In Fascism: Past, Present, and Future, renowned historian Walter Laqueur illuminates the fascist phenomenon, from the emergence of Hitler and Mussolini, to Vladimir Zhirinovsky and his cohorts, to fascism’s not so distant future.Laqueur describes how fascism’s early achievements won many converts.But what successes early fascist parties can claim, Laqueur points out, are certainly overwhelmed by its disasters: Hitler may have built the Autobahnen, but he also launched the war that destroyed them.Laqueur tellingly uncovers contemporary adaptations of fascist tactics and strategies in the French ultra-nationalist Le Pen, the rise of skinheads and right-wing extremism, and Holocaust denial.He shows how single issues–such as immigrants and, more remarkably, the environment–have proven fruitful rallying points for neo-fascist protest movements.Fascism was always a movement of protest and discontent, and there is today a great reservoir of dissatisfaction with contemporary life throughout the world.Among the likely candidates for neo-fascist protest, Laqueur singles out certain parts of Eastern Europe and the Third World where old-fashioned class struggles still oppress millions. In carefully plotting fascism’s past, present, and future, Walter Laqueur offers a riveting, if sometimes disturbing, account of one of the twentieth century’s most baneful political ideas, in a book that is both a masterly survey of the roots, the ideas, and the practices of fascism and an assessment of its prospects in the contemporary world.
