A Book Report on Fascism in Western Europe

According to popular belief, fascism was composed of a dominant totalitarian government that possessed total control over the people of its nation. Fascists were "psychopaths or the scum of society" and fascism was "an appeal to man's animal nature" (5). However, fascism was much more complex than what many people believe it to be. Fascism originated as a synthesis of many ideas and a compromise between conflicting sides. For example, fascists were neither socialists nor capitalists, but believed in ideas from both viewpoints. In addition, fascism was a synthesis of rationalism and irrationalism, of the civilized and of the primitive, and of the mass and of the elite. The reason that fascism became so popular in Europe during the turbulent post-world war I era was because it combined these different views. (It seems that at this point Kedward is sympathetic towards fascism, but after the first two chapters end, he clearly disapproves of it for the remainder of the book.)…