The Sociological Amplifiers
This text is a preview of History of the Reception of Hegel, volume I, to be published in 2026 by Reflexivity Press.
Fascist ideology was not merely a system of thought. It mobilized millions, it organized mass movements, it seized power. To understand this, we must analyze the sociological conditions that enabled its effect.
The common explanation runs: fascism mobilized “the little man”—the frustrated middle classes, the déclassé petty bourgeoisie, the insecure masses. This explanation is not wrong—but it is incomplete. For fascism was borne not only from below, but enabled from above: by capital, church, military. Without this support from the elites, the fascist movement could never have come to power.
28.8.1 The Psychology of Crisis - Fromm, Reich, Theweleit
The Weimar Republic was a society in permanent crisis: defeat in war, hyperinflation (1923), world economic crisis (1929), mass unemployment (6 million in 1932), political instability. This objective crisis produced subjective reactions—fear, insecurity, disorientation, longing for order.
Erich Fromm analyzed in “Escape from Freedom” (1941) the psychological structure of this longing.[1] Modern freedom—liberation from traditional bonds, individual autonomy, self-responsibility—was overwhelming for many people. It produced not liberation, but anxiety: fear of one’s own insignificance, of responsibility for one’s own life, of isolation in mass society.
Fascism offered a “solution” for this anxiety: the escape from freedom into submission. Submission to the Führer, to the people, to the movement gave meaning, belonging, identity. The individual no longer had to decide, think, take responsibility—he could surrender himself to a greater power. The burden of freedom was cast off.
Wilhelm Reich analyzed in “The Mass Psychology of Fascism” (1933) the libidinal structure of this submission.[2] Fascism mobilized sexual energy suppressed within authoritarian families. Mass rituals, uniforms, parades had an erotic component—they channeled suppressed drives into political aggression. The authoritarian family produced the authoritarian character, which tends toward submission and directs aggression against the weaker.
Klaus Theweleit showed in “Male Fantasies” (1977/78) how fascist masculinity rested on fear of the “feminine”—of dissolution, mixing, loss of control.[3] The fascist man constructed himself as “armored,” “hard,” “impenetrable”—and projected everything warded off onto enemies (Jews, communists, women). Violence was not a means to an end, but an end in itself—it secured the fragile male identity against the fear of one’s own dissolution.
These psychological analyses capture real mechanisms. The longing for authority, the libidinal investment in power, projection onto enemies—all this can be empirically observed. But psychological explanation has limits: it does not explain why fascism came to power precisely in Germany (not in other crisis-ridden countries). And it does not explain why elites supported fascism—for industrialists, bankers, generals did not suffer from mass anxiety or suppressed libido.
28.8.2 The Material Enablement - Capital, Church, Military
The decisive question is: why did elites support a movement that staged itself as “revolutionary,” that railed against “the system,” that pursued mass mobilization?
The answer: because these elites feared an even greater threat—communism. The Russian Revolution (1917), the Munich Soviet Republic (1919), the waves of strikes, the growing Communist Party, the world economic crisis, the threatened expropriation—all this generated panic among the propertied.
Fascism presented itself as a bulwark against Bolshevism. Hitler promised: destruction of the unions, ban on the Communist Party (KPD), elimination of the “Marxist danger,” restoration of order. For many industrialists, bankers, large landowners, this was attractive—more attractive than an unstable democracy threatened by communist electoral successes.
Capitalist Support
The financing of the NSDAP by big capital is documented, though disputed in its extent. Henry Ford (1863-1947) was one of the most open supporters—his antisemitic tract “The International Jew” (1920-22) was distributed en masse in Germany; Ford financed the NSDAP directly; Hitler kept a portrait of Ford in his office. In 1938 Hitler awarded Ford the Grand Cross of the German Eagle.[4]
IG Farben, the world’s largest chemical corporation, donated a total of 400,000 Reichsmarks in 1933 for Hitler’s election campaign—the largest single donation from industry. During the war, IG Farben produced Zyklon B for the gas chambers, built plants at Auschwitz, used forced laborers.[5]
On February 20, 1933, leading industrialists met at Göring’s invitation and donated a total of about 3 million Reichsmarks for the election campaign. The support was not motivated by ideological conviction, but by fear of communism and the labor movement—and by opportunism in view of the foreseeable seizure of power.
The historian Henry Ashby Turner showed that there was no unified master plan of big capital—the support was fragmented, opportunistic, in part contradictory.[6] Some industrialists supported Hitler, others were skeptical. But in sum, capital enabled the fascist seizure of power—through financing, through legitimation, through cooperation.
Church Support
The Catholic Church feared “godless communism”—the expropriation of the Church, the persecution of believers, the secularization of society. Fascism presented itself as defender of “Christian values” against Marxism.
The Lateran Treaties (1929) between Mussolini and the Vatican ended the conflict between the Italian state and the Church. The Pope recognized the Italian state; Mussolini recognized the sovereignty of the Vatican. In return, the Church supported the fascist regime.
The Concordat (1933) between Hitler and the Vatican legitimated the National Socialist regime internationally. The Church received guarantees for its institutions. In return, the Catholic Center Party dissolved itself; the Church renounced political resistance. The Concordat sanctioned the dictatorship—and gave it a semblance of normality.
In Spain, General Franco led the Civil War under the banner “por Dios y España.” The Church blessed the war as a “crusade” against godless communism. After victory, the Church was a pillar of the regime until Franco’s death (1975).
The Systematic Point
This support was not monocausal. Fascism did not come to power “only” through capital or “only” through the church. But without this material and ideological enablement by elites, it would not have succeeded.
Marxist analysis spoke of “fascism as agent of monopoly capital.” This formula is too simple—it ignores the inner logic of the fascist movement, the role of the middle classes, the psychological factors. But it captures a truth: fascism was useful for certain class interests. It smashed the unions, banned the communist party, disciplined the working class, secured the property order—at least in the short term.
The irony: many elites who supported Hitler did so out of fear of revolution. But their support led to a catastrophe that engulfed them too—war, destruction, defeat, division of Germany for decades. The elites’ “rational” calculation proved fatally irrational.
Erich Fromm: Escape from Freedom, New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1941. ↩︎
Wilhelm Reich: Die Massenpsychologie des Faschismus, Copenhagen: Verlag für Sexualpolitik, 1933; expanded 1946. ↩︎
Klaus Theweleit: Männerphantasien, 2 vols., Frankfurt/M.: Roter Stern, 1977/78. ↩︎
On Ford see Neil Baldwin: Henry Ford and the Jews. The Mass Production of Hate, New York: PublicAffairs, 2001. ↩︎
On IG Farben see Joseph Borkin: The Crime and Punishment of I.G. Farben, New York: Free Press, 1978. ↩︎
Henry Ashby Turner Jr.: German Big Business and the Rise of Hitler, New York: Oxford University Press, 1985. ↩︎