THE PEDIGREE OF FASCISM A POPULAR ESSAY ON THE WESTERN PHILOSOPHY OF POLITICS BY ALINE LION _Lady Margaret Hall, Oxon._ LONDON: SHEED & WARD 31, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 4 TO JOHN WALTER, ESQ., TO WHOSE QUESTIONS I OWE THE FIRST IDEA OF THIS BOOK. A. L. _First Published_, 1927 CONTENTS Part I THE POLITICAL ANTECEDENTS OF FASCISM CHAPTER PAGE I. Is Fascism a Revolution? 3 II. Liberalism in Italy 10 III. Nationalism and Socialism 23 IV. The European War and its Effects 37 Part II PHILOSOPHICAL ANTECEDENTS OF FASCISM I. Philosophical Antecedents 58 II. Humanism and Renaissance 70 III. The Seventeenth Century 92 IV. The Seventeenth Century in France 114 V. Giambattista Vico 125 VI. Illuminism in England and France 137 VII. Nineteenth Century in Italy 154 VIII. Benedetto Croce 170 IX. Giovanni Gentile 189 X. Benito Mussolini 211 Index 235 AUTHOR’S NOTE I should, perhaps, say from the first that I am neither Italian nor Fascist. Yet, having lived in Italy from 1913 to 1927, I cannot but be conscious of the fact that the country has undergone a deep change, and have come to the conclusion that it is a change for the better. My purpose in writing this book has been to bring to the knowledge of people possessed of a fair amount of general knowledge, the conclusions that might be formed by a specialist with regard to this change and the value of it. Incidentally I have endeavoured to discourage both those who would import Fascism, as it flourishes in Italy, into other countries, and those who would hinder the spread of that philosophy which, I hold, is its basis.