The Frankfurt School and the Challenge of Fascism: An Intellectual and Philosophical Reconstruction

Fascism is a well-defined historical phenomenon, but its political-ideological offshoots have extended into today’s democracies. How should we understand the mimetic and dissimulating capacity of fascism? Starting from the analyses of the exponents of the first Frankfurt School in their rethinking of the Marxian relationship of structure and superstructure, this study considers how fascism may be defined as a specific organization of power together with a form of economic planning accompanied by a masochistic propensity to power. Drawing on archival research at the Horkheimer and Marcuse Archive in Frankfurt, the author guides us through unpublished documents of the Institute of Social Research in the years 1938-1939 concerning the plan to formulate ＂a theory＂ on fascism. This was never produced as a single work, allowing space instead to the flourishing of different contributions. The objective of this book is to provide an internal systemic reading of fascism, finding points of mutual integration among critical theorists whenever possible while revealing irreconcilable divergencies when necessary. This topical book will be of interest to academics and researchers working in the areas of philosophy, the history of ideas, legal philosophy, critical theory, economics and political science.

Claudio Corradetti is Professor of Political Philosophy at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, Italy. He has an extensive research interest in the tradition of Critical Theory, as well as in the philosophy of human rights, transitional justice and the tradition of Republicanism, particularly, Machiavelli and Kant. Some of his recent articles are: C.Corradetti,＂Deconstructive Dynamism in Machiavelli’s Prince＂, Jus Cogens, 7(1), pp.35-53; C.Corradetti, ＂Was Kant a Cosmopolitan Racist?＂, Kant Studien 115(4), 2024, pp. 454-471; C. Corradetti, ＂Machiavelli’s Pendulum: Political Action, Time and Constitutional Change＂, Philosophy & Social Criticism, 50(10), pp. 1541-1563. His latest books are: C.Corradetti Relativism and Human Rights. A Theory of Pluralist Universalism, Springer, Dordrecht, 2nd ed., 2022; C.Corradetti, Kant, Global Politics and Cosmopolitan Law. The World Republic as a Regulative Idea of Reason, Routledge, London-New York, 2020. He coedited an anthology titled: Theorizing Transitional Justice, Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot UK, 2015.