Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T13:50:19.010Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

17 - Communism and fascism

from Part III - Politics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2015

J. R. McNeill
Affiliation:
Georgetown University, Washington DC
Kenneth Pomeranz
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Get access

Summary

Communism, born of the Russian Revolution of 1917, subsequently took root in Eastern Europe, China, Southeast Asia, and Cuba, providing the governing ideology for roughly one third of the world's population by the 1970s. In the Holocaust, the Soviet terror of the 1930s, the Chinese Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, and Cambodia's 'killing fields', communism and fascism generated human tragedies on an immense scale. Ideologies consist of ideas and values about public life, understandings as to how society works or ought to work, and contain both views of history and visions of the future. Such ideologies provided the foundation for social movements, usually embodied in a political organization or a party. In places where movements became regimes, fascists and communists alike had the opportunity to put their ideologies into practice. The effective end of communism occurred very differently from fascism. Its economic and moral failures had eroded support among both elites and ordinary people while generating movements of reform.
Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2015

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Further reading

Brown, Archie. The Rise and Fall of Communism. New York: Ecco, 2009.Google Scholar
Corner, Paul, ed. Popular Opinion in Totalitarian Regimes: Fascism, Nazism, Communism. Oxford University Press, 2009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Furet, François, and Nolte, Ernst. Fascism and Communism. Lincoln, ne: University of Nebraska Press, 2001.Google Scholar
Geyer, Michael, and Fitzpatrick, Sheila, eds. Beyond Totalitarianism: Stalinism and Nazism Compared. Cambridge University Press, 2009.Google Scholar
Kershaw, Ian, and Lewin, Moshe, eds. Stalinism and Nazism: Dictatorships in Comparison. Cambridge University Press, 1997.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neiberg, Michael S., ed. Fascism. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006.Google Scholar
Payne, Stanley. A History of Fascism, 1914–1945. Madison, wi: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.Google Scholar
Priestland, David. The Red Flag: A History of Communism. New York: Grove Press, 2009.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×