Fascism is a philosophy that is characterized by radical authoritarian nationalism. It is described by harsh authority and dominance. The governing few are dictators and the people are not allowed to disagree with the government. In this political system, very few people control most of the national resources including commerce, power and finance. In communism, there is collective ownership of property and power amongst the people. In this case, there is no individual dominance and everything is shared equally among the citizens (Kallis, 2004). Both communist and fascist movements comprise of opposing ideologies but they represent repressive systems that have a single leader. Both fascist and communist systems originated from Europe and their popularity spread across the globe in the 20th century.
In the two systems, there is great theoretical divergence. In reality, the differences are very minimal. This is because across the world, there is no single system that embraces socialism that exists and exhibits the characteristics that are evident in theory (Thoma, 2007). The systems are often characterized with leaders with a lot of power or dominance by a small group of rulers. In most real life situations, the two systems are so identical and one cannot make a difference between the countries that have adopted the two systems. For instance, two countries like Nazi Germany and Soviet Union operated closely to fascist political structures and ideologies despite the fact Soviet Union strongly opposed the fascist state, Nazi Germany, which was presenting a strong competing force (Thoma, 2007).
In theory, the fascist system appears to pose more threat to the social and national structure as it embraces use of capitalism which is characterized by inequality and dictatorship. This leads to imperialism to the countries that use fascist ideologies (Stuart, 2000). The threat is further exaggerated by the fact that the citizens have to be completely submissive to the state. The difference in class is highly evident and it is under constant threat to widen the gap. This leads to a lot of polarization in most aspects in the nation. Although the traditional nature of communism can hardly be felt in reality, fascist systems pose more threat than communist systems.
- Kallis, A. (2004). Western Civilization. NY. Routledge.
- Stuart, J. (2000). The Principles of Political Economy. London: Penguin.
- Thoma, M. (2007). Social consequences of the Industrial Revolution. Economists View… Retrieved from http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2007/08/social-conseque.html
