History buffs/majors?

[AtomicDumpling]

Hitler's NAZI party was not an idealogical movement based on any political or economic philosophy. It was neither conservative nor liberal. The Nazi party was nothing more than a tool to further Hitler's lust for power. Hitler and his cronies like Goebbels, Goring, and Himmler were perfectly willing to say or do whatever it took to gain control over Germany and the rest of Europe. Political and economic philosophy had nothing whatsoever to do with it.

Hitler was driven by nationalistic pride and a lust for power and sought revenge against the Jews, Slavs and Communists whose treachery he blamed for causing Germany's humiliating defeat by the Allied Powers in World War One and the crushing terms of the Treaty of Versailles.

Stalin was much more concerned with ruling the Soviet Union with an iron fist and repressing any dissent against his absolute power than he was with Marxist/Leninist philosophy.

Attempting to shoehorn Nazism into the modern socio-economic-political spectrum is a mistake. Nazism was not an intellectual philosophy designed to create a better form of governance. It was a struggle for raw, crude power. Nothing more.

[Chip R]

Hitler's NAZI party was not an idealogical movement based on any political or economic philosophy. It was neither conservative nor liberal. The Nazi party was nothing more than a tool to further Hitler's lust for power. Hitler and his cronies like Goebbels, Goring, and Himmler were perfectly willing to say or do whatever it took to gain control over Germany and the rest of Europe. Political and economic philosophy had nothing whatsoever to do with it.

Hitler was driven by nationalistic pride and a lust for power and sought revenge against the Jews, Slavs and Communists whose treachery he blamed for causing Germany's humiliating defeat by the Allied Powers in World War One and the crushing terms of the Treaty of Versailles.

Stalin was much more concerned with ruling the Soviet Union with an iron fist and repressing any dissent against his absolute power than he was with Marxist/Leninist philosophy.

Attempting to shoehorn Nazism into the modern socio-economic-political spectrum is a mistake. Nazism was not an intellectual philosophy designed to create a better form of governance. It was a struggle for raw, crude power. Nothing more.

Well said.

[Rojo]

You could have a spectrum based on political freedom where free and open democracy stands at one end and totalitarian undemocratic systems stand at the other. In that spectrum, you'd have the Communists and the Fascists sitting at the undemocratic end for their undemocratic single-party rule, just shy of absolute monarchies and despotism, where no voting takes place at all, diametrically opposed to a liberal democracy where voting takes place often and there are no barriers for entry for particiption.

The problem with the above is that it heavily biased. It says, in essense, American-style liberal capitalism is the definition of "free", so everything else comes up short. It's like me saying the definition of handsome is to be Rojo-like and then crowning myself Mr. Redszone.

A critic might point out that elections aren't really that democratic if big money vets candidates before deciding which of the two we can vote for. Or that, as FDR said, a necessitous man isn't a free man. Or that our workplaces are autocracies. Or that the government enforces a private property police state that enriches a few. I could go on.

My spectrum would move from elite control (right) to popular control (left). While most Communist regime became elite control states, communism as an ideology sits on the far left because everything -- politics and economics -- is controlled by the people.

But fascism, in theory and action, sits on the far right.

[RedsBaron]

While most Communist regime became elite control states, communism as an ideology sits on the far left because everything -- politics and economics -- is controlled by the people.

But fascism, in theory and action, sits on the far right.

While you can argue that in theory communism results in everything being controlled by the people in a century of actual practice this is absolutely untrue. In practice communism has been to freedom what the Chicago Cubs have been to winning World Series over the last century.