SOCIAL FOUNDATIONS OF POLITICAL ORDER IN INTERWAR EUROPE

In: World politics: a quarterly journal of international relations, Band 39, Heft 4, S. 449-478

Abstract

FOUR TYPES OF REGIMES OF HISTORIC IMPORTANCE APPEARED IN BETWEEN THE TWO WORLD WARS: PLURALIST DEMOCRACY, SOCIAL DEMOCRACY, TRADITIONAL DICTATORSHIP, AND FASCISM. THE AUTHOR ATTEMPTS TO EXPLAIN WHY PLURALIST DEMOCRACY WAS NOT POSSIBLE WHERE IT HAD NOT PREVIOUSLY BEEN ESTABLISHED, AND TO IDENTIFY THE CONDITIONS THAT LED TO SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC AND FASCIST REGIMES. IN DEVELOPING AN EXPLANATION OF THE REGIMES THAT APPEARED BETWEEN THE WARS, THE AUTHOR CHALLENGES A NUMBER OF WIDELY ACCEPTED INTERPRETATIONS OF FASCISM THAT ARE BASED ON SOCIAL STRUCTURE, ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, LEADERSHIP, POLARIZATION, AND IDEOLOGICAL CONFLICT.