Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Date of Degree

9-2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Program

Political Science

Advisor

Leonard Feldman

Committee Members

Susan Woodward

Robyn Marasco

Subject Categories

Political Theory

Keywords

Karl Polanyi, Fascism, Market Society, Crisis, Liberalism

Abstract

The revival of interest in the work of Karl Polanyi, which has generated valuable lines of inquiry across disciplines, has largely neglected Polanyi’s extensive writings on fascism. This dissertation argues that Karl Polanyi should be considered a theorist of fascism, one whose thinking revolves around the concept of a “fascist solution” arising as a consequence of a terminal deadlock of market society. This dissertation surveys two decades of Polanyi’s work to construct a full picture of his theory of fascism and its importance for his broader theorizing about the dynamics of capitalist societies. Polanyi makes at least three specific contributions to the study of fascism. First, he adds to the interpretation of fascism as a defensive response to capitalist crisis by conceptualizing fascism as a solution to the deadlock between markets and democracy. Second, Polanyi deepens our conception of fascist anti-individualism by outlining a fascist philosophy that envisions a society of depoliticized subjects, purged of individualism and autonomy, organized into a social totality geared toward capitalist production and international conflict. Third, Polanyi uncovers elective affinities between utopian liberalism and fascism, rejecting the common view that fascism is an implacable enemy of liberalism in all its forms. He located precursor elements of what would become interwar fascism in the thought of several classical liberal thinkers, whom he described as apostles of a liberal creed. This approach deepens and complicates the relation between fascism and capitalism by positing a liberal source for the fascist virus that emerged within market society. Polanyi contributes to our understanding of fascism by positing a model capable of traveling beyond the confines of European nationalist and racial ideologies by linking the fascist solution to the crisis tendencies within the liberal varieties of capitalism. The Polanyian theory of fascism posits a flexible, heterogeneous species of political reaction, a political phenomenon that is not just a unique possibility within market society, but a permanent feature of that society.

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