GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THEORY OP FASCISM 6gl
Mussolini writes, "denies in democracy, the absurd
conventional untruth of political equality dressed out in
the garb of collective irresponsibility." As the treatment
ofJews, socialists and pacifists in Germany shows, Fascism
also denies the dogma that all citizens of the State should
be equal before the law.
a denial of
(3) The denial of equality is reinforced by
the dogma of majority Sovereignty. It is not the case,
according to Fascism, that power in a community either
resides or ought to reside with the people or the majority
of the people. To quote again from Mussolini: " Fascism
denies that the majority, by the simple fact that it is a
it denies that numbers
majority, can direct human society;
alone can govern by means of a periodical consultation,
and it affirms the immutable, beneficial and fruitful
inequality of mankind, which can never be permanently
levelled by the mere operation of a mechanical process
such as universal suffrage." "The general will," which,
according to Fascism, it should be the aim of State policy
to express, is, says Major Barnes, "a question of motive
and not a question of counting votes irrespective ofmotives."
He proceeds to deride the view that "majority government
as a mere piece of machinery" is " calculated to
result in a more efficient, a wiser and more moral government
than any alternative piece of machinery that may
be suggested". What, in effect, the fascist is denying is
the possibility of discovering what is right merely by
counting heads. If it be asked where Sovereignty in a
community ought, according to fascist doctrine, to reside
the answer is in a General Will conceived on Rousseau's
lines. The General Will, according to Major Barnes, is
disinterested votes . . . because
expressed only by "truly
only the disinterested votes represent the social side of
human nature." According to Rousseau and to the idealist
theory of the State, the General Will, by virtue of the
fact that it is disinterested, is the source and repository
of morality. In a fascist State, however, it is the will of
those who are in power which is deemed toexpress the General