosperity and relatively peaceful conditions of life,
a board of directors would do as much. Neither is it exclusively
political, divorced from practical realities and holding
itself aloof from the multifarious activities of the citizens
and the nation. The State, as conceived and realized by
Fascism, is a spiritual and ethical entity for securing the political,
juridical, and economic organization of the nation, an
organization which in its origin and growth is a manifestation of the spirit. The
State guarantees the internal and
external safety of the country, but it also safeguards and
transmits the spirit of the people, elaborated down the ages in its language,
its customs, its faith. The State is
not only the present; it is also the
past and above all the future. Transcending the individual's brief spell
of life, the State stands for the immanent
conscience of the nation. The forms in which it finds
expression change, but the need for it
remains. The State educates
the citizens to civism, makes them aware of their mission, urges them to unity;
its justice harmonizes their divergent interests; it transmits
to future generations the conquests of the mind in
the fields of science, art, law, human solidarity; it leads men up from
primitive tribal life to that highest manifestation
of human power, imperial rule. </p>
<p>The State hands down to future generations
  the memory of those who laid down their
  lives to ensure its safety or to obey its laws; it
  sets up as examples and records for future ages the names of
  the captains who enlarged its territory and of the men of genius who have
  made it famous. Whenever respect for the
  State declines and the disintegrating and centrifugal tendencies
  of individuals and groups prevail, nations are headed
  for decay&quot;. Since
  1929 economic and political development have everywhere emphasized these truths.
  The importance of the State is
  rapidly growing. The so-called crisis can only be settled
  by State action and within the orbit of the State. Where
  are the shades of the Jules Simons who, in the early
  days of liberalism proclaimed that the &quot;State should endeavor
  to render itself useless and prepare to hand in its
  resignation &quot;? Or
  of the MacCullochs who, in the second
  half of last century, urged that the State should desist from governing too
  much? And what of the English Bentham
  who considered that all industry asked of government
  was to be left alone, and of the German Humbolt who
  expressed the opinion that the best government was a
  lazy &quot; one?
  What would they say now to the unceasing, inevitable,
  and urgently requested interventions of government
  in business? It is true that the second generation of economists was less
  uncompromising in this respect than the first,
  and that even Adam Smith left the door ajar -
  however
  cautiously - for government
  intervention in business.</p>
<p>
  If liberalism spells individualism, Fascism spells government.
</p>
<p>The 
  Fascist State
 is, however, a unique and original creation.
It is not reactionary but revolutionary, for 
it anticipates the solution of
certain universal problems which have
been raised elsewhere, in the political field by the splitting
up
of parties, the usurpation of power by parliaments,
the irresponsibility of assemblies; in the economic field
by the increasingly numerous and important functions discharged
by trade unions
and trade associations with their disputes
and ententes, affecting both capital and labor; in the ethical field by the need
felt for order, discipline, obedience to the moral dictates of patriotism.</p>
<p>
Fascism desires the State to
be strong and organic, based on broad foundations of popular support. The
Fascist State lays claim to rule in the
economic field no less than in others;
it makes its action felt throughout the length and breadth
of the country by means of its corporative, social, and
educational institutions, and all the political, economic, and spiritual
forces of the nation, organized in their res­pective
associations, circulate within the State. A State based on millions
of individuals who recognize its authority,
feel its action, and are ready to serve its ends is not the tyrannical
state of a mediaeval lordling. It has nothing in
common with the despotic States existing prior to
or subsequent to 1789. </p>
<p>Far from crushing the individual, the
  Fascist State
 multiplies his energies, just as in a
regiment a soldier is not
diminished but multiplied by the number of his fellow soldiers. The Fascist State organizes the nation, but it leaves the individual
adequate elbow room. It has
curtailed useless or harmful liberties while preserving those which are
essential. In such matters the individual
cannot be the judge, but the State
only. The
Fascist </p>
<p>
State
is not indifferent to religious phenomena
in general nor does it maintain an attitude of indifference
to Roman Catholicism, the special, positive religion of Italians. The
State has not got a theology but it has a moral code. The
Fascist State sees in religion one of the deepest of spiritual
manifestations and for this reason it not
only respects religion but defends and protects it. The
FascistState
does not attempt, as did Robespierre at the
height of the revolutionary delirium of the Convention, to
set up a &quot;god” of its own; nor
does it vainly seek, as does
Bolshevism, to efface God from the soul of man. </p>
<p>Fascism
  respects the God of ascetics, saints, and heroes, and it also respects
  God as conceived by the ingenuous and primitive
  heart of the people, the God to whom their prayers
  are raised.
</p>
<p>
  The Fascist State expresses the will to exercise power and
  to command. Here the Roman tradition is
  embodied in a conception of strength. Imperial
  power, as understood by the Fascist
  doctrine, is not only territorial, or military, or commercial; it is also
  spiritual and ethical. An imperial nation,
  that is to say a nation a which directly or
  indirectly is a leader of others, can exist
  without the need of conquering a
  single square mile of territory. Fascism
  sees in the imperialistic spirit -- i.e.
  in the tendency of nations to
  expand - a manifestation of their vitality. In
  the opposite tendency, which would
  limit their interests to the home country, it sees a symptom of decadence. Peoples
  who rise or rearise
  are imperialistic; renunciation is characteristic of dying peoples. The
  Fascist doctrine is that best suited to the
  tendencies and feelings of a people which, like the Italian, after lying fallow
  during centuries of foreign servitude,
  are now reasserting itself in the world.</p>
<p>
  But imperialism implies discipline, the coordination of efforts,
  a deep sense of duty and a spirit of self-sacrifice. This explains many aspects
  of the practical activity of the regime, and the direction taken by many of the
  forces of the State, as also the
  severity which has to be exercised towards those who would oppose this
  spontaneous and inevitable movement of XXth century
  Italy by agitating outgrown ideologies of the XIXth
  century, ideologies rejected wherever great
  experiments in political and social transformations
  are being dared.</p>
<p>
  Never before have the peoples thirsted for authority, direction,
  order, as they do now. If each age has its
  doctrine, then innumerable symptoms
  indicate that the doctrine of our
  age is the Fascist. That it is vital
  is shown by the fact that it has
  aroused a faith; that this faith has conquered souls
  is shown by the fact that Fascism can point to its fallen
  heroes and its martyrs.</p>
<p>
  Fascism
  has now acquired throughout the world that universally which belongs to
  all doctrines which by achieving
  self-expression represent a moment in the history of human
  thought.</p>
<h2>Appendix footnotes</h2>
<h3>1. Philosophic conception</h3>
<p id="1">(1)
  If Fascism does not wish to die or, worse
  still, commit suicide, it must now
  provide itself with a doctrine. Yet this shall not and must
  not be a robe of Nessus clinging to us for all
  eternity, for tomorrow is some thing
  mysterious and unforeseen. This doctrine shall be
  a norm to guide political and individual action in our daily life.</p>
<p>I
  who have I dictated this doctrine, am the first to realize that
  the modest tables of our laws and program the theoretical and
  practical guidance of Fascism
  should
  be revised, corrected, enlarged,
  developed, because already in parts they have suffered injury at
  the hand of time. I believe the essence and fundamentals of the doctrine
  are still to be found in the postulates which throughout two years have acted as
  a call to arms for the recruits of Italian Fascism. However,
  in taking those first fundamental assumptions for a starting point,
  we must proceed to carry our program into a vaster field. Italian
  Fascists, one and all, should cooperate in this task, one of vital
  importance to Fascism, and more especially those who belong to regions
  where with
  and without agreement peaceful
  coexistence has been achieved between
  two antagonistic movements.</p>
<p>The
  word I am about to use is a great one, but indeed I do wish that during the two
  months which are still to elapse before our National
  Assembly meets, the philosophy of Fascism could be created. 
Milan
 is already contributing with the first
Fascist school of propaganda. It is not merely a question of gathering elements for a program, to
  be used as a solid foundation for the constitution of a party which must
  inevitably arise from the Fascist movement; it is also a question of
  denying the silly tale that Fascism is all made up of violent men. In
  point of fact among Fascists there are many men who belong to the
  restless but meditative class.
</p>
<p>The
  new course taken by Fascist activity will in no way diminish the fighting
  spirit typical of Fascism. To furnish the
  mind with doctrines and creeds does not mean to disarm, rather it
  signifies to strengthen our power of
  action, and make us ever more conscious of our work. Soldiers
  who fight fully conscious of the cause make the best of warriors. Fascism
  takes for its own the twofold device of Mazzini : Thought
  and Action u.
  (Letter to Michele Bianchi, written
  on August 27, 1921, for the opening
  of the School of Fascist Culture and Propaganda in Milan, in Messaggi
  e Proclami, Milano,
  Libreria d'Italia, 1929,
  P. 39).</p>
<p>
  Fascists
  must be placed in contact with one another; their activity must
  be an activity of doctrine, an activity of the spirit and of thought. Had
  our adversaries been present at our meeting, they would have been
  convinced that Fascism is not only action, but thought as well (Speech
  before the National Council of the Fascist Party, August 8, 1924,
  in La Nuova
  Politica dell'Italia, Milano,
  Alpes, 1928, p. 267).</p>
<p id="2">(2)
  Today I hold that Fascism as an idea, a doctrine, a realization,
  is universal; it is Italian in its particular institutions, but it is universal
  in the spirit, nor could it be otherwise. The spirit is universal by
  reason of its nature. Therefore anyone may
  foresee a Fascist Europe.
  Drawing inspiration for her institutions
  from the doctrine and practice of Fascism; Europe
  , in other words, giving a Fascist turn to the
  solution of problems which beset the modern State, the 
  Twentieth Century State which is very different from the States existing before 1789,
  and the States formed immediately after. Today
  Fascism fills universal requirements;
  Fascism solves the threefold problem of relations between State and
  individual, between State and associations, between
  associations and organized associations. (Message for the
  year 1 October 27, 1930, in Discorsi
  del 1930, Milano, Alpes,
  1931, p. 211).</p>
<h3>2. Spiritualized conception</h3>
<p id="3">(3)
  This political process is flanked by a philosophic process. If it be true
  that matter was on the altars for one century, today it
  is the spirit which takes its place. All
  manifestations peculiar to the democratic
  spirit are consequently repudiated: easygoingness,
  improvisation, the lack of a personal
  sense of responsibility, the exaltation of
  numbers and of that mysterious divinity called n The
  People a. All creations
  of the spirit starting with
  that religious are
  coming to the fore, and nobody dare keep up the attitude of
  anticlericalism which, for several decades,
  was a favorite with Democracy in the Western world.
  By saying that God is returning, we mean that spiritual values are
  returning. (Da the parte
  va it mondo, in Tempi della
  Rivoluzione Fascista, 
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930, p. 34).</p>
<p>There
  is a field reserved more to meditation upon the supreme ends
  of life than to a research of these ends. Consequently
  science starts from experience, but breaks out fatally into philosophy and, in my
  opinion, philosophy alone can
  enlighten science and lead to the universal
  idea. (To the Congress of Science at 
    Bologna
  , October 31, 19,26,
  in Discorsidel
 1926.
Milano,
Alpes, 1927, p. 268).</p>
<p>In
  order to understand the Fascist movement one must first appreciate
  the underlying spiritual phenomenon in all its vastness and depth.
  The manifestations of the movement
  have been of a powerful and
  decisive nature, but one should go further. 
  In point of fact Italian Fascism has
  not only been a political revolt against weak and incapable governments
  who had allowed State authority to decay and were threatening
  to arrest the progress of the country, but also a spiritual revolt
  against old ideas which had corrupted the sacred principles of religion,
  of faith, of country. Fascism, therefore, has been a revolt of the
  people. (Message to the British people; January 5, 1924, in Messaggi
  e Proclami, Milano,
Libreria d' Italia, 1929, p. 107).</p>
<h3>3. Positive conception of life as a struggle</h3>
<p id="4">(4)
  Struggle is at the origin of all things, for life is full of contrasts:
  there is love and hatred, white and black, day and night, good and evil;
  and until these contrasts achieve balance, struggle fatefully remains
  at the root of human nature. However,
  it is good for it to be so. Today
  we can indulge in wars, economic battles, conflicts of ideas,
  but if a day came to pass when struggle ceased to exist, that day
  would be tinged with melancholy; it
  would be a day of ruin, the day of
  ending. But thaver discloses
  new horizons. By attempting to restore calm, peace, tranquility, or.
  A would be fighting the tendencies of the present period of dynamism. 
  Ore
  must be prepared for other struggles and
  for other surprises. Peace will only
  come when people surrender to a Christian dream of universal brotherhood, when
  they can hold out hands across the ocean and over the mountains. Personally
  I do not believe very much in these
  idealisms, but I do not exclude them for I exclude nothing. (At the
  Politeama Rossetti, Trieste, September
20, 1920
in
Discorsi
Politici, Milano,
Stab. Tipografico del
 « Popolo d'
Italia » ,
1921, p. 107).</p>
<p id="5">(5)
For me the honor of nations consists in the contribution they have
severally made to human civilization. (E.
Ludwig, Talks with
Mussolini, London, Allen and Unwin, 1932, p. 199)</p>
<h3>4. Ethical conception</h3>
<p>I
called the organization Fasci Italiani
Di Combatimento. This hard metallic name
compromised the whole program of Fascism as I dreamed it. Comrades,
this is still our program: fight. Life for
the Fascist is a continuous, ceaseless fight, which we accept
with ease, with great courage, with the necessary intrepidity. (On the VIIth anniversary of the Foundation of the Fasci,
March 28,
1926, in Discorsi
del 1926, Milano,
Alpes, 7, p.98 You touch the core of Fascist philosophy. When recently a Finnish philosopher
asked me to expound to him the significance of Fascism in
one sentence, I wrote in German: ((We are against the “easy life&quot;!
(E. Ludwig: Talks
with Mussolini, London, Allen
and Unwin, 1932,
p. 190).
</p>
<h3>5.Religious conception</h3>
<p id="7">(7)
If Fascism were not a creed, how could it endow its followers with
courage and stoicism only a creed
which has soared to the heights of religion can inspire such words as
passed the lips, now lifeless alas, of
Federico Florio. (Legami
di Sangue, 
in
Diuturna,
Milano, Alpes, 1930,
p. 256).</p>
<h3>6. Historical and realistic conception</h3>
<p id="8">(8)
Tradition certainly is one of the greatest spiritual forces of a people,
inasmuch as it is
a successive and constant creation of their soul. (Breve
Preludio, 
in
Tempi della
Rivoluzione Fascista, Milano,
Alpes, 1930,
p. 13)</p>
<p id="9">(9)
  Our temperament leads us to appraise
  the concrete aspect of problems,
  rather than their ideological or mystical sublimation. Therefore
  we easily regain our balance. (Aspetti
  del Dramma, in
  Diuturna,
  Milano, Alpes,
  1930, p. 86).</p>
<p>
  Our
  battle is an ungrateful one, yet it is a beautiful battle since it compels
  us to count only upon our own forces. Revealed truths we have torn to shreds,
  dogmas we have spat upon, we have rejected all theories of paradise, we have
  baffled charlatans white, red, black charlatans
  who placed miraculous drugs on the market to give a happiness
  n to mankind. We
  do not believe in program, in plans, in saints or apostles, above all we
  believe not in happiness, in salvation, in the Promised
  Land. (Diuturna,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930, p. 223).</p>
<p>
  We do not
  believe in a single solution, be it economical, political or moral, a linear
  solution of the problems of life, because of illustrious
  choristers from all the sacristies
  life
  is not linear and can never be
  reduced to a segment traced by primordial needs. (Navigare
  necesse, in
  Diuturna,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930,
  p. 233).</p>
<p id="10">(10) We are not and do not wish to be motionless mummies, with faces
  perpetually turned towards the same horizon, nor do we wish to shut
  ourselves up within the narrow hedges of subversive bigotry, where
  formulas, like prayers of a professed religion, are muttered mechanically.
  We are men, living men, who wish to give our contribution,
  however 'modest, to the creation of history. (Audacia,
  in Diu­
  turna,
  Milano, Alpes, 1930, p.233)</p>
<p>
  We
  uphold moral and traditional values which Socialism neglects or despises; but,
  above all, Fascism has a horror of anything implying an arbitrary mortgage on
  the mysterious future. (Dopo
  due anni, in Diuturna,
  Milano, Alpes, 1930, p. 242).</p>
<p>
  In
  spite of the theories of conservation and renovation, of tradition and
  progress expounded by the right and the left, we do not cling desperately
  to the past as to a last board of salvation: yet we do not dash
  headlong into the seductive mists of the future. (Breve
  preludio, in
  Diuturna,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930, p. 14) Negation,
  eternal immobility, mean damnation. I am all for motion. I
  am, one who marches on (E.
  Ludwig, Talks with Mussolini, Lot
  Jon, Allen and Unwin, 1932,
p. 203).</p>
<h3>7. The individual and liberty</h3>
<p id="11">(11)
  We were the first to state, in the face of demo liberal individualism,
  that the individual exists only in so far as he is within the State
  and subjected to the requirements of the state and that, as civilization
  assumes aspects which grow more and more complicated, individual freedom becomes
  more and more restricted. (To the General staff
  Conference of Fascism, in Discorsi
  del 1929, 
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930, p.
  280).</p>
<p>
The
sense of the state grows within the consciousness of Italians, for they feel
that the state alone is the irreplaceable safeguard of their unit
and independence; that the state alone represents continuity into the
future of their stock and their history. (Message on the VIIth
all anniversary, October 25, 1929, Discorsi
del 1929, Milano,
Alpes, 1930,
p. 300).</p>
<p>If,
  in the course of the past eight years, we have made such astounding
  progress, you may well think suppose and foresee that in the
  course of the next fifty or eighty years the onward trend of 
  Italy, of
  this 
  Italy
  we feel to be so powerful, so full of
  vital fluid, will really be
  grandiose. It will be so especially
  if concord lasts among citizens, if
  the State continues to be sole arbitrator in political and social
  conflicts, if all remains within the state and nothing outside the
  State, because it is impossible to conceive any individual existing outside
  the State unless he be a savage whose home is in the solitude of she
  sandy desert. (Speech
  before the Senate, May 12, 1928, in Discorsi
  del 1928, Milano,
  Alpes, 1929, p.
109).</p>
<p>Fascism
  has restored to the State its sovereign functions by claiming its
  absolute ethical meaning, against the egotism of classes and categories;
  to the Government of the state, which was reduced to a mere
  instrument of electoral assemblies, it has restored dignity, as representing
  the personality of the state and its power of Empire. It has
  rescued State administration from the weight of factions and party interests (To
  the council of state, December 22, 1928, in Discorsi
  Del 1928, Milano, Alpes,
1929 p.328).</p>
<p id="12">(12)
  Let no one think of denying the
  moral character of Fascism. For
  I should be ashamed to speak from this tribune if I did not feel that
  I represent the moral and spiritual powers of the state.
  What would
  the state be if it did not possess a spirit of its own, and a morality
  of its own, which lend power to the laws in virtue of which the
  state is obeyed by its citizens?</p>
<p>
  The
  Fascist state claims its ethical character: it is Catholic but
  above all it is Fascist, in fact it is exclusively and essentially Fascist.
  Catholicism completes Fascism, and this we openly declare, but let no one
  think they can turn the tables on us, under cover of metaphysics or philosophy. (To
  the Chamber of Deputies, May 13, 1929,
  in Discorsi
  del 1929, Milano,
  Alpes, 1930,
  p. 182).</p>
<p>
  A
  State which is fully aware of its mission and represents a people which
  are marching on; a state which necessarily transforms the
  people even in their physical aspect.
  In order to be something more
  than a mere administrator, the State must utter great words, expound
  great ideas and place great problems before this people (Di­ scorsi
  del 1929, Milano,
  Alpes, 1930,
  p. 183).</p>
  <p id="13">
  (13)
  The concept of freedom is not
  absolute because nothing is ever absolute
  in life. Freedom is not a right, it is a duty. It
  is not a gift, it is a conquest; it
  is not equality, it is a privilege. The
  concept of freedom changes with the
  passing of time. There is a freedom
  in times of peace which is not the freedom of times of war. There
  is a freedom in times of prosperity which is not a freedom to be
  allowed in times of poverty. (Fifth anniversary of the foundation of
  the Fasci
  di Combattimento, March 24,
  1924, in La
  nuova politica dell'Italia,
  vol. III, Milano,
  Alpes, 1925, p.
  30).</p>
  <p>
  In
  our state the individual is not deprived of freedom. In
  fact, he has greater liberty than an
  isolated man, because the state protects him
  and he is part of the State. Isolated man is without defence.
  (E. Ludwig, Talks
  with Mussolini, London, Allen
  and Unwin, 1932, p. 129).</p>
  <p id="14">
  (14)
  Today we may tell the world of the creation of the powerful united
  State of Italy, ranging from the Alps to Sicily; this State is expressed
  by a well-organized, centralized, unitarian democracy, where people
  circulate at case.  Indeed, gentlemen, you admit the
  people into the citadel of the State and the people will defend it, if
  you close them out, the people will assault it. (speech
  before the Chamber of Deputies, 
  May 26, 1927, in Discorsi del 1927, Milano,
  Alpes, 1928, p. 159).</p>
  <p>
  In the Fascist regime the unity of classes, the political, social and
  coral
  unity of the Italian people is realized within the state, and only within
  the Fascist state. (speech before the Chamber of
Deputies, </p>
<p>December 9, 1928, in Discorsi del 1928, Milano,
  Alpes, 1929, p. 333).</p>
<h3>8. Conception of a corporative state</h3>
<p id="15">(15)
  We have created the united state of Italy 
  remember that since
  the Empire Italy had not been a united state.
  Here I wish to reaffirm
  solemnly our doctrine of the State. Here I
  wish to reaffirm with no weaker energy, the formula I expounded at the scala
  in Milan everything in the state,
  nothing against the State, nothing outside the
  state. (speech
  before the Chamber of Deputies, May 26, 1927, Discorsi del
  1927,
  Milano, Alpes,
  1928, p. 157).</p>
<p id="16">
  (16)
  We are, in other words, a state which controls all forces acting
  in nature. We control political
  forces, we control moral forces we
  control economic forces, therefore we are a full-blown Corporative
  state. We stand for a new principle
  in the world, we stand for sheer,
  categorical, definitive antithesis to the world of democracy, plutocracy,
  free-masonry, to the world which still abides by the fundamental
  principles laid down in 1789. (Speech
  before the new National Directory
  of the Party, April 7, 1926, in Discorsi
  del 1926,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1927, p. 120).</p>
<p>
  The
  Ministry of Corporations is not a bureaucratic organ, nor does
  it wish to exercise the functions of syndical
  organizations which are necessarily
  independent, since they aim at organizing, selecting and improving the
  members of syndicates. The Ministry of
  Corporations is an institution in virtue of which, in the centre and
  outside, integral corporation
  becomes an accomplished fact, where balance is achieved between interests and
  forces of the economic world. Such a
  glance is only possible within the sphere
  of the state, because the state alone
  transcends the contrasting interests of groups and individuals, in view of
  co-coordinating them to achieve higher aims. The achievement
  of these aims is speeded up by the fact that all economic organizations,
  acknowledged, safeguarded and supported by the Corporative
  State, exist within the orbit of Fascism; in other terms they accept
  the conception of Fascism in theory and in practice. (speech
  at the opening of the Ministry of
  Corporations, July 31, 1926, in Di­scorsi
  del 1926, Milano,
  Alpes, 1927, p. 250).</p>
<p>
  We
  have constituted a Corporative and Fascist state, the state of national
  society, a State which concentrates, controls, harmonizes and tempers
  the interests of all social classes, which are thereby protected in
  equal measure. Whereas, during the years of demo-liberal regime, labour
  looked with diffidence upon the state, was, in fact, outside the
  State and against the state, and considered the state an enemy of
  every day and every hour, there is not one working Italian today who
  does not seek a place in his Corporation or federation, who does
  not wish to be a living atom of that great, immense, living organization
  which is the national Corporate State of Fascism. (On the
  Fourth Anniversary of the March on Rome, October 28, 1926, in Discorsi
  del 1926,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1927, p. 340).</p>
<h3>9. Democracy</h3>
<p id="17">(17)
  The war was revolutionary, in the sense
  that
  with
  streams of blood it did away with the century of Democracy, the century
  of number, the century of majorities and of quantities. (Da che parte va il Mondo,
  in Tempi della
  Rivoluzione Fascista, Milano,
  Alpes, 1930, p. 37)</p>
<p id="18">
(18)
  Cf. note 13.</p>
<p id="19">
(19)
  Race: it is a feeling and not a reality; 95 %, a feeling. (E.
  Ludwig, Talks with Mussolini, London, Allen and Unwin,
  1932, p. 75).</p>
<h3>10. Conception of the state</h3>
<p id="20">(20)
  A nation exists inasmuch as it is a
  people. A people rise inasmuch
  as they are numerous, hard working
  and well regulated.
  Power is the outcome of this
  threefold principle. (To the General Assembly
  of the Party, March lo, 1929, in
  Discorsi
  del 1929, Milano,
  Alpes,
  1930, p. 24).</p>
<p>
  Fascism does not deny the State; Fascism
  maintains that a civic society,
  national or imperial, cannot be conceived unless in the form of
  a State (Stab, anti-Slato,
  Fascismo,
  in Tempi
  della Rivoluzione Fa­scista,
  Milano,
  Alpes, 1930,
  p. 94).
  </p>
  <p>
  For us the Nation is mainly spirit
  and not only territory. There are
  States which owned immense territories and
  yet left no trace in the history of
  mankind. Neither is it a question
  of number, because there have been,
  in history, small, microscopic States, which left immortal,
  imperishable documents in art and philosophy.
  The greatness of a nation
  is the compound of all these virtues
  and conditions. A nation is great
  when the power of the spirit is translated into reality. (Speech
  at Naples, October 24, 1922, in Discorsi della
  Rivoluzione, Milano,
  Alpes, 1928, p. 103).
  We wish to unity the nation within the
  sovereign State, which is above everyone rid
  can afford to be against everyone, since it represents
  the moral continuity of the nation in
  history. Without the State there is
  no nation. There are, merely. human
  aggregations. subject
  to all the disintegration's which history may
  inflict upon them. (Speech
  before the National Council of the Fascist Party, August 8, 1924,
  in La Nuova
  Politica dell'Italia,
  vol. III; Milano,
  Alpes, 1928, p.
  269).
</p>
<h3>11. Dynamic reality</h3>
<p id="21">
(21) I
  believe that if
  a people wish to live, they should develop a
  will to power, otherwise they vegetate, live miserably
  and become prey to a stronger people, in whom this will to
  power is developed to a higher degree. (Speech
  to the Senate, May 28, 1926).
</p>
<p id="22">
(22) It
  is Fascism which has refashioned the character of the Italians,
  removing impurity from our souls, tempering us to
  all sacrifices, restoring the true aspect of strength and beauty to
  our Italian face. (Speech delivered
  at 
    Pisa
,
May 25, 1926, in Discorsi 
del
 1926, Milano,
Alpes,
1927, 
p. 193).</p>
<p>
It is not out of place to illustrate
the intrinsic character and profound
significance of the Fascist Levy. It
is not merely a ceremony, but a very
important stage in the system of
education and integral preparation
of Italian men which the Fascist revolution
considers one of the fundamental
duties of the State: fundamental
indeed, for if the State does not
fulfill this duty or in any way accepts to place it
under discussion, the State
merely and simply forfeits its right to
exist. (Speech
before the Chamber of Deputies, May 28,
1928, in Discorsi
del 1928, Milano,
Alpes, 1929, p. 68).
</p>
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