The problem of Self-ownership

Self-ownership is one of the basic principles of libertarian philosophy, from which libertarians derive various natural rights. The idea of self-ownership is often associated with the Lockean tradition, although the term itself is a later formulation.

The basic idea is that you own yourself and, therefore, own your labor. However, there are certain philosophical problems with this conception.

Consider an ordinary example of ownership. Suppose I own a chair. There is a clear distinction between the owner and the property owned: I am the owner, while the chair is the object of my ownership. Ownership therefore presupposes a distinction between the proprietor and the thing possessed.

But this distinction becomes problematic when applied to the self. If I say “I own myself,” what exactly is the self that is being owned? Unlike a chair, I am not merely an object or a thing; I am a person and a subject capable of possessing property, exercising rights, and acting according to reason.

Self-ownership therefore creates a peculiar relation in which the same entity occupies both sides of the ownership relation. I would simultaneously be the owner and the property owned.

This creates a conceptual problem: if I am my own property, then I must be both the proprietor who possesses the property and the object that is possessed. Yet the distinction between these two positions is constitutive of the concept of ownership itself.

The problem with self-ownership, therefore, is not merely terminological. Ownership presupposes a distinction between the owner and the owned, whereas self-ownership attempts to make the same subject both. The concept consequently risks collapsing the distinction that makes the ownership relation intelligible in the first place.

Individualism and collectivism

In libertarian philosophy, the individual is the basic unit of analysis. Social life is understood primarily through the actions, interests, and choices of individuals, who are generally conceived as autonomous and largely self-sufficient agents. Society is therefore understood as an association of individuals, with social institutions, values, and procedures emerging from their interactions and choices.

The problem with this conception is that it treats the individual as an ontologically and explanatorily prior entity: something that can be understood independently of the social whole and from which social life can subsequently be explained. But individuality is not an isolated fact. It is relational and can only become concrete through relationships with other people and through language, culture, history, law, institutions, and mutual recognition.

The individual is therefore not a completely finished and self-sufficient entity that exists prior to society. Rather, individuality is developed and actualized through the social whole of which the individual is a part. The individual becomes a concrete person through participation in a broader social, cultural, and historical world.

This can be expressed through a basic Hegelian principle: the whole explains its parts, not merely the parts the whole. Society is not simply an aggregate of independently constituted individuals. The social whole provides the conditions through which individuals become the particular persons they are.

This leads to a fundamentally different conception of the relationship between the individual and the collective. The collective is not merely an external limitation on individuality; it is the condition of its realization. Language, culture, history, law, and institutions do not merely restrict the individual from the outside. They provide the objective conditions through which the individual can develop a determinate identity, exercise agency, and realize their individuality.

The consequence is a movement away from atomistic individualism toward a form of collectivism or social holism. The collective is not the negation of individuality but the condition through which individuality becomes concrete and actual. Individuality therefore does not require the absence of the collective; it requires participation in a collective whole through which the individual can realize itself.

Negative Liberty

Another important principle of libertarian philosophy is negative liberty: the idea that freedom consists primarily in the absence of external coercion or interference. An individual is free insofar as others do not prevent them from acting according to their own choices.

The problem with this conception is that the mere absence of external interference does not necessarily make an action free in the fuller sense of the term. A person may act without being coerced by anyone else while still being driven by impulses, compulsions, unreflective desires, psychological dispositions, or past experiences that they do not understand or control.

Freedom therefore cannot be reduced simply to the absence of external constraints. It also concerns the individual’s relation to their own motives. To act freely is not merely to do what one wants without interference, but to be capable of reflecting upon one’s desires, understanding one’s motives, and determining one’s actions through reason.

Freedom, in this sense, is not simply the ability to act arbitrarily. It is rational autonomy: the capacity to understand why one acts and to reflect upon and take responsibility for one’s actions.

Freedom therefore cannot be reduced simply to the absence of external constraints. It also concerns the individual’s relation to their own motives. To act freely is not merely to do what one wants without interference, but to be capable of reflecting upon one’s desires, understanding one’s motives, and determining one’s actions through reason.

Freedom, in this sense, is not simply the ability to act arbitrarily. It is rational autonomy: the capacity to understand why one acts and to reflect upon and take responsibility for one’s actions.

This challenges the libertarian conception of the autonomous individual. If freedom is understood merely as non-interference, then an individual can be considered free even when their actions are determined by motives they neither understand nor rationally endorse. A fuller conception of freedom therefore requires not only freedom from external coercion, but also a degree of rational self-determination.

Conclusion:

Taken together, these arguments reveal a common problem within libertarian philosophy: its conception of the individual is too abstract. Libertarianism begins with a self-sufficient subject whose ownership of himself, freedom, and rights are treated as prior to the social relations in which they become concrete. Yet the individual cannot be separated from the social and historical conditions that constitute his identity, rational agency, and capacity for self-determination.

Once this abstraction is rejected, the relationship between individual and society must be understood in fundamentally different terms. Society is not merely a framework imposed upon independently existing individuals, but part of the very conditions through which individuality, freedom, and rights become possible. The individual is therefore neither reducible to the collective nor intelligible apart from it.

What emerges from this critique is a conception of freedom and individuality grounded in participation within a shared social and historical whole.

Idealism and Materialism (core distinction)

A possible foundational distinction between fascist and National Socialist conceptions of political reality can be formulated in terms of idealism and materialism. In fascist thought—both in its syndicalist and idealist formulations—the primary reality is not biological substance, but a spiritual, ethical, and historically constituted form of collective life. Political unity, cultural expression, and even individual identity are grounded in a shared historical and ethical consciousness that precedes and structures institutional forms.

By contrast, National Socialist thought tends to locate the primary reality in the biological constitution of the race. Cultural, political, and intellectual phenomena are therefore not constitutive dimensions of collective existence, but secondary expressions of a pre-given material substance. The state, culture, and knowledge are derived from, and ultimately subordinated to, this underlying biological principle.

This difference can be understood as a deeper ontological divergence regarding what is considered primary in social reality: whether collective life is fundamentally shaped by spiritual-historical consciousness or by biological-material determination.

I.The individual

A. Fascist idealism

In Fascist philosophy, especially after 1921, when it increasingly absorbed Idealist influences, the concept of the individual was reinterpreted through an Idealist framework. Within this view, the individual subject is understood primarily as a rational being endowed with consciousness, and other categories are derived from this basic starting point.

From this perspective, freedom is also redefined. It is not understood simply as the absence of external constraint or the ability to choose arbitrarily, but rather as a form of self-determination that only becomes meaningful when it is expressed through rational, structured, and rule-governed activity. In other words, freedom is not opposed to order; it exists only within it.

The concrete reality of the individual is not to be found in his existence in space and time as a natural phenomenon, an object of sense, but rather in his spiritual existence as a self-conscious being. He exists as a particular person, but not as one among others; his existence is unique and therefore infinite and universal. So the real individual is not opposed to the universal—he is the universal; and the concrete universal is just the individual himself as an actual, self-conscious, determinate, unique being.

The individual qua self-consciousness is not a natural entity in space and time; he contains space, time and nature, all within himself. Only in this way can he have the unconditioned freedom that is his.

-Giovanni Gentile, Genesis and structure of society, p. 86.

On an empirical level, every human being is indeed born as a particular organism located in space and time, with certain biological and psychological conditions. However, in this view, this natural and empirical starting point does not yet amount to full “individuality” in the philosophical sense. It is only the beginning of a process.

To become a genuine individual, the subject must actively develop and unify its experiences. This means that everything it encounters in life—its perceptions, actions, memories, and circumstances—is gradually brought into a coherent structure within consciousness. Instead of being a passive collection of disconnected experiences, the self becomes a unified center that organizes and gives meaning to all of these elements.

Empirically speaking, the individual is born in space and time as a particular being; but just for this reason he is not an individual when he is born. In order to become one he must gradually bring the whole of his particular existence—time and space and everything that falls under their determination—under the control of his consciousness, as one element in that complex of objects which breaks up into a multiplicity of material things as soon as he, the conscious subject, abstracts from his own unifying activity in consider ing it; but which is actually penetrated and assimilated ever more completely by his consciousness, which resolves all particularity in its own native universality.

-Ibid, p. 88-89.

A helpful way to understand this is to distinguish between the raw material of human life and the formed unity of personality. At birth, a person has the material conditions of existence, but not yet the fully developed unity of self-consciousness. Through reflection, action, and participation in shared social and ethical life, these scattered elements are integrated into a coherent whole.

From this perspective, the individual is not defined by the mere fact of birth, nor by contingent circumstances such as place of origin, historical moment, or social conditions. These factors may describe the empirical situation of a person, but they do not exhaust what it means to be an individual in the proper sense. Individuality, and even humanity understood in its fullest meaning, is not something simply given, but something that must be actualized through conscious and active participation in life.

This is why the Idealist position rejects a strictly materialistic or deterministic anthropology, in which biological, psychological, or environmental predispositions are taken to define what a person essentially is. While such predispositions may exist on an empirical level, they do not constitute the essence of the human being. The mind, understood as self-conscious activity, transcends these determinations and constitutes the true ground of individuality. It is through the mind that the individual gains its highest form and meaning, as something that is not passively received but actively realized.

Importantly, this also shifts the question of value. Human worth is not grounded in race, ethnicity, or simple biological fact, but in the capacity for rational consciousness and self-determination. In this sense, the mere possession of mind already establishes a fundamental human dignity, which then becomes actualized through action.

However, this actualization does not occur in isolation. The development of individuality takes place through the alignment of the individual will with a broader historical and cultural reality, particularly the life of the nation—its traditions, its historical development, and its ethical-political continuity. In this sense, the individual becomes fully realized insofar as its conscious activity participates in and expresses this collective historical life.

There is also a subtle dialectical dimension to this relation, in which the conscious mind is not only shaped by this historical-cultural reality, but at the same time actively contributes to its ongoing formation. Culture and national life are thus not merely external frameworks, but living expressions of the self-developing activity of mind itself.

B. Revolutionary syndicalist Fascism

In the earliest phase of Fascism—before its Idealist systematization after 1921, and already in the milieu of revolutionary syndicalism in Italy and Fascist currents in France such as the early Cercle Proudhon—the movement was marked by a pronounced anti-materialist and often anti-intellectual orientation. This stance emerged largely as a reaction against Marxist deterministic materialism, which was rejected as overly reductive in its interpretation of history and human action.

Sorelian revisionism replaced the rationalist, Hegelian foundations of Marxism with Le Bon’s new vision of human nature, with the anti-Cartesianism of Bergson, with the Nietzschean cult of revolt, and with Pareto's most recent discoveries in political sociology. The Sorelian, voluntarist, vitalist, and antimaterialist form of socialism used Bergsonism as an instrument against scientism and did not hesitate to attack reason. It was a philosophy of action based on intuition, the cult of energy and élan vital.

-Zeev Sternhell, The birth of Fascist ideology, p. 24

Although these early currents did not yet possess a fully developed philosophical framework, they nevertheless displayed several traits that later informed Fascist Idealism. Most importantly, they rejected the idea that the individual can be fully explained through economic, social, or material conditions. Instead, they emphasized psychological, vital, and volitional dimensions of human life, often influenced by thinkers such as Henri Bergson and Benedetto Croce.

Within this context, the individual was primarily interpreted through categories of consciousness, intuition, and psychological energy rather than through structural or material determination. This orientation contributed to the formation of so-called “revolutionary myths,” which functioned less as theoretical explanations and more as mobilizing representations capable of unifying collective action. These myths were central in providing direction and cohesion to mass movements, particularly in relation to revolutionary violence understood as a historical force.

Georges Sorel’s revision of Marxism played a key role in this development. Sorel replaced the rationalist and scientific pretensions of orthodox Marxism with an emphasis on voluntarism, intuition, and creative force, drawing heavily on Bergson’s philosophy of élan vital. From this perspective, reality is understood primarily in terms of movement and action . Consciousness is an active, creative force that produces meaning through engagement with the world.

On this basis, Sorel developed the concept of the social myth: not a description of reality, but a symbolic and intuitive construction capable of mobilizing collective will. Myths operate as unifying images that express and concentrate the sentiments of a group, particularly in moments of revolutionary intensity. In this sense, they function as instruments of action rather than objects of analysis.

Sorel’s revolutionary syndicalism thus sought to transform Marxism by stripping it of its materialist and deterministic elements while preserving its revolutionary energy. Influenced by Bergsonian anti-rationalism and vitalism, this revised outlook redefined socialism as a form of collective action oriented toward the destruction of the existing order through direct and concentrated will, most notably expressed in the idea of the general strike.

In this early phase, therefore, Fascist-adjacent thought already exhibited a consistent rejection of materialist explanations of human nature and history, replacing them with a focus on consciousness, will, and collective psychological forces. These elements later became integrated into a more systematic Idealist framework after 1921.

Fascist concept in summary:

While these two forms of Fascist thought differ significantly in their philosophical foundations and may even appear, at certain points, to be in tension with one another, they nonetheless share a set of underlying continuities. Most importantly, both frameworks understand the individual primarily through the category of consciousness and share a common rejection of materialist determinism as an adequate explanation of human nature and historical development.

From this perspective, the adoption of Idealism after 1921 should not be interpreted as a radical rupture or an alien departure from earlier Sorelian or proto-Fascist conceptions of revolutionary action. Rather, it can be understood as a conceptual deepening and systematic elaboration of tendencies that were already present in the pre-Idealist phase. In this sense, Fascist Idealism represents not a negation of earlier revolutionary voluntarism, but its philosophical refinement and theoretical consolidation.

C. National Socialism

In National Socialist thought, the individual is fundamentally understood and defined through the concept of race. Race is not primarily conceived in terms of superficial physical characteristics, such as skin color or external appearance, although these may be regarded as secondary expressions of it. Rather, its essential foundation lies in blood—that is, hereditary lineage. Blood serves as the criterion by which one’s membership in both the nation (Volk) and the state is determined, distinguishing who belongs to the German people and who does not.

But today, an entire generation is beginning to sense that values are only created and preserved where the law of blood still determines a person’s ideas and actions, whether consciously or unconsciously. At the subconscious level, whether in culture or in life, humans obey the commands of the blood, as if in dreams or, according to natural insight, as a happy expression describes this harmony between nature and culture.

-Alfred Rosenberg, The myth of the 20th century, p. 32-33

Within this framework, race constitutes the primary determining principle from which both conscious and unconscious aspects of human existence arise. It is understood as the source of culture, philosophy, science, architecture, art, religion, and every other manifestation of civilization. Likewise, moral and immoral acts are interpreted as expressions of racial character rather than merely individual choice. Consequently, the decline or degeneration of a people is explained through the corruption of its hereditary substance, particularly through the mixing of different racial lineages.

Culture is bound to races [Völker], not to a passage of time!

-Karl Jüng, National socialism, p. 27

It is important to recognize, however, that National Socialist racial theory was far from monolithic. Rather than presenting a single, coherent doctrine, it consisted of multiple and often competing interpretations. One of the clearest examples concerns the very definition of the Aryan. Adolf Hitler himself never provided a precise or systematic archetype of what an Aryan was in Mein Kampf. As a result, the concept underwent significant reinterpretation during the years in which the National Socialists held power.

Nevertheless, these various perspectives may be broadly classified into two principal categories: the naturalistic-political conception of race and the metaphysical-mystical conception of race.

The naturalistic-political conception, represented by many early National Socialist thinkers—including Rudolf Jung, the Strasser brothers, Joseph Goebbels, and, to a considerable extent, Adolf Hitler—understood race primarily as the biological foundation of the nation and the state. While race was regarded as the source of culture and political order, the emphasis remained on its practical and political implications rather than on speculative metaphysics.

The metaphysical-mystical conception, by contrast, reached its fullest articulation in the writings of Alfred Rosenberg. Here, race is understood not merely as a biological reality but as a metaphysical principle or spiritual essence possessing its own soul, values, and historical destiny. Culture, religion, philosophy, science, and art are interpreted as outward manifestations of this deeper racial spirit, making history itself the expression of the unfolding and conflict of distinct racial souls.

From an epistemological perspective, however, this conception presents significant methodological difficulties. Rosenberg repeatedly maintains that the essence of race cannot be fully grasped through reason, logical deduction, or empirical analysis, but only through an intuitive or mystical apprehension of the racial soul. Consequently, the theory does not rest upon criteria that are readily accessible to rational or empirical verification. Instead, it appeals to metaphysical assumptions and to interpretations of history and culture that are themselves grounded in prior ideological and philosophical traditions. As a result, the doctrine is difficult to evaluate using conventional standards of philosophical argument or scientific inquiry, since its central claims are formulated in a manner that is neither straightforwardly verifiable nor readily falsifiable.

The life of a race, of a people, is not a philosophically logical development, nor even a process that unfolds by natural law. It is the formation of a mystical synthesis, of an activity of the soul, which cannot be explained by rational deduction nor made intelligible through analyses of cause and effect. Comprehending the inner heart of a culture consists, therefore, in elucidating its highest religious, moral, philosophic, scientific, and aesthetic values. These determine its total rhythm and, simultaneously, qualify the reciprocal relationship and arrangements of human powers. A people that is primarily religiously-oriented will evolve a different sort of culture than that produced by one in which knowledge or beauty prescribe the form of being. Thus, any philosophy that goes beyond formal rational criticism is less a perception than a confession of faith; a spiritual and racial creed, and an avowal of character values.

-Alfred Rosenberg, myth of the 20th century, p. 109

II. The State

A. The Fascist Ethical State (Stato Etico)

The fascist conception of the state emerged through the early twentieth-century synthesis of revolutionary syndicalism and neo-idealist philosophy. By the 1920s, especially under the influence of Hegelian and post-Hegelian idealism, the state was increasingly understood not merely as a political institution, but as the form of concrete ethical and historical life.

The state is not an external structure imposed upon individuals, nor a purely administrative mechanism for regulating society. Rather, it is the living expression of a people’s historical and cultural existence, in which ethical life becomes actualized. Culture, religion, philosophy, art, and scientific life do not exist as separate spheres opposed to the state; instead, they are unified and made concrete within it as a single historical and ethical reality.

…the authority of the State and the liberty of citizens is an infrangible circle in which authority presupposes liberty and vice versa. Liberty is found only in the State and the State is authority. The State is not an abstraction, an entity that descends from heaven and remains suspended in air above the heads of citizens. Rather, it is all one with the personality of the individual, who for that reason must foster, seek out, and recognize the State, knowing that it is that which he has, himself, fashioned. Fascism, in truth, does not oppose itself to liberalism as a system of authority against a system of liberty. [It sees itself] rather as a system of true and concrete liberty as opposed to abstract and false liberty.

-Giovanni Gentile, Origins and doctrine of Fascism, p. 30

The state is therefore understood as the sphere of concrete actuality in which individual and collective life become fully real. Outside of this sphere, individuality remains abstract: it exists only as potentiality, not yet formed into a concrete ethical identity.

To clarify this relation, a simple analogy may be used.

Imagine a philosopher who exists entirely outside any social and historical context. In isolation, without language, education, intellectual tradition, institutions, or an audience capable of understanding his thought, he cannot meaningfully be considered a philosopher in the full sense of the term. Philosophy is not merely an internal mental activity, but a form of life that is actualized through participation in a shared cultural and intellectual world.

For the philosopher to fully realize himself as a philosopher, he requires a series of conditions that are not reducible to his individual existence: a language shaped by historical development, institutions that preserve and transmit knowledge, material and social conditions that allow for intellectual work, and a community capable of receiving and engaging with his thought. Even his ability to write, publish, and preserve his work presupposes a wider social order.

In this sense, the philosopher does not lose his individuality through dependence on these conditions. Rather, his individuality becomes concrete only through them. Outside of this network of social, cultural, and historical relations, his identity as a philosopher remains indeterminate and unactualized.

In fascist idealism, the state is understood in a structurally similar way. It is the historical and ethical framework within which individual life becomes concrete and meaningful. The individual is not dissolved into the state, nor is the state merely a tool external to the individual. Instead, both are mutually constitutive: the individual achieves full actuality through participation in the ethical and historical life of the state, while the state itself exists only as the living expression of that collective life.

This position therefore rejects both atomistic individualism, which treats the individual as self-sufficient outside of society, and abstract collectivism, which eliminates individuality altogether. Instead, individuality and collective life are understood as internally related: the individual is real only insofar as he is actualized within a shared ethical and historical unity.

B. The Revolutionary syndycalist Fascist Conception of the State

Before the emergence of the fully articulated ethical state associated with fascist idealism after the 1920s, early revolutionary syndicalists and proto-fascist thinkers had already developed an organic conception of political life that rejected liberal individualism and understood society as a unified collective organism. Thinkers such as Georges Sorel, Édouard Berth, Hubert Lagardelle, and later Georges Valois increasingly conceived the nation and the state not as separate or opposing entities, but as interconnected expressions of the same collective and historical reality.

This clarified the question considerably. “Syndicalism no more wants to destroy the state, in the negative and reactionary sense that people imagine, than Monsieur Bergson wants to destroy science,’ wrote Berth. The syndicalists were aware of the importance of the state in modern history, its unifying role, its function as an agent of modernization.” A rejection of the state and the abolition of private property were equally unacceptable to them.

-Zeev Sternhell, The birth of Fascist ideology, p. 104

The state represented the organized expression of a morally, economically, and historically unified national community. Political life was grounded in solidarity, productive participation, collective discipline, and shared national purpose.

Strongly influenced by Sorelian theories of myth, early national syndicalists viewed political myths as forces capable of generating collective unity, sacrifice, heroism, and moral regeneration. Through mythic mobilization and collective participation, fragmented individuals could be integrated into a larger national and historical organism that transcended purely private or individual existence.

Thus, Berth said yes to the state, provided its character was not distorted. He insisted several times on this point: the state, he wrote, is a “warrior ! and that is what it ought to be. This, he wrote, was precisely what the Maurrassians were trying to achieve. The state the Maurrassians were attempting to restore “no more resembles the modern democratic state than the constellation called the Dog resembles the barking animal called a dog.”

“This rebellion, he wrote, sought “the restoration of the state as a warlike entity and the expulsion of the state from the economy. Berth never missed an opportunity to stress this important aspect of national socialism: “The restoration of a state worthy of the name, he wrote, would mean the creation of an authority whose power and manifestations would be unlimited in the political sphere but whose “encroachment in the area of economics” would be prevented by “a highly organized civil society.”

-Ibid., p. 128-129

This tendency also contributed to the development of corporative and producerist conceptions of political organization. Society was increasingly conceived as an organized body composed of productive and functional groups unified within a common national framework. Corporations, syndicates, and professional associations were therefore understood as organs of a larger collective unity rather than as competing private interests.

Although this syndicalist conception did not yet possess the systematic idealist ontology later associated with the fascist ethical state, both perspectives nevertheless shared a fundamentally similar understanding of political reality. In both cases, the nation and the state were treated as organically interconnected and, to a significant extent, interchangeable expressions of collective historical life.

Based on the comparison between the fascist ethical state and the fascist syndicalist conception of the state, it can be concluded that both perspectives share fundamentally similar assumptions regarding the nature of political and collective life. In both cases, the state is understood as something greater than a mere institutional apparatus, legal authority, or instrumental mechanism serving external ends.

Fascist concept in summary:

Within both traditions, the nation and the state become deeply interconnected and, to a significant extent, interchangeable realities. The state is not external to the people, but emerges through their collective participation in a shared ethical, productive, and cultural life. The individual realizes himself through active participation within the collective order.

This principle can already be observed within revolutionary syndicalist and national syndicalist thought. As Édouard Berth argued, the revolutionary movement sought the restoration of a heroic and warlike conception of political life against the reduction of society to purely economic interests and bourgeois materialism. Through myth, sacrifice, discipline, labor, and collective struggle, the individual became integrated into a larger national organism animated by shared historical energies and revolutionary purpose.

Although later fascist idealism reformulated these principles through idealist philosophy and the theory of the ethical state, many of the underlying assumptions remained structurally similar. In both cases, the state is understood through spiritual and ethical values rather than through purely instrumental categories. Heroism, sacrifice, national solidarity, culture, religion, art, and historical participation all become essential components of political life.

The ethical state therefore did not represent a complete break from earlier fascist syndicalism, but rather a philosophical systematization and ontological reformulation of many collectivist, anti-individualist, and organic assumptions already present within national syndicalist thought.

C. The Conception of the State in National Socialism

Within National Socialist thought, the state is understood in a manner analogous to its conception of culture and everyday conscious experience: it is ultimately reduced to an expression of the racial community (Volksgemeinschaft) and exists solely in service of its preservation and development. The state possesses no intrinsic value or independent normative status; rather, it functions instrumentally as the political organization through which the racial community secures its continued existence, unity, and historical progression.

We can conclude that the state is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. The State is indispensable when it comes to forming a higher human civilization, but the State is not the cause of that higher civilization. The civilization depends exclusively on the existence of a race capable of creating that culture. There might be hundreds of states on earth which are excellent models of government, but if the Aryan bearer of civilization were to die out, no culture could continue to exist, at least not a culture that would match the intellectual level of the advanced peoples of today.”

-A.H., Mein Kampf, p. 256

In this respect, the state is conceived in a way that is not entirely foreign to other modern political traditions. Much like liberalism or communism, it is regarded as an institution whose purpose is to serve a collective subject. The crucial distinction lies in the identity of that subject. Whereas liberalism places the individual citizen at the center, and communism privileges the proletariat or class, National Socialism identifies the racial community as the ultimate bearer of political significance. Consequently, the state’s institutions, policies, and authority are justified insofar as they promote the biological, cultural, intellectual, and political development of that community.

This reflects the same reductive principle already observed in the National Socialist conception of the individual and of civilization more broadly. The state, like culture and history, is not understood as possessing autonomous spiritual or normative reality. Instead, it is interpreted as a derivative expression of underlying material—specifically racial—conditions. Political institutions and cultural values therefore function primarily as mechanisms for preserving and advancing the racial community from which they are held to arise.

III. History

A. The Fascist Idealist Conception of History

History as the Story of the State

As the concrete activity of Spirit—the present act of thought itself—the State is a living process of self-development. It is, in the fullest philosophical sense, history. All other histories, whether those of art, religion, economics, or science, remain abstract insofar as they describe only particular moments or forms of spiritual life. Only the State expresses Spirit concretely and universally; consequently, the history of the State constitutes the true history of humanity.

From the standpoint of Fascist Actual Idealism, history is therefore understood as the history of the State. This should not be interpreted merely in a political or institutional sense. Rather, the State is conceived as the immanent realization of the human spirit—the highest concrete expression of self-consciousness within historical reality.

This conception is deeply rooted in the Hegelian dialectical tradition. History is the self-development of thought itself. Every idea contains internal contradictions that emerge from its own content. These contradictions are not imposed from without but arise immanently within the Idea itself, generating its own overcoming and giving rise to a higher unity. Historical development is therefore the progressive unfolding of Mind, whose movement is the movement of Spirit realizing itself through conscious activity.

Within Fascist Actualism, these dialectical contradictions are resolved only within the thinking subject, for thought is regarded as the fundamental principle of reality. Reality is the living act through which consciousness continuously creates and determines itself. Consequently, history should be understood neither as a linear succession of events nor as a cyclical repetition of historical patterns. Rather, history exists as the ever-present, immanent activity of thinking itself. The development of history is ultimately the development of Spirit, which becomes objectively manifest in the ethical and political reality of the State.

The thinking subject therefore occupies the center of historical development. As discussed in the previous section, the individual is not an isolated empirical being but the living subject whose activity constitutes reality itself. Gentile expresses this point succinctly:

The history of the State is the story of humanity as a real individual, the unique universal object. It is the process of development of the unique reality, for of course reality is not a substance that sets itself into motion but exists in itself as the condition of this motion. Its essence lies in this motion.

The individual is unique in history because he is free and therefore infinite. The State is unique because it is the concrete and the absolute individual. In short, the Spirit, meaning the act of thought itself, is unique and free because it is infinite.

-Giovanni Gentile, Genesis and structure of society, p. 166, 169

For this reason, the Fascist conception of history stands in direct opposition to historical materialism and materialist philosophies of history more generally. Materialism explains historical development primarily through external and material conditions, treating the individual as fundamentally determined by economic structures, biological circumstances, or other objective forces. Human beings become products of the historical conditions into which they are born, and freedom is consequently reduced to the passive reflection of material necessity.

Actual Idealism rejects this premise entirely. Since reality is constituted through the living act of thought, the human subject is not determined by external substances but is the active source through which historical reality is continuously created. The individual, as an infinite and self-determining subject, is therefore not a passive object of history but its very author. History is ultimately the history of Spirit realizing itself through free, self-conscious activity, and the State represents the highest concrete expression of that ongoing historical process.

B. The Revolutionary Syndicalist Fascist Conception of History

Before the emergence of Fascist Actual Idealism after 1921, the early Fascist movement drew heavily upon the revolutionary syndicalism of Georges Sorel. Although this earlier phase lacked the systematic philosophical foundation later provided by Giovanni Gentile, it nevertheless shared several fundamental assumptions concerning the nature of historical development.

Like later Fascist Idealism, Sorel rejected orthodox Marxism and every deterministic or reductionist interpretation of history. Historical development could not be explained solely through economic structures, material conditions, or supposedly objective historical laws. Such interpretations reduced human beings to passive products of external circumstances and denied the creative role of human action.

Instead, Sorel understood history as the product of active human will. The primary agent of historical change was the acting individual, whose collective energy found expression through revolutionary myths, direct action, and the psychology of the masses. The General Strike, for example, was not conceived as a scientific prediction but as a revolutionary myth capable of mobilizing collective action and transforming historical reality.

Unlike Hegelian or Actual Idealist philosophy, however, Sorel did not attempt to construct a comprehensive metaphysical system governing historical development. History possesses no universal rational structure applicable to every historical epoch. Rather, each historical situation must be understood according to its own concrete circumstances, and historical action emerges from the intuitive and creative capacities of living individuals rather than from abstract theoretical analysis.

This anti-deterministic conception was profoundly influenced by Henri Bergson’s philosophy of creative evolution. From Bergson, Sorel adopted the view that movement constitutes the essence of life itself. Consciousness is fundamentally creative rather than contemplative, and human freedom consists in actively creating new historical possibilities. As Sorel writes:

When we act, we create an entirely artificial world placed before the present and formed of movements that depend upon us. In this way, our liberty becomes entirely intelligible.

-Georges Sorel, Reflections on violence, p. 26-27

Consequently, the Sorelian conception of history is concerned less with explaining history than with creating it. Historical development arises through revolutionary myths, intuition, collective psychology, direct action, war, and revolutionary struggle rather than through detached rational analysis.

For this reason, Sorel’s philosophy rejected every attempt to reduce historical development to objective scientific laws or material necessity. Although it differed substantially from the systematic Actual Idealism later developed by Gentile, it nevertheless established one of the essential anti-materialist foundations upon which Fascist philosophy would subsequently build. The transition from revolutionary syndicalism to Actual Idealism did not abandon this rejection of historical materialism; rather, it transformed an originally intuitive and anti-systematic worldview into a more comprehensive philosophical doctrine.

Fascist concept in summary:

In conclusion, both the idealist phase of Fascism and its earlier revolutionary syndicalist phase prior to 1921 ultimately assign a constitutive role to the individual as the creator of history through subjective experience and active participation in the nation. In both cases, the primary appeal is directed toward ideas rather than merely material conditions.

Within the revolutionary syndicalist framework, the emphasis is more explicitly psychological, focusing on the transformative power of belief, myth, and collective consciousness. Nevertheless, the principal driving force of historical development remains the thinking subject. Although this is not formulated with the same philosophical precision as in later idealist Fascism, the underlying conception is already present.

C. The National Socialist Conception of History

The National Socialist conception of history, much like Marxism and other forms of historical materialism, seeks to explain historical development through a single, overarching determining principle. Whereas Marxism locates this principle in the material conditions of production and the dialectic of class struggle, National Socialism substitutes race as the primary historical category.

Within this framework, race—understood primarily as blood and hereditary lineage—constitutes the decisive force behind the rise and decline of peoples and civilizations. Historical development is therefore interpreted through processes such as racial preservation, selective breeding, and the mixture of different racial lineages. Since race and blood are regarded as synonymous, the biological composition of a people is believed to determine not only its physical characteristics but also its cultural, political, intellectual, and moral capacities.

To sum up, the deepest roots of these views fail to tap into the understanding that the true power which creates culture and substance of character depends on racial elements and that the state’s primary task is the preservation and improvement of the race. It is the race which is the essential element for all human cultural development.

-A.H., Mein Kampf, p. 256

In this respect, the National Socialist philosophy of history bears a structural resemblance to Marxist historical materialism. Both present history as governed by an immanent principle that determines historical change, although they differ fundamentally regarding the nature of that principle. For Marxism, historical development emerges through the contradictions inherent in economic relations and class conflict. For National Socialism, history is driven by the preservation or corruption of racial substance. The decisive contradiction is therefore not between social classes but between racially creative and racially degenerative forces.

According to Adolf Hitler and other National Socialist theorists, civilizations flourish only insofar as they preserve the racial integrity of what they regarded as the creative races, most notably the Nordic race. The decline of civilizations is explained by racial mixture with peoples believed to possess lesser creative capacities, a process that allegedly results in biological and cultural degeneration. Consequently, the achievements of civilization—including political institutions, philosophy, science, architecture, art, and technological progress—are interpreted as products of the creative potential of the Nordic race.

But it is beyond question that the true culture-bearer for Europe has been, in the first place, the Nordic race. Great heroes, artists, and founders of states have grown from this blood

-Alfred Rosenberg, The myth of the 20th century, p. 406

The concept of the Nordic race itself, however, extends beyond a purely biological classification. Particularly in the writings of Alfred Rosenberg and other proponents of the metaphysical-mystical conception of race, the Nordic type is presented as the primordial creator of culture and the bearer of a unique civilizational spirit. Nations that achieved lasting political organization, cultural excellence, or scientific advancement were therefore interpreted as historical expressions of this Nordic racial principle, regardless of the complexity of their actual historical development.

Accordingly, differences between civilizations are understood not primarily in terms of economic structures, geographical conditions, or political institutions, but as reflections of differing racial constitutions. Distinct racial lineages are believed to possess distinct historical potentials, giving rise to different forms of culture, different political orders, and different stages of civilizational development. History, therefore, is interpreted as the unfolding of racial forces rather than as the consequence of contingent social, economic, or institutional processes.

Final Conclusion:

What, then, can be drawn from the foregoing comparison? By examining the concepts of the individual, the state, and history—together with the broader philosophical implications discussed throughout each section—a fundamental distinction emerges between fascism and National Socialism.

From a philosophical perspective, fascism, whether in its earlier Sorelian and revolutionary syndicalist form or in its later idealist formulation, is ultimately grounded in the primacy of the subject. The individual, understood as the active and self-determining subject of history, constitutes the first principle from which the entire philosophical system unfolds. National Socialism, by contrast, begins not from the subject but from the biological existence of the individual. Everything that proceeds from the individual is consequently reduced to race as the ultimate explanatory principle. This difference is not merely secondary or incidental; it represents one of the deepest philosophical divisions separating National Socialism from fascism.

The same distinction also explains why National Socialism cannot simply be understood as one variant among the many fascist movements that emerged during the twentieth century. Its philosophical foundations are fundamentally different. More importantly, the conceptual framework outlined throughout this study demonstrates that race cannot be integrated into either of the two principal stages in the development of fascist thought—neither its revolutionary syndicalist phase nor its later idealist phase.

One might almost say that  fascism has reacted upon the creative life of the Italian people somewhat like sterilization. It is, after all, nothing like National Socialism. While the latter goes deep down to the roots,  fascism is only a superficial thing. That is regrettable, but one must recognize it clearly. National Socialism is really a way of life [eine Weltanschauung ].

-Joseph Goebbels, The Goebbels diaries, 1942-1943, p.71

It is understandable that some individuals may regard racial theory as compatible with fascism or even view it as a natural extension of fascist principles. Yet such an interpretation overlooks the internal coherence of fascist philosophy. Fascism is not a collection of isolated political positions that can be freely combined; it is a systematic philosophical framework grounded upon specific metaphysical and epistemological premises. To introduce race as its fundamental principle would require abandoning those premises altogether, thereby dissolving the very structure that constitutes fascism as a coherent ideology.

For this reason, the fact that certain self-identified fascists expressed racial views, anti-Semitic opinions, or adopted doctrines influenced by racial theories does not alter the philosophical foundations of fascism itself. Individual deviations cannot redefine the first principles upon which a philosophy rests.

From its intellectual origins, fascism is founded upon the rejection of reductionism, materialism, and determinism. It affirms the priority of the subject over the object, of spirit over matter, and of creative agency over fixed biological necessity. Racial ideology, however, necessarily operates through reductionism, materialism, and determinism, reducing human existence to biological inheritance and immutable natural categories. Because these principles stand in direct philosophical opposition to the foundations of fascism, race cannot be incorporated into the fascist framework without fundamentally negating the philosophy upon which that framework is built.

Sources:

• Genesis and Structure of Society – Giovanni Gentile

• Reflections on Violence – Georges Sorel

• The Birth of Fascist Ideology – Zeev Sternhell

• Origins and Doctrine of Fascism – Giovanni Gentile

• National Socialism (1922) – Rudolf Jüng

• The Myth of the Twentieth Century – Alfred Rosenberg

• Mein Kampf – A.H.

Preface:

In this article, I will not focus primarily on historical claims or pieces of evidence, many of which are disputed, contradictory, or interpreted differently by different scholars and commentators. I will address those issues later in the article.

Instead, my primary focus will be on the deeper epistemological standards we use to determine whether someone can legitimately be called a Christian. I will examine the consistency of those standards, test whether they can be applied coherently across different historical figures, and explore whether they provide a reliable basis for concluding whether Adolf Hitler was, in any meaningful sense, a Christian.

The Problem of Historical Evidence:

When discussing whether Adolf Hitler was a Christian, people often encounter videos, articles, and debates in which both sides present quotations and historical evidence that they believe support their position. The difficulty is that both sides tend to treat the opposing evidence in much the same way: some quotations are accepted as authentic, while others are dismissed as fabrications, misinterpretations, or taken out of context. As a result, simply exchanging quotations rarely resolves the disagreement.

For the sake of this discussion, I am willing to grant my interlocutor the strongest possible case. I will assume that every quotation or historical statement they wish to cite is authentic and accurately represents Hitler’s words. Even under that assumption, an important philosophical question remains: Does any collection of quotations, professions of faith, or favorable statements about Christianity logically justify the conclusion that someone was a Christian?

The Question of the Epistemological Standard:

The central question is not whether Adolf Hitler ever called himself a Christian, attended church services, appeared in photographs with Christian symbols, or made positive statements about Christianity. The real question is whether any of these facts are sufficient to justify the conclusion that someone is a Christian.

Many modern commentators who argue that Hitler was a Christian rely on precisely these kinds of considerations: that he identified himself as a Christian, that others referred to him as one, that he was photographed in churches, that he appeared alongside Christian clergy, or that he occasionally spoke positively about God, Jesus, or Christianity. However, none of these observations, by themselves, establish Christian identity.

The New Testament itself warns against equating profession with genuine faith. Jesus declares:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 7:21)

Likewise, the Apostle John writes:

“They went out from us, but they were not of us.” (1 John 2:19)

These passages demonstrate an important epistemological principle:

self-identification alone is not a sufficient criterion for determining who is truly a Christian.

The history of Christianity confirms this principle. Virtually every major heretical movement claimed to follow Jesus Christ, regarded itself as the true Church, and believed that it possessed the authentic Gospel. The mere fact that a group identified itself as Christian has never been regarded by orthodox Christianity as sufficient proof that it actually was.

If self-identification is accepted as the decisive criterion, then consistency requires us to recognize every movement that has claimed the Christian name as genuinely Christian. That would include Arians, Nestorians, Unitarians, Modalists, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and countless other groups whose theological doctrines have historically been rejected by the Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant traditions alike. It would also require us to classify as Christians those who reject significant portions of Scripture or deny central doctrines of the historic Christian faith, provided that they continue to identify themselves as followers of Christ.

The same problem arises if the criterion is simply making positive statements about Jesus. Respectful or favorable remarks about Jesus do not uniquely identify someone as a Christian. Islam honors Jesus as a prophet. Many forms of Hinduism regard him as a holy teacher or enlightened figure. Some Buddhists express deep admiration for his moral teachings. Yet no one concludes that these religions are therefore Christian.

Consequently, neither self-identification, association with Christian symbols, participation in Christian institutions, nor favorable statements about Jesus constitutes a sufficient epistemological standard for concluding that a person is a Christian. A more robust criterion is required—one capable of distinguishing genuine Christian identity from mere profession, political expediency, cultural association, or selective admiration.

A Test of Consistency:

Having examined the epistemological question, we can now test the consistency of the proposed standard. The most effective way to evaluate any epistemological criterion is to ask whether it can be applied consistently to other historical figures.

Suppose we accept the criteria commonly used by those who argue that Adolf Hitler was a Christian. These criteria typically include:

• Self-identification as a Christian.

• Positive statements about God, Jesus, or Christianity.

• Cooperation with Christian churches.

• Participation in Christian ceremonies or association with Christian symbols.

Now let us apply precisely the same standard to another twentieth-century dictator: Joseph Stalin.

At first glance, this may seem surprising. However, Stalin satisfies many of these same criteria.

First, Stalin possessed an extensive religious education. Before entering revolutionary politics, he spent approximately a decade studying within the educational system of the Russian Orthodox Church. He was qualified to teach in a church school, had an extensive knowledge of Scripture, was deeply familiar with Christian theology and church history, and understood the liturgy and practices of Eastern Orthodoxy.

Second, Stalin frequently employed biblical language and religious imagery. In one of his speeches, he declared:

“Here I stand on the borderline between the old capitalist world and the new socialist world. Here on this borderline I unite the efforts of the proletarians of the West and the peasants of the East in order to shatter the old world. May the God of history be my aid.”

This statement is particularly noteworthy because it deliberately echoes Martin Luther’s famous declaration at the Diet of Worms in 1521.

Scholars have also observed that Stalin’s writings are filled with biblical allusions, religious expressions, and theological language. Roland Boer, for example, notes that Stalin frequently employed biblical imagery, referred to Trotsky as a “Judas,” and regularly invoked God in everyday speech.

Third, Stalin was publicly described in explicitly religious terms by prominent representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church. Following the restoration of church-state relations during the Second World War, the Patriarchate referred to Stalin as a deeply revered and beloved leader who had been appointed through God’s providence.

Finally, Stalin actively cooperated with the Russian Orthodox Church after 1943. He approved the election of a new Patriarch, authorized the reopening of churches, released imprisoned clergy, permitted the establishment of seminaries and theological academies, and even provided state financial assistance for certain ecclesiastical needs.

If these kinds of evidence are sufficient to conclude that Adolf Hitler was a Christian, then consistency appears to require the same conclusion regarding Joseph Stalin.

Yet very few people—if any—would seriously argue that Stalin was a Christian simply because he employed Christian language, cooperated with churches, possessed theological knowledge, or was praised by church leaders.

This reveals an important point. The problem is not merely historical; it is epistemological. If a criterion leads to conclusions that most people recognize as implausible, then the criterion itself is inadequate. We therefore need a deeper and more reliable standard for determining whether someone can genuinely be described as a Christian.

Toward a Better Criterion:

At this point, we can ask an important question. Suppose you were to ask those who argue that Adolf Hitler was a Christian whether Joseph Stalin was also a Christian. Almost all of them would immediately answer no.

The obvious question is: why?

The answer they would most likely give is not that Stalin lacked positive statements about God, religious education, or cooperation with churches. Rather, they would appeal to something deeper—his ideology. They would argue that Stalin’s commitment to Marxism and dialectical materialism is fundamentally incompatible with Christianity.

If that is the reason, then we have already moved beyond historical quotations and political symbolism. We are operating at a deeper level of analysis: the level of metaphysical and theological commitments.

This is precisely where the discussion should begin.

We have already seen that self-identification, religious symbolism, institutional cooperation with churches, and positive statements about Christianity are insufficient criteria for determining whether someone is a Christian. The question, therefore, becomes: what is the appropriate criterion?

A natural answer is that we must examine the underlying worldview of the individual. Christianity is not merely a collection of religious expressions or political affiliations, but a comprehensive metaphysical and theological framework that makes fundamental claims about God, human nature, morality, history, and salvation.

This brings us to the central premise of this discussion: not whether Adolf Hitler occasionally spoke favorably about Christianity, but whether the philosophical foundations of National Socialism are compatible with the theological foundations of historic Christianity. The answer, I will argue, is no.

The same reasoning that prevents us from describing Joseph Stalin as a Christian, despite his religious language, also prevents us from describing Adolf Hitler as one.

Stalin’s worldview is grounded in dialectical materialism. In his 1938 essay Dialectical and Historical Materialism, history is presented as the product of material conditions, economic relations, and class conflict. Human development is ultimately explained through material forces.

National Socialism replaces class with race, but it retains a similar reductionist structure. In Mein Kampf, particularly in the chapter “The State,” Hitler treats race and biological inheritance as the primary principles for explaining culture, civilization, political order, and historical development. History is understood primarily as a struggle between racial groups driven by heredity, biological preservation, and degeneration.

This pattern can also be found in the works of National Socialist thinkers such as Rudolf Jung, Alfred Rosenberg and others. In their writings, racial categories are not treated as secondary descriptions of human variation, but as primary explanatory principles through which the totality of human existence is interpreted. Human beings are understood primarily through racial belonging, and historical development is explained through the interaction, preservation, or decline of racial groups.

It is precisely this move—from descriptive observation to totalizing explanatory reduction—that creates the philosophical conflict.

Historic Christianity, by contrast, affirms that human beings cannot be reduced to biological or racial categories. While it does not deny empirical distinctions between peoples, it rejects any framework in which such distinctions become the fundamental principle for explaining human nature, moral worth, history or salvation.

Thus, the issue is not the recognition of difference, but its elevation into a totalizing metaphysical principle.

Once this distinction is made, the incompatibility becomes clear: it is not diversity that is at stake, but reduction.

Conclusion:

Premise 1: Historic Christianity rejects worldviews that reduce human nature, moral responsibility, and history to material or biological determinants.

Premise 2: Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist worldview explains human beings and historical development primarily through race and biological inheritance, as reflected in Mein Kampf and the writings of leading National Socialist thinkers.

Conclusion: Therefore, Adolf Hitler’s worldview is fundamentally incompatible with historic Christianity, and he cannot be considered a Christian in any historically orthodox theological sense.

National Socialism requires the Jew in order to validate itself. National Socialists may claim, “We hate the Jews; we do not want the Jews here,” yet the entire ideological structure of National Socialism depends upon the existence of a negative counterpart — a fundamentally evil figure against which everything else is defined.

Within this worldview, the Jew becomes the explanation for everything perceived as corrupt or destructive: capitalism, communism, materialism, decadence, financial greed, and social decay. Consequently, the National Socialist concludes that he must embody the opposite characteristics: courage instead of weakness, sacrifice instead of selfishness, discipline instead of decadence, spiritual vitality instead of materialism. The ideology therefore defines itself negatively. It does not begin with an independent conception of truth or virtue; rather, it begins with the assumption that “the Jew” represents evil, and whatever is associated with him must therefore be rejected.

Ironically, this logic undermines its own moral framework. If behavior is supposedly determined by racial essence — by “blood” — then the Jew cannot even truly be considered morally evil in the traditional sense, because he would merely be acting according to his predetermined nature. But that contradiction is secondary to the larger point. The central issue is that National Socialism derives its identity from opposition to an externalized enemy. The moment that enemy disappears, the ideology loses the foundation that gives it meaning and emotional force.

This also explains why many people historically became National Socialists rather than fascists or revolutionary syndicalists. The reasoning is often simplistic: “The Jews are responsible for society’s problems, and National Socialism opposes the Jews, therefore National Socialism must be the solution.” The ideology gains coherence not through a fully developed philosophical anthropology or metaphysics, but through the existence of a singular enemy figure onto which all social contradictions are projected.

This is also one of the fundamental differences between National Socialism and fascism. Fascism does not require a singular external enemy in order to justify itself. In the fascist conception of life, struggle itself is permanent and unavoidable. Existence itself is conflict. There is no final utopia in which all contradictions disappear once some evil force has been removed.

National Socialism, in a fundamentally positivistic sense, assumes that history can ultimately be purified: remove the corrupting racial enemy, and harmony can finally emerge. Fascism, by contrast, views life as a never-ending process of tension, conflict, sacrifice, and overcoming. One obstacle may disappear, but another will inevitably arise, whether within the nation, civilization, or human character itself.

This is why thinkers such as Georges Sorel were drawn to the classical Protestant and especially Calvinist idea of total depravity. Man is inherently fallen, and no political order can permanently eliminate conflict, corruption, or struggle from human existence. The purpose of struggle is therefore not to achieve a final earthly perfection, but to continually overcome degeneration through action, discipline, and moral vitality.

Someone might object by arguing that National Socialists also possess a conception of life as a never-ending struggle. And while it is true that some National Socialist pseudo-intellectuals speak in similar terms, the problem is that this idea is not actually derived from the internal logic of their doctrine. Rather, it functions more as a form of make-believe — an aesthetic posture incorporated into the system simply because it sounds profound or heroic, even though the ideology itself does not logically lead to such a conclusion.

If National Socialists truly believe in the existence of a “superior race” or “creative race” and an “inferior race,” along with the idea that inferior races embody inferior values and forms of life, then the logical conclusion is that the superior race must eventually overcome or eliminate the inferior one — the “great enemy,” the “big evil Jew,” or whatever figure is identified as the source of degeneration.

In this sense, National Socialism reaches a conclusion structurally similar to Marxism. The Marxist believes that through class consciousness the proletariat will ultimately overcome the bourgeoisie and establish the dictatorship of the proletariat, after which class distinctions, money, and eventually even the state itself will disappear. The final outcome is once again a form of utopian reconciliation — a vision in which history’s contradictions are permanently resolved and society enters a state of harmony.

This is precisely where fascism fundamentally differs. Fascism does not believe that conflict can ever be permanently abolished through the destruction of a single enemy class, race, or group. Struggle is not a temporary condition caused by one corrupting force; it is an inseparable aspect of existence itself.

A common argument among those who adopt some form of racial realism is that because fascism is in principle universal, a form of racial nationalism can be integrated into it without contradiction. The idea is that fascism, as a political framework, could adopt race as one of its organizing principles while still maintaining its universal structure of unity, discipline, and state integration.

The problem is that this assumes two different levels of logic can be fully harmonized. Classical fascist theory, especially in its Italian formulation, is grounded in the idea of the state as a universal and total political form. The unity of society is produced through the state, which integrates individuals into a single ethical and political organism.

Racial nationalism introduces a different principle of unity: one that is not politically constructed, but treated as given in advance through biological or quasi-metaphysical identity. In this framework, unity does not emerge from the state, but precedes it. The state becomes secondary to an underlying racial substance.

This creates a structural tension. If race is understood as a hierarchy of fixed human types with different cultural or civilizational capacities, then the universal integration of a single political body becomes unstable. Unity is no longer purely political or ethical, but conditioned by an external principle that divides humanity at the deepest level.

One way this tension is sometimes addressed is by treating race not as a literal biological determinant, but as a symbolic or mythological language of identity. However, even here a problem remains.

Myths are usually defined through abstract values such as heroism, sacrifice, love, duty, and loyalty—often directed toward something like the nation. These elements work because they appeal to emotion and intuition rather than abstract classification. They are embedded in a specific socio-historical and cultural context, which gives them meaning and force.

From this perspective, even if “race” is treated as a symbolic or mythological concept, it still struggles to function as a genuine myth in the same way. Myths operate at the level of shared cultural meaning and lived historical experience, not as rigid classifications of human nature. They are meant to unify emotional and moral perception within a people, not to divide humanity into fixed, hierarchical types.

Because of this, myth is structurally closer to culture and historical identity than to race. Culture can carry symbolic meaning, adapt over time, and form a shared horizon of values. Race, when understood as a fixed or essential category, introduces a level of abstraction that is too static and deterministic to function as a living myth in the political and cultural sense.

In this sense, myth does not primarily describe what a people is, but how a people understands itself.

For this reason, culture, tradition, and historical formation of a people tend to be more compatible with a universal political framework than racial determinism. Culture can be shaped and integrated into a political unity, while race, when treated as fixed and hierarchical, resists such integration by definition.

This guide is, in my experience, probably one of the best ways to understand the basic foundations of Gentile’s philosophy—how to navigate it, get a sense of his perspectives, and so on. I especially think it’s a good idea to start with these books and works before diving into his other, more well-known writings, such as The Theory of Mind as a Pure Act or The Philosophy of Marx.

I. Giovanni Gentile: Philosopher of Fascism

A. James Gregor

This work serves as the most effective point of entry into the thought of Giovanni Gentile. Gregor provides a biographical account and more importantly, a systematic reconstruction of the development of Gentile’s philosophy—from its roots in German idealism to its eventual articulation within the framework of fascist ideology.

One of the major strengths of this book lies in its contextual breadth. Gregor situates Gentile in relation to competing intellectual traditions, particularly Marxism and liberalism, thereby demonstrating that Gentile was a philosopher attempting to construct a coherent and comprehensive alternative to dominant modern doctrines.

Without such a framework, Gentile’s own writings can be difficult to navigate. Gregor, therefore, offers a conceptual map—an indispensable guide for any serious reader.

II. The Origins and Doctrine of Fascism

This text represents one of the most accessible introductions to fascist doctrine as articulated by Gentile himself. It is a historical account of the emergence of fascism in Italy and an effort to provide it with philosophical grounding.

Here, Gentile outlines key principles such as the unity of the individual and the state, the rejection of liberal individualism, and the conception of the state as an ethical reality. Importantly, this work should not be read as a simple political manifesto; rather, it is an attempt to formulate a philosophically coherent vision of social and political order.

As a second step in the reading sequence, it allows the reader—already equipped with Gregor’s contextual framework—to begin engaging directly with the doctrine from within.

III. The Reform of Education

At first glance, this work may appear less overtly political; however, it is crucial for understanding how Gentile’s philosophy operates in practice. Focused on education, culture, and the formation of the individual, it reveals the depth of the connection between his idealism and his conception of the nation and the state.

Gentile treats education not as an active formation of consciousness embedded within a broader cultural and political framework. In this respect, the text illustrates how the principles of actual idealism permeate lived social reality.

For the reader, this marks an important shift: Gentile’s thought is no longer merely abstract, but emerges as a concrete project of societal transformation.

IV. The Philosophical Basis of Fascism

This relatively brief text offers a concentrated expression of Gentile’s philosophical understanding of fascism. While more concise than his larger works, it is conceptually dense and philosophically significant.

Gentile develops a critique of liberalism and individualism, opposing them with a vision of the state as an organic unity in which the individual finds fulfillment. Central to this argument is the idea that freedom is not opposed to the state, but is instead realized through it.

As such, the text is particularly valuable for grasping the philosophical core of fascism in a relatively distilled form.

V. Genesis and Structure of Society

This work represents one of Gentile’s most mature philosophical statements and can be read as a systematic synthesis of his broader intellectual project. It moves beyond strictly political concerns and seeks to articulate the underlying structure of society from the perspective of his idealism.

Here, Gentile integrates metaphysics, epistemology, and political philosophy into a unified framework. Society is conceived as a dynamic process in which consciousness continuously actualizes itself.

For readers who have engaged with the preceding texts, this work provides a moment of conceptual integration—though it also demands a higher level of interpretive effort.

What is communism:

Communism is a political and economic ideology grounded in class struggle. It seeks the abolition of private ownership of the means of production and its replacement with collective ownership. In Marxist theory, historical development proceeds through a transitional socialist phase toward a classless society in which the state and other coercive structures gradually disappear. This development is understood as a necessary outcome of changes in the relations of production, which form the foundation of social life and shape institutions, culture, and human consciousness.

This framework is derived from Marxist theory, particularly dialectical and historical materialism, where history is analyzed through the relations of production as the foundation of every aspect of society and of the individual’s experience itself. The political vision of communism is therefore inseparable from the theoretical framework of Marxism: the ideology emerges naturally from the analysis of historical and material conditions

I will begin with a structured argument and then expand on its implications.

Premise 1:

Classical Marxism, as formulated by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, explicitly affirms a materialist metaphysics. According to this view, reality is fundamentally composed of matter and its motion. Consciousness, ideas, morality, religion, and all forms of human thought are not independent realities, but products or reflections of material conditions—especially the mode of production.

Premise 2:

Historical materialism applies this metaphysical framework to history. The economic base, defined by productive forces and relations of production, determines the superstructure, which includes law, religion, morality, culture, and ideology. In this framework, religion is not something true in itself, but something that arises from material and economic conditions.

Premise 3:

Dialectical materialism is not merely a theory of social development or class struggle. It is a comprehensive, monistic system. Because of its materialist foundation, it interprets everything—society, class relations, human thought, and even individual experience—through material conditions. The individual is therefore not understood as an independent rational agent in any ultimate sense, but as a product of these conditions.

Conclusion :

Marxism, and by extension communism, reduces reality to material conditions and class relations. This reduction directly conflicts with fundamental aspects of the Christian faith.

1. Religion as a Product, Not Truth

In Marxism, religion is explained as a product of material life. It is something generated by economic structures and social conditions. This means that religion cannot be ultimately true in itself—it is always reducible to something more basic.

Christianity, however, claims that God exists independently of material conditions, that divine revelation is real, and that truth is not reducible to economics or class structure. Because Marxism explains religion away, it cannot consistently affirm Christianity as true in its own terms.

2. Determinism and the Collapse of Rational Thought

Rational inference requires that beliefs are held because of their logical relation to evidence and to other beliefs. This “because” is rational, not merely causal.

If strict materialism is true, then every belief is fully determined by non-rational physical causes—brain chemistry, neural firings, and physical laws. Under such a framework, the reason why someone believes something is never ultimately about truth or logic, but about causation.

This leads to a serious problem:

not only religious belief, but all belief—including belief in Marxism itself—is determined by material conditions rather than rational evaluation. What you believe depends on your class position, your environment, and the material relations in which you exist.

Belief is therefore not truly chosen, and not ultimately grounded in truth. It is produced.

At this point, the problem becomes self-referential: if all beliefs are determined by non-rational causes, then the belief in Marxism itself is not held because it is true, but because it is caused. This undermines the very possibility of rational justification.

By contrast, Christianity affirms the reality and reliability of reason. Human beings, as created in the image of God, are endowed with rational faculties that are oriented toward truth. While human reasoning can be affected by sin and error, it is not reducible to blind physical causation. Rational thought, logical inference, and the pursuit of truth are meaningful precisely because they are not merely the byproduct of material forces.

3. The Reduction of the Individual

“the phantoms formed in the human brain are also, necessarily, sublimates of their material life process. Morality, religion, metaphysics, all the rest of ideology and their corresponding forms of consciousness, thus no longer retain the semblance of independence. Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life."

Marx, The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 297.

“coincides with their production, both with what they produce and how they produce. The nature of individuals thus depends on the material conditions determining their production."

“division of labor determines also the relations of individuals to one another."

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The German Ideology (New York: International, 1988), p. 42-43.

Because Marxism is materialist and monistic, it reduces the individual to a product of external forces. Human identity, thought, and decision-making are interpreted through material conditions and class relations.

From a Christian perspective, this contradicts the doctrine that human beings are created in the image of God (imago Dei). The individual is understood as a rational, moral agent with real responsibility, not merely as an expression of economic structures.

4. Ethics and the Problem of Moral Relativism

Marxism does not provide an independent or objective ethical system. Instead, morality is subordinated to class struggle and material conditions.

"One therefore cannot deny the justice of [the] remark that 'in Marxism itself there is not a grain of ethics from beginning to end' theoretically it subordinates the 'ethical standpoint' to the 'principle of causality'; in practice it reduces it to the class struggle."

Lenin, "The Economic Content of Narodism and the Criticism of It in Mr. Struve's Book," Collected Works, 1, pp. 420-421.

As Vladimir Lenin argued, morality/ethics is derived from the interests of the proletariat and is entirely subordinated to the class struggle.

Under this framework:

what benefits the proletariat no matter how barbaric it is, is good, what harms it is bad, what is irrelevant to it is morally insignificant.

This removes any universal moral standard. Christianity, by contrast, teaches that moral truth is objective and grounded in God, and that moral obligations apply universally—including love for one’s enemies.

5. Class Struggle and Moral Responsibility

Marxism places class struggle at the center of historical development. However, within a deterministic materialist framework, individual responsibility becomes difficult to maintain.

If actions, beliefs, and decisions are all determined by material conditions, then individuals are not ultimately responsible in the full moral sense. Their behavior is explained rather than judged.

Christian theology, however, affirms that individuals are morally responsible for their actions. Each person is accountable before God, which presupposes genuine agency and responsibility.

Final Conclusion:

Based on these considerations, Marxism and Christianity are not merely different—they are fundamentally incompatible at the level of metaphysics, anthropology, epistemology, and ethics.

If someone claims to be both a communist and a Christian, this tension does not remain stable. In practice, one of the two frameworks is reinterpreted or gradually abandoned.

Fascist and national syndicalist ideologies are often criticised by the Marxists and other socialists for their position on property. Critics point out that these movements did not abolish private ownership. We can see this not only in the practical policies of many fascist and national syndicalist regimes, but also in their explicit doctrines and in the intellectual traditions from which these ideologies emerged. In fact, one of the reasons fascism accepts private property is precisely this continuity with earlier movements and ideas that shaped its development.

One of the most important of these influences is revolutionary syndicalism. Within this movement we find figures such as Georges Sorel and Georges Valois, among many others. There were also anarcho-syndicalists who, despite their radicalism, did not necessarily advocate the abolition of all forms of private property. Indeed, revolutionary syndicalists and Sorelian thinkers were among the first socialist groups that did not treat the abolition of private property as the central question of socialism.

“To reform in a bourgeoisie society is to affirm private property”

-Georges Sorel (Introduction to modern economics, p. 138-41.)

This intellectual trajectory can be traced even further back to the father of anarchism, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. In his later work, particularly in Théorie de la propriété (Theory of Property), Proudhon offers a more developed defense of property. Rather than treating property as an absolute and unlimited right, he presents it as a necessary institution that secures the independence of the individual.

For Proudhon, property functions as a counterweight to centralized power. It provides the individual with a sphere of autonomy and protection, allowing him to act freely within society.

The deeper reason behind these views on property lies in a particular understanding of human nature. Many political movements that accept some form of private ownership, such as distributists, national syndicalists, revolutionary syndicalists, libertarians etc., ground their position in their view of the individual.

These ideologies tend to affirm human autonomy, especially the autonomy of reason. They understand the human being as a rational subject and as a morally responsible agent. From this anthropological premise follows their view of property. Ownership is connected to the individual because the individual is understood as capable of responsibility and rational decision.

At the same time, the fascist understanding of property is not absolute in the way it is in libertarian thought. In fact, the term private property can sometimes be misleading, since it often implies that property belongs entirely to the individual and that the individual has the unrestricted right to dispose of it however he wishes.

The fascist position can be described more accurately as responsible ownership. Property is not merely a right; it is a responsibility. The individual is entrusted with the use of property and is expected to exercise that responsibility within a broader social and national framework.

This perspective also reflects fascism’s rejection of Marxist determinism and materialism. Influenced in part by Sorelian ideas, fascism emphasizes the role of will, and the active agency of the individual.

For this reason, fascism rejects the abolition of private ownership. From its perspective, eliminating the possibility of individual ownership would imply a denial of human autonomy itself. If the individual cannot possess or steward property, then the individual is no longer treated as a rational and morally responsible agent.

This, according to fascist thinkers, is precisely the error of Marxism. Marxism ultimately rejects this vision of the human person by interpreting individuals primarily through economic structures and material conditions rather than through autonomy, moral responsibility, and will.

“Sorelian revisionism replaced the rationalist, Hegelian foundations of Marxism with Le Bon’s new vision of human nature, with the anti-Cartesianism of Bergson, with the Nietzschean cult of revolt, and with Pareto's most recent discoveries in political sociology. The Sorelian, voluntarist, vitalist, and antimaterialist form of socialism used Bergsonism as an instrument against scientism and did not hesitate to attack reason. It was a philosophy of action based on intuition, the cult of energy and élan vital.“

-Zeev Sternhell (The birth of Fascist ideology, p.34)

Another reason why fascism affirms property lies in its support for industrialization, modernism, and the overall development of society. These processes historically arise in connection with the existence of private property and market activity. A similar perspective can also be found in the thought of Georges Sorel. In his work The Illusions of Progress, Sorel acknowledges the potential for material improvement in production, while emphasizing that such progress is best driven by autonomous producers rather than by bureaucratic control. In this way, he connects economic development with the initiative and independence of individuals rather than with centralized management.

For this reason, fascism generally accepts the functioning of the market as a practical reality within economic life. In a simple sense, one could say that fascism abides by the rules of the market rather than seeking to abolish them.

This idea can also be found in The Social Foundations of Contemporary Economics, where Sorel discusses the role of economic forces and social organization. His reflections on the dynamics of modern economic life influenced many later syndicalist and national-syndicalist thinkers.

“It is hardly necessary to insist on the immense importance of the market which created the prosperity of so many cities.”

Georges Sorel (The Social Foundations of Contemporary Economics, p.93)

Of course, a person could still identify as a fascist or a national syndicalist while rejecting private ownership. However, this position creates significant difficulties, because it tends to undermine several of the other ideas and doctrines associated with fascism and national syndicalism.

If private ownership is rejected entirely, the question immediately arises: on what basis is this rejection justified? Why should ownership be considered something that no one ought to possess, not even the workers or families themselves even though they are the basic unit of every society ?

Here we again encounter the underlying question of how one understands the individual. If one maintains that the individual is a morally responsible agent, then it follows that property itself must be morally neutral. Ownership does not carry inherent moral value in itself. What matters is the way in which the individual relates to and uses that property.

Another argument along these lines can be found in the thought of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. Proudhon argued that property can function as a form of power through which the individual is able to act and realize himself within society.

From this perspective, if such power is extended to workers, it may make more sense to allow workers themselves to possess property rather than to deprive them of it entirely. In Proudhon’s view, removing ownership from the working class does not truly empower them; instead, it risks weakening them by stripping away a significant means through which individuals can exercise autonomy and responsibility and that it is a necessary "counterweight to the State". He believed that widely distributed, small-scale possession prevents the state from monopolizing power.

This understanding of property, as articulated by Proudhon, was accepted by the syndicalists and then incorporated into fascist ideology, but with a key reinterpretation. Fascism rejects the state as a mere bureaucratic apparatus; the fascist state is organic, not mechanical or hierarchical in the bureaucratic sense.

Within this framework, property and ownership are not intended to fragment society or divide workers in a way that weakens the state. On the contrary, private property is integrated into the organic unity of the state, serving to fulfill the will of the state as an ethical and social organism. Individuals and groups exercise responsibility and initiative through their ownership, but always in alignment with the collective purpose of the nation, reinforcing both personal autonomy and the cohesion of the national community thereby realizing human reason and moral responsibility within the organic and ethical unity.

“Fascism accepted from Syndicalism the idea of the educative and moral function of the syndicate. But since the intention was to overcome the antithesis between the State and the syndicate, the effort was made to enter the system of syndicates harmoniously into corporations subject to discipline by the State and to thereby give expression to the organic character of the State. In order to give expression to the will of the individual, the organic State must reach him, not as an abstract political individual that the old liberalism supposed—as a featureless atom. The organic State sought to reach the individual as it could only find him, as he in fact is: as a specialized producer whose tasks moved him to associate himself with others of the same category, all belonging to the same unitary economic organism that is the nation.”

Giovanni Gentile (Origins and Doctrine of Fascism, p.29)

Conclusion:

Fascism is goated.

I. Introduction

Discussions about Mary are often burdened by dogmatic boundaries and confessional anxieties. In Papist and Orthodox theology, Marian doctrine is carefully articulated through councils, traditions, and defined formulations. In many Protestant contexts, Mary is approached cautiously, often reduced to a necessary historical figure whose theological significance is deliberately limited.

My position does not comfortably belong to either instinct. I do not require dogma in order to recognize Mary’s uniqueness, nor do I feel compelled to diminish her significance in order to safeguard Christ’s centrality. At the same time, I do not ground my view in ecclesial authority, patristic consensus, or metaphysical elevation. What follows is not an argument against Papist or Orthodox Mariology, nor an attempt to replicate it in Protestant language. It is a presentation of a view whose conclusion remains stable regardless of which of those traditions one finds persuasive.

II. The Point of Departure

The Incarnation is not merely a metaphysical claim about divine and human natures; it is a historical and relational event. God does not become human in abstraction. He becomes human within a concrete network of relationships: birth, dependence, upbringing, protection, and growth.

From this perspective, Mary’s significance does not begin with questions of sinlessness, predestination, or ontological status. Rather it begins with the fact that the eternal Son of God enters human history through her, and that this entry establishes a relationship that no other human being has ever had or ever will have.

Mary is not merely a believer in Christ. She is not merely a servant of God. She is the mother of the incarnate Son of God. This relationship is not symbolic, exemplary, or repeatable. It is singular.

III. The Uniqueness of Mary

The uniqueness I attribute to Mary is not ontological. I do not claim that she belongs to a different order of being, that she possesses a distinct metaphysical constitution, or that she stands outside the shared human condition by nature. Whether one affirms or denies her sinlessness does not alter the structure of my position.

Mary’s uniqueness is relational and historical. She alone stands at the intersection of two otherwise incomparable relations: the relation between God and humanity, and the relation between a mother and her child

Each of these relations exists elsewhere. Their coincidence exists only once.

No prophet, no apostle, no saint, no theologian, regardless of holiness, insight, or closeness to God has ever stood in this position. Nor could anyone else ever do so.

For this reason, Mary may rightly be regarded as exceptional among human beings, because no other human life has been shaped by such a relation.

IV. Grace, Consent (Fiat), and Human Agency

It is essential to clarify that Mary’s consent is not understood here as an autonomous achievement detached from divine grace. From a Reformed perspective, all genuinely good human acts arise from God’s prior action. Mary’s “yes” is no exception.

She is neither coerced nor self-originating. Her consent is real, meaningful, and necessary, yet enabled by grace. This preserves both divine sovereignty and genuine human participation.

The same logic applies to St. Joseph.

V. Joseph and the Economy of the Incarnation

Joseph is often treated as theologically secondary, a background figure whose role is practical rather than meaningful. This is a mistake in my opinion.

Joseph’s consent, expressed in obedience to divine revelation, in remaining with Mary, in assuming legal fatherhood, and in protecting and raising Jesus (Matthew 1:20-21), is not incidental. Without Joseph, the concrete conditions of Jesus’ human life would not exist in the form they do.

Jesus does not merely need to be born. He needs to be raised, protected, taught, and situated within a real human family. Joseph is not biologically the father of Christ, but he is truly and decisively the father of Jesus’ human life.

For this reason, Joseph cannot be excluded from the economy that leads to redemption. While his role is not symmetrical to Mary’s, it is indispensable. One could meaningfully say that neither Mary nor Joseph stands alone as a passive instrument; both participate, by grace, in the historical realization of the Incarnation.

VI. On Co-Redemption and Terminology

Whether one applies terms such as Co-Redemptrix is ultimately secondary. What matters is clarity about what is meant.

Neither Mary nor Joseph redeems in the strict sense. Redemption, in its proper meaning, belongs solely to Christ and to the act of the Cross. Yet both Mary and Joseph participate in the conditions that make the full human life of Christ possible, a life that culminates in that redemptive act.

If one wishes to reserve technical language, that is understandable. If one wishes to emphasize participation rather than causation, that is equally valid. My concern is not terminological maximalism, but theological honesty about the human realities through which God chose to act.

VII. Independence from Dogmatic Variations

At this point, it should be clear why debates about Marian dogma do not determine my conclusion.

If Mary was sinless, her unique relation to Christ remains unique.

If she was not, that relation remains equally unique.

If tradition elevates her status, the relational fact still stands.

If one approaches Christ alone, the same fact emerges.

My view does not depend on resolving these disputes. It remains intact across doctrinal variations because it is grounded in the event of the Incarnation itself, not in later theological classifications.

VIII. Conclusion: Mary’s Uniqueness and the Glory of God

To recognize Mary’s uniqueness is not to compete with Christ, nor to obscure divine glory. On the contrary, it is to take seriously the form God chose for His self-revelation.

God did not redeem humanity by bypassing human relations, but by entering them fully. Mary’s motherhood and Joseph’s fatherhood are the very means through which it unfolds.

For this reason, honoring the singular place of Mary, and acknowledging the indispensable role of Joseph does not detract from God’s glory. It magnifies it.

With regard to class struggle, it emerges only out of decadence or the gradual degeneration of a nation, together with its progressive weakening and distortion through the influence of other nations. When addressing the so-called class question, it is necessary to examine the motives behind the actions of the upper classes themselves. What is often offered instead are various ethically incoherent claims or deterministic arguments suggesting that belonging to a particular class endows individuals with fixed predispositions that determine their character. This is simply class reductionism, a view rejected by the vast majority of nationalist ideologies, and it fails to withstand serious scrutiny.

People are not immoral or malicious by virtue of the amount of property they own or the income they earn. Such claims amount to little more than a myth. Individuals make concrete decisions that later affect the working class, and it is these decisions within a broader context of national decline, that give rise to class conflict and, eventually, revolutionary movements within the nation itself.

The Marxist concept encapsulated in the slogan “workers of the world, unite” is fundamentally flawed and has never reflected historical reality. Class conflict has always manifested itself within the framework of a particular nation, because it is always a specific nation that enters into decadence and undergoes gradual destruction. The causes of this destruction, moreover, lie primarily in external influences, international conflicts, and pressure exerted by other nations.

For this reason, the nation transcends class. It possesses greater explanatory power than class, because accepting class as the primary analytical category necessarily entails some form of reductionism and determinism. The nation, provides a more comprehensive framework for understanding social conflict, historical development, and collective responsibility.

Fascism does not require race as a foundational concept. Although fascism is often described as flexible and capable of adapting to different historical and cultural conditions, the introduction of race into its ideological core creates profound theoretical problems. Race may appear as a possible addition, but its inclusion undermines the very principles upon which fascism historically developed.

From its origins, fascism emerged as a rejection of materialist reductionism. This rejection was directed not only against Marxism and dialectical materialism, but against any worldview that reduces human history, agency, and creativity to fixed material determinants. Fascism developed in opposition to the idea that history is governed by impersonal forces such as class, economic structure, or biological necessity. Instead, it emphasized will, action, myth, and creative becoming.

The intellectual genealogy of fascism reflects this orientation. Thinkers such as Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, various anarcho-syndicalist theorists, Georges Sorel, and his intellectual circle contributed to a vision centered on human will, moral energy, and collective mobilization. Nationalist figures such as Enrico Corradini further developed this perspective by emphasizing national consciousness and historical agency rather than biological determinism. Within this tradition, the Sorelian myth, the idea of revolutionary action, and the glorification of future-oriented creativity formed a central axis of fascist thought.

Race, as an explanatory principle, disrupts this axis. It introduces a form of determinism that parallels the problems fascism identified in Marxist class reductionism. Where Marxism reduces history to class and economic relations, racial ideology reduces history to biological categories. In both cases, the individual is diminished, and human action is subordinated to an allegedly objective and pre-given material factor. This contradicts fascism’s emphasis on will, leadership, and the active shaping of history.

Fascism is grounded in the mobilization and direction of national energies into an organic unity. This process presupposes the primacy of political form, spiritual cohesion, and collective purpose. The nation, understood as a historical and cultural organism, is shaped through leadership and action rather than inherited biological essence. The addition of race shifts this focus away from political and spiritual formation toward static classification, thereby eroding the ideological coherence of fascism itself.

Moreover, fascism has historically presented itself as universal in form. It was articulated as a model applicable to different nations, cultures, and historical circumstances, each expressing fascist principles through its own traditions and conditions. Racial doctrine undermines this universality by tying the ideology to specific biological criteria, restricting its applicability and contradicting its original self-understanding.

For these reasons, race functions as an antithesis to fascism’s core philosophical commitments. It negates the rejection of determinism, weakens the centrality of human will and creativity, and disrupts the organic conception of the nation as a political and historical construct. Fascism, understood as a complete ideology rooted in action, myth, and collective formation, does not require racial theory and gains no conceptual coherence from its inclusion. On the contrary, race appears as an ad hoc addition that compromises the ideological foundations rather than completing them.

Georges Valois was a student of Georges Sorel and can be regarded as one of the earliest fascists. He was the founder of Le Faisceau, the first explicitly fascist political party in France. Valois was also one of the co-founders of the Cercle Proudhon, alongside figures such as Édouard Berth, who played a crucial role in shaping its ideological foundations.

The creation of the Cercle Proudhon can be understood as a decisive moment in the birth of fascism. Valois was a national syndicalist, and his understanding of economics, politics, and corporatism developed within this circle. The ideas formulated there represented an early synthesis of nationalism and revolutionary syndicalism, laying the groundwork for a corporatist conception of the state.

These ideas had a significant influence on many Italian syndicalists and contributed to the ideological formation of Italian Fascism and Italian corporatism. Elements of the Italian economic system implemented under Fascist rule were directly inspired by the theories and writings associated with Georges Valois and the Cercle Proudhon tradition.

During the Second World War, Valois viewed National Socialism as the complete antithesis of everything he believed in. He regarded it as a grave threat to the French nation and to French national sovereignty. In 1941, he joined the French Resistance and took part in the struggle against Nazism.

In 1944, Georges Valois was arrested by the Gestapo. He was deported to a concentration camp, where he died of typhus in February 1945. His death marked the end of a life defined by ideological commitment, political struggle, and ultimately resistance against a regime he considered fundamentally hostile to France and to his vision of national and social order.

Engelbert Dollfuß

Engelbert Dollfuss was the founder of the Austrian Fatherland Front, often considered the embodiment of Austrofascism. His regime was centered on Catholic values, corporatism, national unity, and the core principles of fascism as applied to Austria.

At the beginning of his rule in 1932, Dollfuss worked to consolidate Austria’s national identity and strengthen its independence. He opposed both Nazism and socialist movements, aiming to preserve Austrian sovereignty and prevent foreign domination. Together with allies such as Kurt Schuschnigg, he resisted the expansionist ambitions of the German Nazi Party.

Dollfuss also sought support from Italy and Hungary to maintain Austria’s independence. His efforts to implement a corporatist system and a uniquely Austrian form of fascism were directly opposed by the Nazis, who saw his policies as an obstacle to their plans for annexation.

On July 25, 1934, Engelbert Dollfuss was assassinated by Austrian Nazis during a failed coup. He died defending his vision of Austria: a sovereign nation guided by corporatist principles and traditional values. His death stands as a testament to a man who remained loyal to his ideals, striving to preserve the culture, identity, and independence of his nation in the face of foreign and ideological threats.

Kurt Schuschnigg

There is no question of ever accepting Nazi representatives in the Austrian cabinet. An absolute abyss separates Austria from Nazism. We do not like arbitrary power, we want law to rule our freedom. We reject uniformity and centralization. . . . Christendom is anchored in our very soil, and we know but one God: and that is not the State, or the Nation, or that elusive thing, Race.

Kurt Schuschnigg was the political successor of Engelbert Dollfuss and a central figure of Austrofascism. Although he did not die as a martyr in the literal sense, his life was marked by sacrifice, persecution, and unwavering loyalty to his vision of an independent Austria.

After the assassination of Dollfuss, Schuschnigg inherited a deeply fragile political situation. Italy could no longer provide effective support to Austria, and his political power was increasingly constrained by German pressure. Despite these limitations, Schuschnigg continued to defend Austrian sovereignty and openly opposed National Socialism. He never concealed his beliefs and remained publicly committed to his vision of Austria, even when it placed his life at risk.

Following the Anschluss in 1938, Schuschnigg was arrested by the Nazis and imprisoned. He spent years in concentration camps and narrowly escaped execution. In 1945, he was liberated together with other prisoners and transferred to Italy.

After the war, Schuschnigg emigrated to the United States, where he lived for many years before eventually returning to Austria, where he died after a full life. Though he survived, his experience stands as a testament to resistance, endurance, and steadfast commitment to national sovereignty in the face of overwhelming coercion.

Gregor Strasser

Gregor Strasser was a German political figure whose legacy occupies a complex and controversial place in twentieth-century political history. Although he was not a fascist, his ideas exerted a lasting influence on currents of revolutionary nationalism and revolutionary socialism, and he stood in clear opposition to Hitlerism and its imperial direction.

In the early years of the National Socialist movement, Strasser belonged to its radical wing. Alongside his brother Otto and figures such as Ernst Röhm, he contributed to shaping the party’s early economic and social program, emphasizing anti-capitalism, social justice, and national renewal. His vision represented a form of national revolutionary socialism that conflicted with the increasingly authoritarian and conservative course taken by Adolf Hitler.

As Hitler consolidated power, Strasser’s influence declined. The party leadership abandoned its earlier social-revolutionary promises, leading to deep internal conflicts between the revolutionary faction and those aligned with Hitler’s centralized authority and strategic compromises. Strasser ultimately broke with the party leadership and became a perceived threat to Hitler’s control.

In 1934, during the Night of the Long Knives, Gregor Strasser was arrested and executed. His death symbolized the final destruction of the revolutionary socialist wing of National Socialism and marked the triumph of Hitler’s personal dictatorship over internal ideological diversity.

Though he was not a fascist, Gregor Strasser remains a historical example of opposition to Hitlers National Socialism. His revolutionary nationalism and social radicalism continue to be cited as an inspiration by those who seek alternatives to both liberal capitalism and Marxism.

The “God-of-the-gaps” fallacy describes a situation in which a person inserts God into every area of scientific uncertainty, using divine action as an explanatory shortcut. Instead of seeking a deeper causal account, the argument relies on a placeholder.

By analogy, I have developed my own version of this error. It can be called the “Race-of-the-Gaps” fallacy. This fallacy appears whenever individuals explain complex social, cultural, historical, or political phenomena by appealing to race as the decisive cause, even when such an explanation lacks demonstrable evidence, fails to engage with alternative factors, and does not possess the explanatory power required to account for the event in question.

The “Race-of-the-Gaps” fallacy emerges most visibly when observers encounter a social or national phenomenon they do not understand. Instead of examining the historical development of the society, its cultural norms, institutional structures, religious commitments, geopolitical pressures, or economic conditions, they reduce the entire issue to racial characteristics. Race becomes a simplified answer that removes the burden of serious analysis. The social world is treated as a mechanical extension of biological categories, as if culture, morality, politics, and history did not have their own substantial causal depth.

Just as the God-of-the-gaps argument ignores the complexity of natural processes, the Race-of-the-Gaps argument ignores the richness of human society. It omits the decisive forces that shape nations: political institutions, historical trauma, religious imagination, moral education, family structure, economic systems, class dynamics, and the entire accumulated spiritual heritage of a people. These forces are neither reducible to genetics nor explained by racial essentialism. To attribute them to race requires the deliberate neglect of thousands of years of cultural formation.

The fallacy also fails at the level of explanatory power. A useful explanation must incorporate the greatest amount of relevant evidence with the fewest contradictions. Racial determinism cannot achieve this. It does not account for the vast differences within a single racial group, nor does it capture the similarities across racial lines that arise from shared religion, shared political experience, or shared cultural structures. Societies with identical racial composition frequently develop radically different political systems, moral codes, and cultural identities. Conversely, societies with distinct racial backgrounds often produce parallel values, similar institutional patterns, and comparable forms of collective life. Only a sociological, historical, and spiritual analysis can explain these convergences and divergences; a racial explanation cannot.

The Race-of-the-Gaps fallacy also undermines intellectual integrity. It tempts individuals toward laziness by providing a single, universalized answer that bypasses the responsibility of genuine inquiry. Instead of engaging with the complexity of national life, the adherent collapses it into a biological over-simplification. This is not merely an analytical error; it is a moral one, because it discards the dignity of human cultures and reduces the human spirit to a material mechanism.

In its final form, the Race-of-the-Gaps fallacy is a confession of ignorance disguised as certainty. It announces that one lacks the patience or capacity to understand the inner life of nations and cultures, and therefore chooses the easiest answer available. It is the mental shortcut of those who attempt to interpret the political world without the intellectual tools required to grasp it.

There is a common claim made by racial nationalists and biological determinists that race and culture are essentially the same thing, or that race produces culture in some direct, natural way. At first glance this appears to be a simple and intuitive argument: if race determines who we are biologically, and if culture is an expression of who we are, then it would follow that culture grows out of race. But when one looks deeper into the philosophical, historical, and ideological implications of such a claim, its foundations begin to collapse. The relationship between race and culture is far more complex than racial determinists admit, and many of their assumptions contradict the very principles they claim to uphold.

To begin with, it is true that if one fully accepted strict biological determinism, then race could be seen as a force that shapes culture. If our character, worldview, moral tendencies, and even our collective identity were all determined by genetics, then the habits, traditions, values, beliefs, and social structures that make up a culture would simply be the outward expression of inherited biological predispositions. In that case, culture would not be something created by human consciousness, history, or shared experience. It would be the inevitable result of a biological program. And under that strict determinist view, one could argue that race produces culture.

But such a view demands a deep commitment to biological determinism—a worldview in which human freedom, moral responsibility, spiritual agency, and cultural creativity are reduced to genetic mechanisms. This is the first major problem. Because the moment one accepts biological determinism, one enters into direct conflict with many ideological, religious, and philosophical traditions that view culture as a spiritual or intellectual expression rather than a material reflex.

Christianity is one of those traditions. Christianity understands human beings not as biological automatons, but as moral and spiritual agents capable of choosing good or evil. Human beings are accountable to God precisely because they possess free will, conscience, and the capacity for repentance and transformation. To claim that culture is simply the product of biological instincts would strip culture of its moral dimension and reduce human action to instinctive behavior. That would undermine the Christian understanding of personhood, sin, virtue, and salvation. For a Christian, the idea that culture is genetically predetermined is simply unacceptable.

The same contradiction appears within the idealist form of fascism represented by Giovanni Gentile. Gentile understood the nation, culture, and the state not as biological entities but as spiritual realities, created through the self-conscious activity of human thought and will. For Gentile, culture is the unfolding of the collective spirit, a dynamic process in which individuals shape and are shaped by the ethical life of the state. To reduce culture to biology would destroy the central idea of fascist idealism: that man creates himself through action, thought, and participation in the national community. Biological determinism would render the spiritual dimension of Gentile’s philosophy meaningless. Race, as a biological substance, cannot take the place of the active, self-creating spirit. Therefore, within Gentile’s idealist framework, race cannot be the foundation of culture.

Because of these conflicts, race can only be considered the source of culture if one fully embraces a materialist and deterministic worldview. But such a worldview is incompatible with Christianity, with idealism (fascist or otherwise), and with any philosophy that affirms human agency.

Another crucial point is that even the way we perceive race is itself a cultural construction. The categories by which people classify race, the importance they attach to it, the stereotypes they associate with it, and the boundaries they draw between groups are not biological facts—they are learned. They depend on the society one grows up in, the history one is taught, the ideology dominant in that society, its political structures, its religious traditions, and its economic conditions. Race is interpreted through a cultural lens. In some cultures racial categories are rigid; in others they are fluid. In some cultures they carry deep moral or political significance; in others they barely matter. This alone indicates that race cannot stand above culture as a universal or objective force. If race itself is understood differently depending on cultural context, then it is culture—not biology—that shapes the meaning of race.

This becomes even clearer when one considers the idea often mentioned by racial nationalists: the idea that people have a natural instinct to “protect their own kind.” The notion is that humans are biologically driven to defend their racial or ethnic group. But this too is deeply shaped by culture. Western societies like the United States or the United Kingdom tend to be individualistic, prioritizing personal autonomy over group identity. Eastern European societies, and especially those shaped by communist or authoritarian regimes, lean more toward collectivism. These differences are not rooted in genetics. They are the products of historical experience, political ideology, and social values. What one society considers a moral obligation—to protect and preserve the group—another society may see as unnecessary or irrelevant. This shows that even the instinct to protect one’s group is not a universal biological impulse but a culturally conditioned reaction.

Moreover, the idea that race determines culture becomes even less convincing when one examines the massive cultural diversity that exists within so-called racial categories. Europeans, despite being grouped into the same “race,” have radically different cultures, values, and historical experiences. The same is true in Asia. If race truly produced culture, then members of the same race should share the same cultural foundations. But they do not. Culture follows history, religion, geography, political development, and collective experience, not biology.

All of this leads to an unavoidable conclusion.

Race can only produce culture within a system of strict biological determinism. But biological determinism contradicts Christianity, contradicts idealist philosophy, contradicts the spiritual view of the nation, and contradicts any worldview that holds human beings morally responsible for their actions. Therefore, in any worldview that acknowledges human agency, moral freedom, or spiritual identity, race cannot be the source of culture.

On the other hand, culture clearly shapes the way race is understood, interpreted, and valued. Culture determines the boundaries and meanings of racial categories, not the other way around. Culture is a creation of human consciousness, shared experience, and historical development and not a product of genetic necessity.

Today, the word “revolution” is tossed around with reckless ease. Many call themselves radicals, warriors against the system, opponents of decadence, globalism, liberalism, capitalism—against everything and anything. But if we look closer, we see that their so-called “revolt” is little more than a chaotic scream with no soul. There is no doctrine, no spiritual vision, only a desperate negation of the void they feel inside.

This is not revolution.

This is not resistance.

It is nothing but cultural frustration without spirit.

And in this lies a profound betrayal of men like Georges Sorel.

Yes, Sorel was a Marxist. But he was no fanatic.

His concept of revolution was not built on blind rage or mechanical inevitability. It was a moral act, rooted in conviction, discipline, and sacrifice. He understood revolution not as destruction for its own sake, but as a spiritual rebirth of society—a reawakening of man’s dignity and purpose.

The tragedy of our time is that so many who now march under banners of “nationalism,” “reaction,” or “anti-globalism” have absorbed nothing of Sorel’s spirit. They imitate only the aesthetic of revolt—the posture, the slogans, the aggression—but without meaning.

They lack doctrine. They lack spiritual clarity.

They do not know what they are fighting for. Only what they are fighting against.

True revolution is not born from chaos, but from order—an inner order of the soul. It demands a guiding idea, a metaphysical foundation, a reason to act beyond instinct or resentment.

Without this, we are not revolutionaries.

We are not builders.

We are shadows firing blindly into the darkness, pretending it is war.

Many today wear the mask of the rebel, but they are not the heirs of Sorel.

They are his distortion.

They are his disgrace.

If revolution is to mean anything in our time, it must be spiritual, philosophical, and national. It must arise from a deep understanding of man, nation, duty, and destiny. It must not be reduced to impulse, nor paraded as mere reaction.

It must be a conscious act of will—but also of thought, of discipline, of meaning.

Without that, we have no revolution.

Only noise.

Only decay.