Neofascism

The defeat of Donald Trump, and the widely anticipated defeat of Jair Bolsonaro, has led to a drop-off in commentary of the "Are we heading for Fascism?" sort, though the continued success of Narendra Modi remains a caution. Focusing on the latter, the Indian economist Prabhat Patnaik recently published an article in the Boston Review suggesting that the BJP's dominance in India represented a critical turn in neoliberalism that would persist regardless of electoral change: "As the old prop of trickle-down economics lost its credibility, a new prop was needed to sustain the neoliberal regime politically. The solution came in the form of an alliance between globally integrated corporate capital and local neofascist elements". I've never been happy with the casual use of the term Fascism, though I do think that the BJP comes close to the definition because of its focus on Hindu cultural hegemony (Hindutva) and vicious treatment of opponents. Like populism, the word is bandied about with little regard to its history. Patnaik does at least recognise the change over time, both in theory and practice, hence his version is "neo", but that raises the question: just what is new about it?

Before addressing his definition of neofascism (I'll use his spelling, rather than the more pedantic neo-Fascism), it's worth considering his working definition of neoliberalism: "The result today is a perverse regime defined by the free movement of capital, which moves relatively effortlessly across international borders, even as free movement of the people is ruthlessly controlled by a sharp increase in income inequality and a steady winnowing of democracy". The free movement of people as an economic factor has increased during the neoliberal period and its regulation has been administrative rather than economic or political. For all the talk of a border wall in the US, the mechanics of economic migration centre on amnesties for the undocumented, while the free movement of labour in the EU shows how the administrative is often in tension with the political. The idea that this is somehow controlled by changes in income inequality not only flies in the face of the evidence - East European migration to the UK grew in lock-step with inequality during the 00s - it doesn't make any sort of sense. This seems typical of Patnaik's approach: adding a rhetorical flourish that is so dubious it serves to distract from his substantive and inarguable point, namely that neoliberalism is chiefly characterised by the free movement of capital.

The idea that there has been a steady winnowing of democracy is also questionable. While there has obviously been a technocratic turn against popular representation during the neoliberal period, as outlined by Colin Crouch (Post-Democracy) and Peter Mair (Ruling the Void), and an increasing deference shown to corporate interests and epistocratic fancies (Dominic Cummings is very much a product of neoliberalism), "disillusion with" rather than "winnowing of" would be more acurate. Whatever else it was, and however much it was manipulated or misinterpreted, the UK's EU referendum in 2016 was clear proof of the health of democracy. Patnaik is more on the money with his observation that "No matter who comes to power, no matter what promises are made before elections, the same economic policies are followed ... The sovereignty of the people, in short, is replaced by the sovereignty of global finance and the domestic corporations integrated with it". But that is a critique of neoliberal hegemony and the failings of the politico-media caste, rather than a critique of democracy itself.

The centrepiece of Patnaik's argument, both as to the definition of neofascist neoliberalism and how it can be overturned, are two issues that he sees as interdependent: capital controls and welfare spending. "For evidence of the connection between neofascism and neoliberalism, we need look no further than the fact that no neofascist political formation has actually imposed controls over cross-border financial flows. Ultimately, it is only by implementing such controls—along with strong domestic welfare policies—that we can escape this alliance". But turning this around, what he appears to be saying is that the neo of neofascism is precisely its abandonment of capital controls and its under-investment in welfare, which implies that they were both distinguishing marks of classical Fascism. In fact, though Germany did impose limited capital controls in the 1930s, these predated the Nazis and remained largely in line with other economies (except for an increasing focus on the expropriation of Jewish emigrants after 1933). Similarly, most developed nations expanded welfare spending after World War One, a development clearly linked to the extension of the franchise in countries like the UK. 

Historians such as Adam Tooze (The Wages of Destruction) have shown how flimsy the claims to economic revolution under the Nazi regime were, in particular highlighting the continuing reliance on foreign currency and the way that social spending and consumption were squeezed to divert funds towards armaments. That said, there is no doubt that the German economy, like that of other Fascist regimes in the 1930s, was centrally planned. But then even the American economy was experiencing the central direction of the New Deal, while other liberal economies such as the UK and France were significantly increasing public investment at the same time and moving towards the direction of industry in preparation for war. However, while capital was given an expressly national set of goals under the Nazi regime, it was far more indulged than contemporary critics like Hayek would allow. For example, it was an outlier for the times in its pioneering of privatisation. The truth is that the interwar Fascist regimes were far more economically liberal, and the democracies far more centrally-planned, than both contemporary and subsequent propaganda acknowledged.

At this point, you might begin to wonder just how Fascist the neofascists really are, given that they are so tightly circumscribed by neoliberalism. A traditional way of conceptualising Fascism is as an anti-democratic agent of capital. Patnaik continues this Marxist tradition, noting that neofascism depends on "fringe elements [that] take center stage in periods of crisis only with the backing of corporate capital, which provides access to massive financial resources and control over the corporate-owned media and other means of opinion-making". But if we're applying the neofascist tag to Trump, then that picture doesn't reflect the US in 2016, when the bulk of corporate capital supported Hillary Clinton and the establishment media leant Democrat. Even in Brazil, Bolsonaro owed more to traditional extractive capital (notably agribusines and mining) and reactionary outlets than to corporate capital or mainstream media. It may be a more relevant model for India, but if so that may just reflect the relative political immaturity of Indian capital: essentially still in a nationalist phase similar to that which the US experienced in the late nineteenth century.

Patnaik's view of Fascism and its position within economic history becomes eccentric when he addresses imperialism: "Classical fascism emerged before capital had been globalized, in the sense that it more clearly bore the stamp of its national origin: it was engaged in intense inter-imperialist rivalry with capital from other advanced countries, a rivalry in which it enlisted the support of its own state". This implies that imperialism wasn't globalised capitalism, which is an unconventional view. Patnaik's "national origin" qualification also ignores just how much global capital was circulating outside the boundaries of formal empire in the nineteenth century, such as between the UK and South America. As part of his contrast, he further oversells the universality of neoliberalism: "Since globalized capital is intent on keeping the entire world open for its free movement, it discourages inter-imperialist rivalry and the fragmentation of the world into rival economic zones". Clearly, we still have a patchwork of economic zones, such as the EU and NAFTA, even if lip-service is paid to the near-moribund GATT, while US-China rivalry is essentially economic. In short, capital was globally mobile in the imperial era (particularly via London) and this predated Fascism. Today, world trade is organised around regional blocs in an often uneasy relationship with the actual and would-be hegemons.

The argument that classical Fascism and neoliberalism were antipathetic because of global capital mobility segues into the claim that neofascism is distinguished by the absence of this antipathy. Turning specifically to India, Patnaik argues that "India provides a vivid illustration of the relation between neofascism and neoliberalism. For one thing, the neofascist Hindu supremacists that came to power in 2014 never had anything to do with India’s anti-colonial struggle (indeed, one of them even assassinated Mahatma Gandhi). Instead they are arch neoliberals, even more so than earlier neoliberal governments". What exactly is the relevance of the point about the distance maintained by the RSS (the BJP's predecessor) and the Quit India Movement? That the BJP aren't meaningfully nationalist, at least within the frame of colonial liberation? The substantive point surely is that the BJP are "arch neoliberals". You don't need to highlight neofascism or the ethnic exclusivity of Hindutva to explain the economic policies of the Modi government, as the point about the continuity with earlier administrations should make clear.

When it comes to a prescription, Patnaik is ironically arguing for policies that he associates with classical Fascism, namely welfarism and capital controls, albeit leavened by the sort of wealth taxes that those earlier Fascists (as much as contemporary neofascists) would have abhorred. His critique of neofascism is that it is incapable of reforming neoliberism in this way, but that simply raises the question as to whether it is really Fascist in any meaningful sense. I'm more inclined to think that what Patnaik defines as neofascism is merely one of the morbid symptoms of neoliberalism post-2008: a flirtation with ethnic exclusivity and a more authoritarian, interventionist style of government. This is intended to divert popular anger with the political and economic establishment and provide a semblance of social responsiveness after thirty years in which the state insisted that it was subject to the discipline of the market. Neoliberalism doesn't need neofascism, as Patnaik suggests, but liberals do like to imagine that by trying to return politics to a pre-2008 golden age they are resisting Fascism. I'm not sure whether the Marxist Patnaik is just employing their favoured rhetoric to convince them of the need for capital controls or whether he really has drunk the Kool-Aid. Either way, neofascism really isn't a useful term.