Sir James Gunn, 'Conversation Piece' (1932)

A triple portrait of (sitting down) G.K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc - the original intellectuals behind British fascism - together with their friend (standing) Maurice Baring

(via NPG 3654; Conversation piece (G.K. Chesterton; Maurice Baring; Hilaire Belloc) - Portrait - National Portrait Gallery) 

The Philosophy of British Fascism

At first glance Mosley’s take on the philosophy of fascism is quite as reliably unconventional as his ideas were about almost anything else. From the Abdication Crisis to the European Common Market, his views were hardly ever predictable and seldom less than startling. On close inspection, however, and beneath the standard Mosley bluster, his understanding of the intellectual phenomenon of fascism is actually quite acute and fits surprisingly neatly into the wider fascist expression.

Now I believe, as it so often happens in daily life, that creeds which appear to be so dissimilar are in fact susceptible of some reconciliation when examined more closely, and indeed of a certain synthesis; and I think I can show you that actually, in the Fascist doctrine today, you find a complete wedding of the great characteristics of both creeds. On the one hand you find in Fascism, taken from Christianity, taken directly from the Christian conception, the immense vision of service, of self-abnegation, of self-sacrifice in the cause of others, in the cause of the world, in the cause of your country; not the elimination of the individual, so much as the fusion of the individual in something far greater than himself; and you have that basic doctrine of Fascism— service, self-surrender—to what the Fascist must conceive to be the greatest cause and the greatest impulse in the world. On the other hand you find taken from Nietzschean thought the virility, the challenge to all existing things which impede the march of mankind, the absolute abnegation of the doctrine of surrender; the firm ability to grapple with and to overcome all obstructions. You have, in fact, the creation of a doctrine of men of vigour and of self-help which is the other outstanding characteristic of Fascism.

Therefore we find—I think I can claim—some wedding of those two great doctrines expressing itself in the practical creed of Fascism today. And that, in fact, works itself out in our whole attitude to life. We can bring it down to the smallest details of general existence. From the widest and most abstract conception we can come down to the most detailed things of daily life. We demand from all our people an overriding conception of public service, but we also concede to them in return and believe that in the Fascist conception the State should concede, absolute freedom. In his public life, a man must behave himself as a fit member of the State, in his every action he must conform to the welfare of the nation. On the other hand he receives from the State in return, a complete liberty to live and to develop as an individual. And in our morality—and I think possibly I can claim that it is the only public morality in which private practice altogether coincides with public protestation—in our morality the one single test of any moral question is whether it impedes or destroys in any way the power of the individual to serve the State. He must answer the questions: “Does this action injure the nation? Does it injure other members of the nation? Does it injure my own ability to serve the nation?” And if the answer is clear on all those questions, the individual has absolute liberty to do as he will; and that confers upon the individual by far the greatest measure of freedom under the State which any system under the State, or any religious authority has ever conferred upon the individual.

[The Philosophy of Fascism – OswaldMosley.com]

The simplest way to think of fascism philosophically speaking is of course as “right-wing Marxism”*. For all Marx's own bluster, his great revolutionary idea was little more than English liberalism overlaid with French socialism and then given ideological form by German idealism (specifically that of Hegel). If you swap socialism for syndicalism, and then swap liberalism for liberal nationalism (which, if it does not degenerate into Marxist socialism, ultimately just becomes nationalism), you get almost exactly what Giovanni Gentile and Benito Mussolini describe as classical fascism.

Christian socialism (or "social Christianity"- because despite Leo XIII’s protestations in Rerum Novarum the two things were essentially the same) on the other hand really built itself on a ideological base of Prussian socialism, albeit with a sugar coating of Christian morality. And in practice in Ireland and Austria it pretty quickly devolved into fascism in all but name - all the populism, all the anti-Semitism, all the silly flags and funny uniforms, and so on. And of course swap the Precious Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ with the Sacred Blood (and Soil) of our Forefathers and you can get from Christian Socialism to National Socialism in pretty much a single bound. 

In practice, funnily enough, it was really the British Empire - not to mention Charles Darwin, Houston Stewart Chamberlain, and even, albeit indirectly, Cecil Rhodes, et al. - who provided the "racialist" background reading that was so essential to the Nazi project. (And of course throw in the swastikas, the concentration camps and a paramilitary youth movement and you're most the way there. It shouldn't be much of a surprise that Hitler's favourite writer was Shakespeare and his favourite film was The Lives of a Bengal Lancer.) So it is hardly to be wondered at that Tom Mosley's "British" fascism comes across as hardly racist, nationalist or anti-Semitic at all - or rather no more consciously so than any instinctive, patriotic supporter of the British Empire might (however unfairly!) have been accused of being. In fact to build an ideology that is recognizably fascist on a base of "British imperialism" all Mosely really needs are a heavily socialised Anglican version of Christianity to supply the "socialism" and some German idealism to top it all off, only this time supplied by Nietzsche (with Spengler getting an honourable mention) rather than Hegel.

In general then there's not very much more to Mosley's fascism than the standard left-right synthesis of (typically oxymoronic!) generic "revolutionary conservatism" - trying to harness the vitality and egalitarianism (though Mosley insists on equality of opportunity rather than of outcome) of liberalism and socialism to the natural order, hierarchy and above all (of course!) authority of conservatism, producing a "Caesarism" but of the people, with complete private freedom and complete public duty and discipline. Mosley just puts it better than any "fascist" leader on the continent ever did.

In retrospect of course it's in keeping with the apparently self-contradictory nature of fascism that it should find perhaps its finest expression in England - that most self-contradictory (with the possible exception of Prussia) of all nations. And for good measure it's no less congruous that this most anti-intellectual and populist of creeds should find its finest ideological exposition in the mouth of an eccentric aristocrat!

Whatever else one might say about Oswald Mosley, if you want to "understand" fascism he's worth reading.

*I.e not really right-wing at all, but we can leave that.