![An Italian partisan in Florence, 14 August 1944](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7f/An_Italian_partisan_in_Florence%2C_14_August_1944._TR2282.jpg)
Anti-fascism is a
political movement in opposition to
fascist ideologies, groups and individuals. Beginning in European countries in the 1920s, it was at its most significant shortly before and during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, where the
Axis powers
The Axis powers, ; it, Potenze dell'Asse ; ja, 枢軸国 ''Sūjikukoku'', group=nb originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis, was a military coalition that initiated World War II and fought against the Allies. Its principal members were ...
were opposed by many countries forming the
Allies of World War II
The Allies, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during the Second World War (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy ...
and dozens of
resistance movement
A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objective ...
s worldwide. Anti-fascism has been an element of movements across the political spectrum and holding many different political positions such as
anarchism,
communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
,
pacifism
Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaign ...
,
republicanism
Republicanism is a political ideology centered on citizenship in a state organized as a republic. Historically, it emphasises the idea of self-rule and ranges from the rule of a representative minority or oligarchy to popular sovereignty. It ...
,
social democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote s ...
,
socialism
Socialism is a left-wing Economic ideology, economic philosophy and Political movement, movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to Private prop ...
and
syndicalism
Syndicalism is a revolutionary current within the left-wing of the labor movement that seeks to unionize workers according to industry and advance their demands through strikes with the eventual goal of gaining control over the means of prod ...
as well as
centrist
Centrism is a political outlook or position involving acceptance or support of a balance of social equality and a degree of social hierarchy while opposing political changes that would result in a significant shift of society strongly to Left-w ...
,
conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
,
liberal
Liberal or liberalism may refer to:
Politics
* a supporter of liberalism
** Liberalism by country
* an adherent of a Liberal Party
* Liberalism (international relations)
* Sexually liberal feminism
* Social liberalism
Arts, entertainment and m ...
and
nationalist
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...
viewpoints.
Fascism, a
far-right ultra-nationalistic ideology best known for its use by the
Italian Fascists and the
Nazis
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in N ...
, became prominent beginning in the 1910s while organization against fascism began around 1920. Fascism became the state ideology of Italy in 1922 and of Germany in 1933, spurring a large increase in anti-fascist action, including
German resistance to Nazism
Many individuals and groups in Germany that were opposed to the Nazi regime engaged in active resistance, including attempts to remove Adolf Hitler from power by assassination or by overthrowing his established regime.
German resistance was ...
and the
Italian resistance movement. Anti-fascism was a major aspect of the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...
, which foreshadowed World War II.
Prior to World War II,
the West
West is a cardinal direction or compass point.
West or The West may also refer to:
Geography and locations
Global context
* The Western world
* Western culture and Western civilization in general
* The Western Bloc, countries allied with NATO ...
had not taken seriously the threat of fascism, and anti-fascism was sometimes associated with communism. However, the
outbreak of World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
greatly changed Western perceptions, and fascism was seen as an existential threat by not only the
Communist Soviet Union but also by the
liberal-democratic United States and United Kingdom.
The Axis Powers of World War II were generally fascist, and the fight against them was characterized in anti-fascist terms.
Resistance during World War II
Resistance movements during World War II occurred in every occupied country by a variety of means, ranging from non-cooperation to propaganda, hiding crashed pilots and even to outright warfare and the recapturing of towns. In many countries, r ...
to fascism occurred in every occupied country, and came from across the ideological spectrum. The defeat of the
Axis powers
The Axis powers, ; it, Potenze dell'Asse ; ja, 枢軸国 ''Sūjikukoku'', group=nb originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis, was a military coalition that initiated World War II and fought against the Allies. Its principal members were ...
generally ended fascism as a state ideology.
After World War II, the anti-fascist movement continued to be active in places where organized fascism continued or re-emerged. There was a resurgence of
antifa in Germany
Antifa is a political movement in Germany composed of multiple far-left, autonomous, militant groups and individuals who describe themselves as anti-fascist. According to the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and th ...
in the 1980s, as a response to the invasion of the
punk scene
The punk subculture includes a diverse and widely known array of ideologies, fashion, and other forms of expression, visual art, dance, literature, and film. Largely characterised by anti-establishment views, the promotion of individual freedom ...
by
neo-Nazis
Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and racial supremacy (often white supremacy), attack ...
. This influenced the
antifa movement in the United States
Antifa () is a left-wing anti-fascist and anti-racist political movement in the United States. It consists of a highly decentralized array of autonomous groups that use both nonviolent direct action and violence to achieve their aims. Most an ...
in the late 1980s and 1990s, which was similarly carried by punks. In the 21st century, this greatly increased in prominence as a response to the resurgence of the
radical right, especially after the
election of Donald Trump
The 2016 United States presidential election was the 58th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 2016. The Republican ticket of businessman Donald Trump and Indiana governor Mike Pence defeated the Democratic ticket ...
.
Origins
With the development and spread of
Italian Fascism, i.e. the original fascism, the
National Fascist Party
The National Fascist Party ( it, Partito Nazionale Fascista, PNF) was a political party in Italy, created by Benito Mussolini as the political expression of Italian Fascism and as a reorganization of the previous Italian Fasces of Combat. Th ...
's ideology was met with increasingly militant opposition by Italian communists and socialists. Organizations such as ''
Arditi del Popolo
The ''Arditi del Popolo'' (''The People's Daring Ones'') was an Italian militant anti-fascist group founded at the end of June 1921 to resist the rise of Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party and the violence of the Blackshirts (''squadrist ...
''
[Gli Arditi del Popolo (Birth)]
and the
Italian Anarchist Union emerged between 1919 and 1921, to combat the nationalist and fascist surge of the post-World War I period.
In the words of historian
Eric Hobsbawm, as fascism developed and spread, a "nationalism of the left" developed in those nations threatened by Italian
irredentism
Irredentism is usually understood as a desire that one state annexes a territory of a neighboring state. This desire is motivated by ethnic reasons (because the population of the territory is ethnically similar to the population of the parent sta ...
(e.g. in the
Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...
, and
Albania
Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...
in particular). After the outbreak of World War II, the
Albanian and
Yugoslav resistances were instrumental in antifascist action and underground resistance. This combination of irreconcilable nationalisms and
leftist partisans constitute the earliest roots of European anti-fascism. Less militant forms of anti-fascism arose later. During the 1930s in Britain, "Christians – especially the
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britai ...
– provided both a language of opposition to fascism and inspired anti-fascist action".
Michael Seidman argues that traditionally anti-fascism was seen as the purview of the
political left
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
but that in recent years this has been questioned. Seidman identifies two types of anti-fascism, namely revolutionary and counterrevolutionary:
* Revolutionary anti-fascism was expressed amongst communists and anarchists, where it identified fascism and capitalism as its enemies and made little distinction between fascism and other forms of authoritarianism. It did not disappear after the Second World War but was used as an official ideology of the Soviet bloc, with the "fascist" West as the new enemy.
* Counterrevolutionary anti-fascism was much more conservative in nature, with Seidman arguing that Charles de Gaulle and Winston Churchill represented examples of it and that they tried to win the masses to their cause. Counterrevolutionary antifascists desired to ensure the restoration or continuation of the prewar old regime and conservative antifascists disliked fascism's erasure of the distinction between the public and private spheres. Like its revolutionary counterpart, it would outlast fascism once the Second World War ended.
Seidman argues that despite the differences between these two strands of anti-fascism, there were similarities. They would both come to regard violent expansion as intrinsic to the fascist project. They both rejected any claim that the
Versailles Treaty
The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 19 ...
was responsible for the rise of Nazism and instead viewed fascist dynamism as the cause of conflict. Unlike fascism, these two types of anti-fascism did not promise a quick victory but an extended struggle against a powerful enemy. During World War II, both anti-fascisms responded to fascist aggression by creating a cult of heroism which relegated victims to a secondary position.
[Seidman, Michael. Transatlantic Antifascisms: From the Spanish Civil War to the End of World War II. Cambridge University Press, 2017, pp.1-8] However, after the war, conflict arose between the revolutionary and counterrevolutionary anti-fascisms; the victory of the Western Allies allowed them to restore the old regimes of liberal democracy in Western Europe, while Soviet victory in Eastern Europe allowed for the establishment of new revolutionary anti-fascist regimes there.
History
![101st with members of dutch resistance](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/101st_with_members_of_dutch_resistance.jpg)
Anti-fascist movements emerged first in Italy during the rise of
Benito Mussolini, but they soon spread to other European countries and then globally. In the early period, Communist, socialist, anarchist and Christian workers and intellectuals were involved. Until 1928, the period of the
United front
A united front is an alliance of groups against their common enemies, figuratively evoking unification of previously separate geographic fronts and/or unification of previously separate armies into a front. The name often refers to a political ...
, there was significant collaboration between the Communists and non-Communist anti-fascists.
In 1928, the
Comintern instituted its
ultra-left
The term ultra-leftism, when used among Marxist groups, is a pejorative for certain types of positions on the far-left that are extreme or uncompromising. Another definition historically refers to a particular current of Marxist communism, where ...
Third Period
The Third Period is an ideological concept adopted by the Communist International (Comintern) at its Sixth World Congress, held in Moscow in the summer of 1928. It set policy until reversed when the Nazis took over Germany in 1933.
The Comint ...
policies, ending co-operation with other left groups, and denouncing social democrats as "
social fascists
Social fascism (also socio-fascism) was a theory that was supported by the Communist International (Comintern) and affiliated communist parties in the early 1930s that held that social democracy was a variant of fascism because it stood in the way ...
". From 1934 until the
Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was a non-aggression pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union that enabled those powers to partition Poland between them. The pact was signed in Moscow on 23 August 1939 by German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ri ...
, the Communists pursued a
Popular Front
A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault".
More generally, it is "a coalition ...
approach, of building broad-based coalitions with liberal and even conservative anti-fascists. As fascism consolidated its power, and especially during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, anti-fascism largely took the form of
partisan or
resistance movements.
Italy: against Fascism and Mussolini
![Flag of the Arditi del Popolo Battalion](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/Flag_of_the_Arditi_del_Popolo_Battalion.svg)
In Italy, Mussolini's
Fascist regime used the term ''anti-fascist'' to describe its opponents. Mussolini's
secret police
Secret police (or political police) are intelligence, security or police agencies that engage in covert operations against a government's political, religious, or social opponents and dissidents. Secret police organizations are characteristic of ...
was officially known as the
Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism
The OVRA, whose most probable name was Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism ( it, Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell'Antifascismo), was the secret police of the Kingdom of Italy, founded in 1927 under the ...
. During the 1920s in the
Kingdom of Italy
The Kingdom of Italy ( it, Regno d'Italia) was a state that existed from 1861, when Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia was proclaimed King of Italy, until 1946, when civil discontent led to an institutional referendum to abandon the monarchy and f ...
, anti-fascists, many of them from the
labor movement, fought against the violent
Blackshirts
The Voluntary Militia for National Security ( it, Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale, MVSN), commonly called the Blackshirts ( it, Camicie Nere, CCNN, singular: ) or (singular: ), was originally the paramilitary wing of the Nation ...
and against the rise of the fascist leader Benito Mussolini. After the
Italian Socialist Party
The Italian Socialist Party (, PSI) was a Socialism, socialist and later Social democracy, social-democratic List of political parties in Italy, political party in Italy, whose history stretched for longer than a century, making it one of the l ...
(PSI) signed a
pacification pact with Mussolini and his
Fasces of Combat on 3 August 1921, and trade unions adopted a legalist and pacified strategy, members of the workers' movement who disagreed with this strategy formed ''
Arditi del Popolo
The ''Arditi del Popolo'' (''The People's Daring Ones'') was an Italian militant anti-fascist group founded at the end of June 1921 to resist the rise of Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party and the violence of the Blackshirts (''squadrist ...
''.
The
Italian General Confederation of Labour
The Italian General Confederation of Labour (; CGIL) is a national trade union based in Italy. It was formed by agreement between socialists, communists, and Christian democrats in the "Pact of Rome" of June 1944. In 1950, socialists and Christi ...
(CGL) and the PSI refused to officially recognize the anti-fascist militia and maintained a non-violent, legalist strategy, while the
Communist Party of Italy
The Italian Communist Party ( it, Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI) was a communist political party in Italy.
The PCI was founded as ''Communist Party of Italy'' on 21 January 1921 in Livorno by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party (PSI). ...
(PCd'I) ordered its members to quit the organization. The PCd'I organized some militant groups, but their actions were relatively minor. The Italian anarchist
Severino Di Giovanni
Severino Di Giovanni (17 March 1901 – 1 February 1931) was an Italian anarchist who immigrated to Argentina, where he became the best-known anarchist figure in that country for his campaign of violence in support of Sacco and Vanzetti and anti ...
, who exiled himself to Argentina following the 1922
March on Rome
The March on Rome ( it, Marcia su Roma) was an organized mass demonstration and a coup d'état in October 1922 which resulted in Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party (PNF) ascending to power in the Kingdom of Italy. In late October 1922, ...
, organized several bombings against the Italian fascist community. The Italian liberal anti-fascist
Benedetto Croce wrote his ''
Manifesto of the Anti-Fascist Intellectuals
The Manifesto of the Anti-Fascist Intellectuals, written by Benedetto Croce in response to the Manifesto of the Fascist Intellectuals by Giovanni Gentile, sanctioned the irreconcilable split between the philosopher and the Fascist government of B ...
'', which was published in 1925. Other notable Italian liberal anti-fascists around that time were
Piero Gobetti
Piero Gobetti (; 19 June 1901, Turin – 15 February 1926, Neuilly-sur-Seine) was an Italian journalist, intellectual and radical liberal and anti-fascist. He was an exceptionally active campaigner and critic in the crisis years in Italy after ...
and
Carlo Rosselli.
Concentrazione Antifascista Italiana
(CAI; Italian Anti-Fascist Concentration), officially known as (Anti-Fascist Action Concentration), was an Italian coalition of anti-fascist groups which existed from 1927 to 1934. It was formed in Paris on 27 March 1927 with the purpose of the ...
(Italian Anti-Fascist Concentration), officially known as Concentrazione d'Azione Antifascista (Anti-Fascist Action Concentration), was an Italian coalition of Anti-Fascist groups which existed from 1927 to 1934. Founded in
Nérac
Nérac (; oc, Nerac, ) is a commune in the Lot-et-Garonne department, Southwestern France. The composer and organist Louis Raffy was born in Nérac, as was the former Arsenal and Bordeaux footballer Marouane Chamakh, as was Admiral Francois D ...
, France, by expatriate Italians, the CAI was an alliance of non-communist anti-fascist forces (republican, socialist, nationalist) trying to promote and to coordinate expatriate actions to fight fascism in Italy; they published a propaganda paper entitled ''La Libertà''.
Between 1920 and 1943, several anti-fascist movements were active among the
Slovenes
The Slovenes, also known as Slovenians ( sl, Slovenci ), are a South Slavic ethnic group native to Slovenia, and adjacent regions in Italy, Austria and Hungary. Slovenes share a common ancestry, culture, history and speak Slovene as their na ...
and
Croats
The Croats (; hr, Hrvati ) are a South Slavic ethnic group who share a common Croatian ancestry, culture, history and language. They are also a recognized minority in a number of neighboring countries, namely Austria, the Czech Republic, ...
in the territories annexed to Italy after
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, known as the
Julian March
Venezia Giulia, traditionally called Julian March (Serbo-Croatian, Slovene: ''Julijska krajina'') or Julian Venetia ( it, Venezia Giulia; vec, Venesia Julia; fur, Vignesie Julie; german: Julisch Venetien) is an area of southeastern Europe wh ...
. The most influential was the militant insurgent organization
TIGR
TIGR, an abbreviation for ''Trst'', ''Istra'', ''Gorica'', and ''Reka'', full name Revolutionary Organization of the Julian March T.I.G.R. ( sl, Revolucionarna organizacija Julijske krajine T.I.G.R.), was a militant anti-fascist and insurgent or ...
, which carried out numerous sabotages, as well as attacks on representatives of the Fascist Party and the military. Most of the underground structure of the organization was discovered and dismantled by the
Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism
The OVRA, whose most probable name was Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism ( it, Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell'Antifascismo), was the secret police of the Kingdom of Italy, founded in 1927 under the ...
(OVRA) in 1940 and 1941, and after June 1941 most of its former activists joined the
Slovene Partisans
The Slovene Partisans, formally the National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Slovenia, (NOV in POS) were part of Europe's most effective anti-Nazi resistance movement Jeffreys-Jones, R. (2013): ''In Spies We Trust: The Story of Western ...
.
During
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, many members of the
Italian resistance
The Italian resistance movement (the ''Resistenza italiana'' and ''la Resistenza'') is an umbrella term for the Italian resistance groups who fought the occupying forces of Nazi Germany and the fascist collaborationists of the Italian Socia ...
left their homes and went to live in the mountains, fighting against Italian fascists and
German Nazi
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
soldiers during the
Italian Civil War. Many cities in Italy, including
Turin
Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. The ...
,
Naples
Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
and
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
, were freed by anti-fascist uprisings.
Slovenians and Croats under Italianization
The anti-fascist resistance emerged within the
Slovene minority in Italy (1920–1947), whom the Fascists meant to
deprive of their culture, language and ethnicity. The 1920 burning of the
National Hall in Trieste, the
Slovene center in the multi-cultural and multi-ethnic
Trieste
Trieste ( , ; sl, Trst ; german: Triest ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital city, and largest city, of the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, one of two autonomous regions which are not subdivided into prov ...
by the Blackshirts,
was praised by Benito Mussolini (yet to become Il Duce) as a "masterpiece of the Triestine fascism" ().
The use of Slovene in public places, including churches, was forbidden, not only in multi-ethnic areas, but also in the areas where the population was exclusively Slovene. Children, if they spoke Slovene, were punished by Italian teachers who were brought by the Fascist State from
Southern Italy. Slovene teachers, writers, and clergy were sent to the other side of Italy.
The first anti-fascist organization, called
TIGR
TIGR, an abbreviation for ''Trst'', ''Istra'', ''Gorica'', and ''Reka'', full name Revolutionary Organization of the Julian March T.I.G.R. ( sl, Revolucionarna organizacija Julijske krajine T.I.G.R.), was a militant anti-fascist and insurgent or ...
, was formed by Slovenes and Croats in 1927 in order to fight Fascist violence. Its guerrilla fight continued into the late 1920s and 1930s.
[Cresciani, Gianfranco (2004]
Clash of civilisations
, Italian Historical Society Journal, Vol. 12, No. 2, p. 4 By the mid-1930s, 70,000 Slovenes had fled Italy, mostly to
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
(then part of Yugoslavia) and
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sout ...
.
The Slovene anti-fascist resistance in
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...
during World War II was led by
Liberation Front of the Slovenian People
The Liberation Front of the Slovene Nation ( sl, Osvobodilna fronta slovenskega naroda), or simply Liberation Front (''Osvobodilna fronta'', OF), originally called the Anti-Imperialist Front (''Protiimperialistična fronta'', PIF), was a Slovene ...
. The
Province of Ljubljana, occupied by Italian Fascists, saw the deportation of 25,000 people, representing 7.5% of the total population, filling up the
Rab concentration camp
The Rab concentration camp ( it, Campo di concentramento per internati civili di Guerra – Arbe; hr, Koncentracijski logor Rab; sl, Koncentracijsko taborišče Rab) was one of several Italian concentration camps. It was established during World ...
and
Gonars concentration camp
The Gonars concentration camp was one of the several Italian concentration camps and it was established on February 23, 1942, near Gonars, Italy.
Many internees were transferred to this camp from the other Italian concentration camp, Rab concen ...
as well as other
Italian concentration camps
Italian concentration camps include camps from the Italian colonial wars in Africa as well as camps for the civilian population from areas occupied by Italy during World War II. Memory of both camps were subjected to "historical amnesia". The repr ...
.
Germany: against the NSDAP and Hitlerism
![3arrows Anti-fascist](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/64/3arrows_Anti-fascist.png)
The specific term anti-fascism was primarily used by the
Communist Party of Germany (KPD), which held the view that it was the only anti-fascist party in Germany. The KPD formed several explicitly anti-fascist groups such as ''
Roter Frontkämpferbund
The (, translated as "Alliance of Red Front-Fighters" or "Red Front Fighters' League"), usually called (RFB), was a far-left paramilitary organization affiliated with the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) during the Weimar Republic. It was of ...
'' (formed in 1924 and banned by the
Social Democrats
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote so ...
in 1929) and ''Kampfbund gegen den Faschismus'' (a ''de facto'' successor to the latter). At its height, ''Roter Frontkämpferbund'' had over 100,000 members. In 1932, the KPD established the
Antifaschistische Aktion
''Antifaschistische Aktion'' () was a militant anti-fascist organisation in the Weimar Republic started by members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) that existed from 1932 to 1933. It was primarily active as a KPD campaign during the Ju ...
as a "red united front under the leadership of the only anti-fascist party, the KPD".
Under the leadership of the committed
Stalinist Ernst Thälmann
Ernst Johannes Fritz Thälmann (; 16 April 1886 – 18 August 1944) was a German communist politician, and leader of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) from 1925 to 1933.
A committed Marxist-Leninist and Stalinist, Thälmann played a major r ...
, the KPD primarily viewed fascism as the final stage of
capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, priva ...
rather than as a specific movement or group, and therefore applied the term broadly to its opponents, and in the name of anti-fascism the KPD focused in large part on attacking its main adversary, the centre-left
Social Democratic Party of Germany, whom they referred to as
social fascists
Social fascism (also socio-fascism) was a theory that was supported by the Communist International (Comintern) and affiliated communist parties in the early 1930s that held that social democracy was a variant of fascism because it stood in the way ...
and regarded as the "main pillar of the dictatorship of Capital."
The movement of
Nazism
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) i ...
, which grew ever more influential in the last years of the
Weimar Republic
The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is ...
, was opposed for different ideological reasons by a wide variety of groups, including groups which also opposed each other, such as social democrats, centrists, conservatives and communists. The SPD and centrists formed ''
Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold'' in 1924 to defend
liberal democracy
Liberal democracy is the combination of a liberal political ideology that operates under an indirect democratic form of government. It is characterized by elections between multiple distinct political parties, a separation of powers into ...
against both the Nazi Party and the KPD, and their affiliated organizations. Later, mainly SPD members formed the
Iron Front
The Iron Front (german: Eiserne Front) was a German paramilitary organization in the Weimar Republic which consisted of social democrats, trade unionists, and liberals. Its main goal was to defend liberal democracy against totalitarian ide ...
which opposed the same groups.
The name and logo of ''Antifaschistische Aktion'' remain influential. Its two-flag logo, designed by and , is still widely used as a symbol of militant anti-fascists in Germany and globally, as is the Iron Front's
Three Arrows
The Three Arrows (german: Drei Pfeile) is a social democratic political symbol associated with the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), used in the late history of the Weimar Republic. First conceived for the SPD-dominated Iron Front as ...
logo.
Spain: Civil War against the Nationalists
![Barcelone 19 juillet 1936](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Barcelone_19_juillet_1936.jpg)
The historian
Eric Hobsbawm wrote: "The
Spanish civil war
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...
was both at the centre and on the margin of the era of anti-fascism. It was central, since it was immediately seen as a European war between fascism and anti-fascism, almost as the first battle in the coming world war, some of the characteristic aspects of which – for example, air raids against civilian populations – it anticipated."
![Strijdlustige_vrouw_-_Woman_ready_to_fight_(3334194838)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/Strijdlustige_vrouw_-_Woman_ready_to_fight_%283334194838%29.jpg)
In Spain, there were histories of popular uprisings in the late 19th century through to the 1930s against the deep-seated military dictatorships. of General Prim and the Primo de la Rivieras These movements further coalesced into large-scale anti-fascist movements in the 1930s, many in the Basque Country, before and during the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...
. The
republican
Republican can refer to:
Political ideology
* An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law.
** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...
government and army, the
Antifascist Worker and Peasant Militias
{{anti-fascism sidebar, Interwar anti-fascism
The Antifascist Worker and Peasant Militias ( es, Milicias Antifascistas Obreras y Campesinas, MAOC) were a militia group founded in the Second Spanish Republic in 1934. Their purpose was to protect l ...
(MAOC) linked to the
Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...
(PCE),
[De Miguel, Jesús y Sánchez, Antonio: ''Batalla de Madrid,'' in his ''Historia Ilustrada de la Guerra Civil Española.'' Alcobendas, Editorial Libsa, 2006, pp. 189–221.] the
International Brigades, the
Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM),
Spanish anarchist militias
A militia () is generally an army or some other fighting organization of non-professional soldiers, citizens of a country, or subjects of a state, who may perform military service during a time of need, as opposed to a professional force of r ...
, such as the
Iron Column
The Iron Column ( ca, Columna de Ferro, es, Columna de Hierro) was a Valencian anarchist militia column formed during the Spanish Civil War to fight against the military forces of the Nationalist Faction that had rebelled against the Second ...
and the autonomous governments of
Catalonia
Catalonia (; ca, Catalunya ; Aranese Occitan: ''Catalonha'' ; es, Cataluña ) is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a '' nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy.
Most of the territory (except the Val d'Aran) lies on the nort ...
and the
Basque Country, fought the rise of
Francisco Franco with military force.
The
Friends of Durruti
The Friends of Durruti Group (in Spanish, ''Agrupación de los Amigos de Durruti'') was an anarchist group in Spain, named after Buenaventura Durruti. It was founded on 15 March 1937, by Jaime Balius, Félix Martínez (anarchist), Félix Martínez ...
, associated with the
Federación Anarquista Ibérica
The Iberian Anarchist Federation ( es, Federación Anarquista Ibérica, FAI) is a Spanish organization of anarchist militants active within affinity groups in the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) anarcho-syndicalist union. It is often ...
(FAI), were a particularly militant group. Thousands of people from many countries went to Spain in support of the anti-fascist cause, joining units such as the
Abraham Lincoln Brigade
The Abraham Lincoln Brigade ( es, Brigada Abraham Lincoln), officially the XV International Brigade (''XV Brigada Internacional''), was a mixed brigade that fought for the Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War as a part of the Internation ...
, the
British Battalion
The British Battalion (1936–1938; officially the Saklatvala Battalion) was the 16th battalion of the XV International Brigade, one of the mixed brigades of the International Brigades, during the Spanish Civil War. It comprised British and ...
, the
Dabrowski Battalion, the
Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, the
Naftali Botwin Company and the
Thälmann Battalion
The Thälmann Battalion was a battalion of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. It was named after the imprisoned German communist leader Ernst Thälmann (born 16 April 1886, executed 18 August 1944) and included approximately 1,50 ...
, including
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
's nephew,
Esmond Romilly
}
Esmond Marcus David Romilly (10 June 1918 – 30 November 1941) was a British socialist, anti-fascist, and journalist, who was in turn a schoolboy rebel, a veteran with the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War and, following ...
. Notable anti-fascists who worked internationally against Franco included:
George Orwell (who fought in the POUM militia and wrote ''
Homage to Catalonia
''Homage to Catalonia'' is George Orwell's personal account of his experiences and observations fighting in the Spanish Civil War for the POUM militia of the Republican army.
Published in 1938 (about a year before the war ended) with little c ...
'' about his experience),
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century f ...
(a supporter of the International Brigades who wrote ''
For Whom the Bell Tolls
''For Whom the Bell Tolls'' is a novel by Ernest Hemingway published in 1940. It tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American volunteer attached to a Republican guerrilla unit during the Spanish Civil War. As a dynamiter, he is assigned ...
'' about his experience), and the radical journalist
Martha Gellhorn
Martha Ellis Gellhorn (8 November 1908 – 15 February 1998) was an American novelist, travel writer, and journalist who is considered one of the great war correspondents of the 20th century.
Gellhorn reported on virtually every major worl ...
.
The Spanish anarchist
guerrilla Francesc Sabaté Llopart Francesc () is a masculine given name of Catalan origin. It is a cognate of Francis, Francesco, Francisco, François, and Franz. People with the name include:
*Cesc Fàbregas (Francesc Fàbregas i Soler) (born 1987), Spanish professional football ...
fought against Franco's regime until the 1960s, from a base in France. The
Spanish Maquis
The Maquis were Spanish guerrillas who waged an irregular warfare against the Francoist dictatorship within Spain following the Republican defeat in the Spanish Civil War until the early 1960s, carrying out sabotage, robberies (to help fund ...
, linked to the PCE, also fought the Franco regime long after the Spanish Civil war had ended.
France: against ''Action Française'' and Vichy
![Members of the Maquis in La Tresorerie](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Members_of_the_Maquis_in_La_Tresorerie.jpg)
In the 1920s and 1930s in the
French Third Republic
The French Third Republic (french: Troisième République, sometimes written as ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War, until 10 July 19 ...
, anti-fascists confronted aggressive
far-right groups such as the
Action Française
Action may refer to:
* Action (narrative), a literary mode
* Action fiction, a type of genre fiction
* Action game, a genre of video game
Film
* Action film, a genre of film
* ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford
* ''Action'' (1980 fil ...
movement in France, which dominated the
Latin Quarter
The Latin Quarter of Paris (french: Quartier latin, ) is an area in the 5th and the 6th arrondissements of Paris. It is situated on the left bank of the Seine, around the Sorbonne.
Known for its student life, lively atmosphere, and bistro ...
students' neighborhood. After fascism triumphed via invasion, the French Resistance (french: La Résistance française) or, more accurately,
resistance movement
A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objective ...
s fought against the
Nazi German
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
occupation and against the collaborationist
Vichy régime
Vichy France (french: Régime de Vichy; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was the fascist French state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II. Officially independent, but with half of its terr ...
. Resistance cells were small groups of armed men and women (called the
''maquis'' in rural areas), who, in addition to their
guerrilla warfare activities, were also publishers of
underground newspapers and magazines such as ''
Arbeiter und Soldat
''Arbeiter und Soldat'' (meaning ''Worker and Soldier'' in English) was a clandestine magazine produced for German soldiers by the French Trotskyist group Internationalist Workers Party, Parti Ouvrier Internationaliste during the World War II Nazi ...
'' (''Worker and Soldier'') during World War Two, providers of first-hand intelligence information, and maintainers of escape networks.
United Kingdom: against Mosley's BUF
The rise of
Oswald Mosley
Sir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet (16 November 1896 – 3 December 1980) was a British politician during the 1920s and 1930s who rose to fame when, having become disillusioned with mainstream politics, he turned to fascism. He was a member ...
's
British Union of Fascists (BUF) in the 1930s was challenged by the
Communist Party of Great Britain,
socialists
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the eco ...
in the
Labour Party and
Independent Labour Party
The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse working-class candidates ...
,
anarchists
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessari ...
,
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
dockmen and
working class
The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colo ...
Jew
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...
s in
London's East End. A high point in the struggle was the
Battle of Cable Street
The Battle of Cable Street was a series of clashes that took place at several locations in the inner East End, most notably Cable Street, on Sunday 4 October 1936. It was a clash between the Metropolitan Police, sent to protect a march by mem ...
, when thousands of eastenders and others turned out to stop the BUF from marching. Initially, the national Communist Party leadership wanted a mass demonstration at
Hyde Park in solidarity with
Republican Spain
The Spanish Republic (), commonly known as the Second Spanish Republic (), was the form of government in Spain from 1931 to 1939. The Republic was proclaimed on 14 April 1931, after the deposition of King Alfonso XIII, and was dissolved on 1 A ...
, instead of a mobilization against the BUF, but local party activists argued against this. Activists rallied support with the slogan ''
They shall not pass
In Modern English, ''they'' is a third-person pronoun relating to a grammatical subject.
Morphology
In Standard Modern English, ''they'' has five distinct word forms:
* ''they'': the nominative (subjective) form
* ''them'': the accusat ...
,'' adopted from Republican Spain.
There were debates within the anti-fascist movement over tactics. While many East End ex-servicemen participated in violence against fascists, Communist Party leader
Phil Piratin
Philip Piratin (15 May 1907 – 10 December 1995) was a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) and one of the four CPGB Members of Parliament during the first thirty years of its existence. (The others were Shapurji Saklatvala, Wa ...
denounced these tactics and instead called for large demonstrations. In addition to the militant anti-fascist movement, there was a smaller current of liberal anti-fascism in Britain; Sir
Ernest Barker, for example, was a notable English liberal anti-fascist in the 1930s.
United States, World War II
![Woody Guthrie NYWTS](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/Woody_Guthrie_NYWTS.jpg)
Anti-fascist Italian expatriates in the United States founded the
Mazzini Society The Mazzini Society was an antifascist political association, formed on a democratic and republican basis, situating itself within the tradition of the Risorgimento, and created in the United States by Italian-American immigrants in the late 1930s. ...
in
Northampton, Massachusetts in September 1939 to work toward ending Fascist rule in Italy. As political refugees from Mussolini's regime, they disagreed among themselves whether to ally with Communists and anarchists or to exclude them. The Mazzini Society joined with other anti-Fascist Italian expatriates in the Americas at a conference in
Montevideo, Uruguay in 1942. They unsuccessfully promoted one of their members,
Carlo Sforza
Count Carlo Sforza (24 January 1872 – 4 September 1952) was an Italian diplomat and anti-fascist politician.
Life and career
Sforza was born at Lucca, the second son of Count Giovanni Sforza (1846-1922), an archivist and noted historian ...
, to become the post-Fascist leader of a republican Italy. The Mazzini Society dispersed after the overthrow of Mussolini as most of its members returned to Italy.
During the
Second Red Scare
McCarthyism is the practice of making false or unfounded accusations of subversion and treason, especially when related to anarchism, communism and socialism, and especially when done in a public and attention-grabbing manner.
The term origina ...
which occurred in the United States in the years that immediately followed the end of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, the term "premature anti-fascist" came into currency and it was used to describe Americans who had strongly agitated or worked against fascism, such as Americans who had fought for the
Republicans during the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...
, before fascism was seen as a proximate and existential threat to the United States (which only occurred generally after the
invasion of Poland
The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week aft ...
by
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
and only occurred universally after the
attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl HarborAlso known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii ...
). The implication was that such persons were either Communists or Communist sympathizers whose loyalty to the United States was suspect. However, the historians
John Earl Haynes
John Earl Haynes (born 1944) is an American historian who worked as a specialist in 20th-century political history in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress. He is known for his books on the subject of the American Communist and anti- ...
and
Harvey Klehr
Harvey Elliott Klehr (born December 25, 1945) is a professor of politics and history at Emory University. Klehr is known for his books on the subject of the American Communist movement, and on Soviet espionage in America (many written jointly wit ...
have written that no documentary evidence has been found of the US government referring to American members of the
International Brigades as "premature antifascists": the
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...
,
Office of Strategic Services, and
United States Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...
records used terms such as "Communist", "Red", "subversive", and "radical" instead. Indeed, Haynes and Klehr indicate that they have found many examples of members of the
XV International Brigade
The Abraham Lincoln Brigade ( es, Brigada Abraham Lincoln), officially the XV International Brigade (''XV Brigada Internacional''), was a mixed brigade that fought for the Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War as a part of the Internation ...
and their supporters referring to themselves sardonically as "premature antifascists".
Burma, World War II
The
Anti-Fascist Organisation
The Anti-Fascist Organisation (AFO) was a resistance movement against the Japanese occupation of Burma and independence of Burma during World War II. It was the forerunner of the Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League.
History
The AFO was formed a ...
(AFO) was a
resistance movement
A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objective ...
which advocated the independence of Burma and fought against the
Japanese occupation of Burma during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
. It was the forerunner of the
Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League
The Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League (AFPFL), ; abbreviated , ''hpa hsa pa la'' was the dominant political alliance in Burma from 1945 to 1958. It consisted of political parties and mass and class organizations.
The league evolved out of ...
. The AFO was formed during a meeting which was held in
Pegu
Bago (formerly spelt Pegu; , ), formerly known as Hanthawaddy, is a city and the capital of the Bago Region in Myanmar. It is located north-east of Yangon.
Etymology
The Burmese name Bago (ပဲခူး) is likely derived from the Mon langua ...
in August 1944, the meeting was held by the leaders of the
Communist Party of Burma
The Communist Party of Burma (CPB), also known as the Burma Communist Party (BCP), is a clandestine communist party in Myanmar (Burma). It is the oldest existing political party in the country.
Founded in 1939, the CPB initially fought ag ...
(CPB), the
Burma National Army
The Burma Independence Army (BIA), was a collaborationist and revolutionary army that fought for the end of British rule in Burma by assisting the Japanese in their conquest of the country in 1942 during World War II. It was the first post-c ...
(BNA) led by General
Aung San
Aung San (, ; 13 February 191519 July 1947) was a Burmese politician, independence activist and revolutionary. He was instrumental in Myanmar's struggle for independence from British rule, but he was assassinated just six months before his goa ...
, and the People's Revolutionary Party (PRP), later renamed the
Burma Socialist Party.
Whilst in Insein prison in July 1941, CPB leaders
Thakin Than Tun
Thakin Than Tun ( my, သခင် သန်းထွန်း; 1911 – 24 September 1968) was a Burmese politician and leader of the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) from 1945 until his assassination in 1968. He was uncle of the former State C ...
and
Thakin Soe
Thakin Soe ( my, သခင်စိုး, ; 1906 – 6 May 1989) was a founding member of the Communist Party of Burma, formed in 1939 and a leader of Anti-Fascist Organisation. He is regarded as one of Burma's most prominent communist leaders. ...
had co-authored the ''Insein Manifesto'', which, against the prevailing opinion in the Burmese nationalist movement led by the ''
Dobama Asiayone'', identified world
fascism
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...
as the main enemy in the coming war and called for temporary cooperation with the British in a broad allied coalition that included the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
. Soe had already gone underground to organise resistance against the Japanese occupation, and Than Tun as Minister of Land and Agriculture was able to pass on Japanese intelligence to Soe, while other Communist leaders Thakin Thein Pe and Thakin Tin Shwe made contact with the exiled colonial government in
Simla
Shimla (; ; also known as Simla, the official name until 1972) is the capital and the largest city of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. In 1864, Shimla was declared as the summer capital of British India. After independence, th ...
,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
. Aung San was War Minister in the puppet administration which was set up on 1 August 1943 and included the Socialist leaders
Thakin Nu
Dobama Asiayone ( my, တို့ဗမာအစည်းအရုံး, ''Dóbăma Ăsì-Ăyòun'', meaning ''We Burmans Association'', DAA), commonly known as the Thakhins ( my, သခင် ''sa.hkang'', lit. Lords), was a Burmese national ...
and
Thakin Mya
Dobama Asiayone ( my, တို့ဗမာအစည်းအရုံး, ''Dóbăma Ăsì-Ăyòun'', meaning ''We Burmans Association'', DAA), commonly known as the Thakhins ( my, သခင် ''sa.hkang'', lit. Lords), was a Burmese national ...
.
During a meeting which was held between 1 and 3 March 1945, the AFO was reorganized as a multi-party front which was named the
Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League
The Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League (AFPFL), ; abbreviated , ''hpa hsa pa la'' was the dominant political alliance in Burma from 1945 to 1958. It consisted of political parties and mass and class organizations.
The league evolved out of ...
.
Poland, World War II
![Odezwa Bloku Antyfaszystowskiego z 15 maja 1942](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/Odezwa_Bloku_Antyfaszystowskiego_z_15_maja_1942.jpg)
The Anti-Fascist Bloc was an organization of
Polish Jews
The history of the Jews in Poland dates back at least 1,000 years. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Ashkenazi Jewish community in the world. Poland was a principal center of Jewish culture, because of the l ...
formed in the March 1942 in the
Warsaw Ghetto
The Warsaw Ghetto (german: Warschauer Ghetto, officially , "Jewish Residential District in Warsaw"; pl, getto warszawskie) was the largest of the Nazi ghettos during World War II and the Holocaust. It was established in November 1940 by the G ...
. It was created after an alliance between
leftist-Zionist, communist and socialist Jewish parties was agreed upon. The initiators of the bloc were
Mordechai Anielewicz
Mordechai Anielewicz ( he, מרדכי אנילביץ'; 1919 – 8 May 1943) was the leader of the Jewish Fighting Organization ( pl, Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa, ŻOB), which led the Warsaw Ghetto uprising; the largest Jewish insurrection dur ...
,
Józef Lewartowski
Józef Lewartowski ( yi, יוסף לעווארטאווסקי, birth name: Aron Finkelstein yi, ןאהרן פינקעלשטיי May 1895 Bielsk Podlaski - 25 August 1942 Warsaw) was a Polish communist politician of Jewish origin, revolutionary, ...
(Aron Finkelstein) from the
Polish Workers' Party
The Polish Workers' Party ( pl, Polska Partia Robotnicza, PPR) was a communist party in Poland from 1942 to 1948. It was founded as a reconstitution of the Communist Party of Poland (KPP) and merged with the Polish Socialist Party (PPS) in 194 ...
,
Josef Kaplan from
Hashomer Hatzair,
Szachno Sagan from
Poale Zion
Poale Zion (also spelled Poalei Tziyon or Poaley Syjon, meaning "Workers of Zion") was a movement of Marxist–Zionist Jewish workers founded in various cities of Poland, Europe and the Russian Empire in about the turn of the 20th century after ...
-Left,
Jozef Sak as a representative of socialist-Zionists and
Izaak Cukierman with his wife
Cywia Lubetkin from
Dror. The
Jewish Bund did not join the bloc though they were represented at its first conference by
Abraham Blum
Abraham Blum (also known as Abrasza Blum; born c. 1905, Wilno (now Vilnius) – May 1943, Warsaw) was a Polish-Jewish socialist activist, one of the leaders of the Bund in the Warsaw Ghetto and a participant in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
Ea ...
and
Maurycy Orzech
Maurycy Orzech (; nom de guerre: ''Janczyn'';David Cesarani, Sarah Kavanaugh, Holocaust: critical concepts in historical studies, Volume 4, Routledge, 2004, pg. 312/ref> 1891 – August 1943, Warsaw) was a Polish economist, journalist, politician ...
.
After World War II
![Vlepa antify, Warszawa (2020)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/Vlepa_antify%2C_Warszawa_%282020%29.jpg)
The anti-fascist movements which emerged during the period of classical fascism, both liberal and militant, continued to operate after the defeat of the
Axis powers
The Axis powers, ; it, Potenze dell'Asse ; ja, 枢軸国 ''Sūjikukoku'', group=nb originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis, was a military coalition that initiated World War II and fought against the Allies. Its principal members were ...
in response to the resilience and mutation of fascism both in Europe and elsewhere. In Germany, as Nazi rule crumbled in 1944, veterans of the 1930s anti-fascist struggles formed ''Antifaschistische Ausschüsse'', ''Antifaschistische Kommittees'', or ''
Antifaschistische Aktion
''Antifaschistische Aktion'' () was a militant anti-fascist organisation in the Weimar Republic started by members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) that existed from 1932 to 1933. It was primarily active as a KPD campaign during the Ju ...
'' groups, all typically abbreviated to "antifa". The socialist government of
East Germany
East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...
built the
Berlin Wall in 1961, and the
Eastern Bloc referred to it officially as the "Anti-fascist Protection Rampart". Resistance to fascists dictatorships in Spain and Portugal continued, including the activities of the
Spanish Maquis
The Maquis were Spanish guerrillas who waged an irregular warfare against the Francoist dictatorship within Spain following the Republican defeat in the Spanish Civil War until the early 1960s, carrying out sabotage, robberies (to help fund ...
and others, leading up to the
Spanish transition to democracy and the
Carnation Revolution, respectively, as well as to similar dictatorships in
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
and elsewhere. Other notable anti-fascist mobilisations in the first decades of the post-war period include the
43 Group
The 43 Group was an English anti-fascist group set up by Jewish ex-servicemen after the Second World War. They did this when, upon returning to London, they encountered British fascist organisations such as Jeffrey Hamm's British League of Ex ...
in Britain.
With the start of the
Cold War between the former World War II allies of the United States and the Soviet Union, the concept of
totalitarianism
Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and regu ...
became prominent in Western
anti-communist political discourse as a tool to convert pre-war anti-fascism into post-war anti-communism.
[Siegel, Achim (1998). ''The Totalitarian Paradigm after the End of Communism: Towards a Theoretical Reassessment''. Rodopi. p. 200. . "Concepts of totalitarianism became most widespread at the height of the Cold War. Since the late 1940s, especially since the Korean War, they were condensed into a far-reaching, even hegemonic, ideology, by which the political elites of the Western world tried to explain and even to justify the Cold War constellation."][Guilhot, Nicholas (2005). ''The Democracy Makers: Human Rights and International Order''. Columbia University Press. p. 33. . "The opposition between the West and Soviet totalitarianism was often presented as an opposition both moral and epistemological between truth and falsehood. The democratic, social, and economic credentials of the Soviet Union were typically seen as 'lies' and as the product of a deliberate and multiform propaganda. ..In this context, the concept of totalitarianism was itself an asset. As it made possible the conversion of prewar anti-fascism into postwar anti-communism."][Reisch, George A. (2005). ''How the Cold War Transformed Philosophy of Science: To the Icy Slopes of Logic''. Cambridge University Press. pp. 153–154. .]
Modern antifa politics can be traced to opposition to the infiltration of Britain's
punk
Punk or punks may refer to:
Genres, subculture, and related aspects
* Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres
* Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...
scene by
white power skinheads in the 1970s and 1980s, and the emergence of
neo-Nazism in Germany following the
fall of the Berlin Wall
The fall of the Berlin Wall (german: Mauerfall) on 9 November 1989, during the Peaceful Revolution, was a pivotal event in world history which marked the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the figurative Iron Curtain and one of the series of eve ...
. In Germany, young leftists, including anarchists and punk fans, renewed the practice of street-level anti-fascism. Columnist
Peter Beinart
Peter Alexander Beinart (; born February 28, 1971) is an American liberal columnist, journalist, and political commentator. A former editor of ''The New Republic'', he has also written for ''Time'', ''The New York Times'', and ''The New York Revie ...
writes that "in the late '80s, left-wing punk fans in the United States began following suit, though they initially called their groups
Anti-Racist Action
Anti-Racist Action (ARA), also known as the Anti-Racist Action Network, is a decentralized network of militant far-left political cells in the United States and Canada. The ARA network originated in the late 1980s to engage in direct action (inc ...
(ARA) on the theory that Americans would be more familiar with fighting racism than they would be with fighting fascism".
Germany
The contemporary antifa movement in Germany comprises different anti-fascist groups which usually use the abbreviation antifa and regard the historical ''
Antifaschistische Aktion
''Antifaschistische Aktion'' () was a militant anti-fascist organisation in the Weimar Republic started by members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) that existed from 1932 to 1933. It was primarily active as a KPD campaign during the Ju ...
'' (Antifa) of the early 1930s as an inspiration, drawing on the historic group for its aesthetics and some of its tactics, in addition to the name. Many new antifa groups formed from the late 1980s onward. According to Loren Balhorn, contemporary antifa in Germany "has no practical historical connection to the movement from which it takes its name but is instead a product of West Germany's squatter scene and autonomist movement in the 1980s".
One of the biggest antifascist campaigns in Germany in recent years was the ultimately successful effort to
block the annual Nazi-rallies in the east German city of Dresden in Saxony which had grown into "Europe's biggest gathering of Nazis". Unlike the original Antifa which had links to the
Communist Party of Germany and which was concerned with industrial working-class politics, the late 1980s and early 1990s,
autonomists
The Autonomists (french: Autonomistes; it, Autonomisti) was a Christian-democratic Italian political party active in the Aosta Valley.
It was founded in 1997 by the union of the regional Italian People's Party with For Aosta Valley, and some ...
were independent
anti-authoritarian
Anti-authoritarianism is opposition to authoritarianism, which is defined as "a form of social organisation characterised by submission to authority", "favoring complete obedience or subjection to authority as opposed to individual freedom" an ...
libertarian Marxists
Libertarian socialism, also known by various other names, is a left-wing,Diemer, Ulli (1997)"What Is Libertarian Socialism?" The Anarchist Library. Retrieved 4 August 2019. anti-authoritarian, anti-statist and libertarianLong, Roderick T. (201 ...
and
anarcho-communists not associated with any particular party. The publication ''
Antifaschistisches Infoblatt
''Antifaschistisches Infoblatt'' (''AIB'') is an anti-fascist publication in Berlin, Germany. It was founded in 1987 and the first issue appeared in Spring. The magazine is published four times a year. The publication cooperates with similar pu ...
'', in operation since 1987, sought to expose
radical nationalists publicly.
German government
The Federal Cabinet or Federal Government (german: link=no, Bundeskabinett or ') is the chief executive body of the Federal Republic of Germany. It consists of the Federal Chancellor and cabinet ministers. The fundamentals of the cabinet's or ...
institutions such as the
Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution
The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (german: Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz or BfV, often ''Bundesverfassungsschutz'') is Germany's federal domestic intelligence agency. Together with the Landesämter für Verfassungss ...
and the
Federal Agency for Civic Education
The Federal Agency for Civic Education (FACE, german: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (''bpb'')) is a German federal government agency responsible for promoting civic education. It is subordinated to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, ...
describe the contemporary antifa movement as part of the extreme left and as partially violent. Antifa groups are monitored by the federal office in the context of its legal mandate to combat
extremism
Extremism is "the quality or state of being extreme" or "the advocacy of extreme measures or views". The term is primarily used in a political or religious sense to refer to an ideology that is considered (by the speaker or by some implied shar ...
.
The federal office states that the underlying goal of the antifa movement is "the struggle against the
liberal democratic basic order
The liberal democratic basic order (german: freiheitliche demokratische Grundordnung (FDGO)) is a fundamental term in German constitutional law. It determines the unalienable, invariable core structure of the German commonwealth. As such, it is ...
" and capitalism.
In the 1980s, the movement was accused by German authorities of engaging in
terrorist
Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...
acts of violence.
[Horst Schöppner: ''Antifa heißt Angriff: Militanter Antifaschismus in den 80er Jahren'' (pp. 129–132). Unrast, Münster 2015, .]
Greece
In Greece anti-fascism is a popular part of leftist and anarchist culture, September 2013 anti-fascist hip-hop artist
Pavlos 'Killah P' Fyssas was accosted and attacked with bats and knives by a large group of
Golden Dawn affiliated people leaving Pavlos to be pronounced dead at the hospital. The attack lead international protests and riots, the retaliatory
shooting of three Golden Dawn members outside of their
Neo Irakleio as well as condemnations against the party by politicians and other public figures, including
Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...
Antonis Samaras
Antonis Samaras ( el, Αντώνης Σαμαράς, ; born 23 May 1951) is a Greek politician who served as 14th Prime Minister of Greece from 2012 to 2015. A member of the New Democracy party, he was its president from 2009 until 2015. Samaras ...
. This episode led to Golden Dawn to being criminally investigated, with the result in sixty-eight members of Golden Dawn being declared part of a criminal organization whilst fifteen out of the seventeen members accused in Pavlos's murder were convicted, "Effectively banning" the party.
Italy
![2013-04-25 Porta san Paolo Roma](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/2013-04-25_Porta_san_Paolo_Roma.jpg)
Today's
Italian constitution
The Constitution of the Italian Republic ( it, Costituzione della Repubblica Italiana) was enacted by the Constituent Assembly on 22 December 1947, with 453 votes in favour and 62 against. The text, which has since been amended sixteen times, ...
is the result of the work of the
Constituent Assembly
A constituent assembly (also known as a constitutional convention, constitutional congress, or constitutional assembly) is a body assembled for the purpose of drafting or revising a constitution. Members of a constituent assembly may be elected b ...
, which was formed by the representatives of all the anti-fascist forces that contributed to the defeat of Nazi and Fascist forces during the
Italian Civil War.
Liberation Day
Liberation Day is a day, often a public holiday, that marks the liberation of a place, similar to an independence day. Liberation marks the date of either a revolution, as in Cuba, the fall of a dictatorship, as in Portugal, or the end of an oc ...
is a national holiday in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
that commemorates the victory of the
Italian resistance movement against
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
and the
Italian Social Republic,
puppet state
A puppet state, puppet régime, puppet government or dummy government, is a state that is ''de jure'' independent but ''de facto'' completely dependent upon an outside power and subject to its orders.Compare: Puppet states have nominal sove ...
of the Nazis and
rump state
A rump state is the remnant of a once much larger state, left with a reduced territory in the wake of secession, annexation, occupation, decolonization, or a successful coup d'état or revolution on part of its former territory. In the last case ...
of the fascists, in the
Italian Civil War, a
civil war
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
in Italy fought during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, which takes place on 25 April. The date was chosen by convention, as it was the day of the year 1945 when the
National Liberation Committee
The National Liberation Committee ( it, Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale, CLN) was a political umbrella organization and the main representative of the Italian resistance movement fighting against Nazi Germany’s forces during the German occup ...
of Upper Italy (CLNAI) officially proclaimed the insurgency in a radio announcement, propounding the seizure of power by the CLNAI and proclaiming the death sentence for all fascist leaders (including
Benito Mussolini, who was shot three days later).
![ANPI logo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/ANPI_logo.jpeg)
''
Associazione Nazionale Partigiani d'Italia'' (ANPI; "National Association of Italian
Partisans") is an association founded by participants of the
Italian resistance
The Italian resistance movement (the ''Resistenza italiana'' and ''la Resistenza'') is an umbrella term for the Italian resistance groups who fought the occupying forces of Nazi Germany and the fascist collaborationists of the Italian Socia ...
against the
Italian Fascist regime and the subsequent
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
occupation during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
. ANPI was founded in
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
in 1944
while the war continued in
northern Italy. It was constituted as a
charitable foundation
A foundation (also a charitable foundation) is a category of nonprofit organization or charitable trust that typically provides funding and support for other charitable organizations through grants, but may also engage directly in charitable act ...
on 5 April 1945. It persists due to the activity of its antifascist members. ANPI's objectives are the maintenance of the historical role of the partisan war by means of research and the collection of personal stories. Its goals are a continued defense against
historical revisionism and the ideal and ethical support of the high values of freedom and democracy expressed in the 1948
constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed.
When these princ ...
, in which the ideals of the
Italian resistance
The Italian resistance movement (the ''Resistenza italiana'' and ''la Resistenza'') is an umbrella term for the Italian resistance groups who fought the occupying forces of Nazi Germany and the fascist collaborationists of the Italian Socia ...
were collected. Since 2008, every two years ANPI organizes its national festival. During the event, meetings, debates, and musical concerts that focus on antifascism, peace, and democracy are organized.
''
Bella ciao'' (; "Goodbye beautiful") is an
Italian folk song modified and adopted as an anthem of the
Italian resistance movement by the partisans who opposed
nazism
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) i ...
and
fascism
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...
, and fought against the occupying forces of
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
, who were allied with the fascist and collaborationist
Italian Social Republic between 1943 and 1945 during the
Italian Civil War. Versions of this Italian anti-fascist song continue to be sung worldwide as a hymn of freedom and resistance. As an internationally known hymn of freedom, it was intoned at many historic and revolutionary events. The song originally aligned itself with Italian partisans fighting against Nazi German occupation troops, but has since become to merely stand for the inherent rights of all people to be liberated from tyranny.
United States
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...
historian Mark Bray, author of ''
Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook'', credits the ARA as the precursor of modern antifa groups in the United States. In the late 1980s and 1990s, ARA activists toured with popular punk rock and skinhead bands in order to prevent
Klansmen, neo-Nazis and other assorted white supremacists from recruiting. Their motto was "We go where they go" by which they meant that they would confront
far-right activists in concerts and actively remove their materials from public places.
In 2002, the ARA disrupted a speech in Pennsylvania by
Matthew F. Hale, the head of the white supremacist group
World Church of the Creator
Creativity, historically known as The (World) Church of the Creator, is an atheistic ( "nontheistic") white supremacist religious movement which espouses white separatism, antitheism, antisemitism, scientific racism, homophobia, and religious a ...
, resulting in a fight and twenty-five arrests. In 2007,
Rose City Antifa
Rose City Antifa (RCA) is an antifascist group founded in 2007 in Portland, Oregon. A leftist group, it is the oldest known active antifa group in the United States. While anti-fascist activism in the United States dates back to the 1980s, Rose ...
, likely the first group to utilize the name antifa, was formed in
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...
.
Other antifa groups in the United States have other genealogies. In
Minneapolis, Minnesota, a group called the Baldies was formed in 1987 with the intent to fight neo-Nazi groups directly. In 2013, the "most radical" chapters of the ARA formed the
Torch Antifa Network which has chapters throughout the United States. Other antifa groups are a part of different associations such as NYC Antifa or operate independently.
Modern antifa in the United States is a highly
decentralized
Decentralization or decentralisation is the process by which the activities of an organization, particularly those regarding planning and decision making, are distributed or delegated away from a central, authoritative location or group.
Conce ...
movement. Antifa
political activists
Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fro ...
are
anti-racists who engage in
protest
A protest (also called a demonstration, remonstration or remonstrance) is a public expression of objection, disapproval or dissent towards an idea or action, typically a political one.
Protests can be thought of as acts of cooper ...
tactics, seeking to combat
fascists and
racists
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
such as
neo-Nazis
Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and racial supremacy (often white supremacy), attack ...
,
white supremacists
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White s ...
, and other
far-right extremists
Extremism is "the quality or state of being extreme" or "the advocacy of extreme measures or views". The term is primarily used in a political or religious sense to refer to an ideology that is considered (by the speaker or by some implied shar ...
. This may involve
digital activism,
harassment,
physical violence
Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened ...
, and
property damage
Property damage (or cf. criminal damage in England and Wales) is damage or destruction of real or tangible personal property, caused by negligence, willful destruction, or act of nature.
It is similar to vandalism and arson (destroying prop ...
against those whom they identify as belonging to the far-right. Much antifa activity is nonviolent, involving poster and flyer campaigns, delivering speeches, marching in protest, and community organizing on behalf of anti-racist and anti-
white nationalist
White nationalism is a type of racial nationalism or pan-nationalism which espouses the belief that white people are a raceHeidi Beirich and Kevin Hicks. "Chapter 7: White nationalism in America". In Perry, Barbara. ''Hate Crimes''. Greenwoo ...
causes.
A June 2020 study by the
Center for Strategic and International Studies
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is an American think tank based in Washington, D.C. CSIS was founded as the Center for Strategic and International Studies of Georgetown University in 1962. The center conducts polic ...
of 893 terrorism incidents in the United States since 1994 found one attack staged by an anti-fascist that led to a fatality (the
2019 Tacoma attack
On July 13, 2019, Willem van Spronsen firebombed a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Tacoma, Washington. He was shot dead by police who say he was attempting to ignite a propane tank.
Incident
The incident too ...
, in which the attacker, who identified as an anti-fascist, was killed by police), while attacks by white supremacists or other right-wing extremists resulted in 329 deaths.
Since the study was published, one
homicide has been connected to anti-fascism.
A
DHS
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-ter ...
draft report from August 2020 similarly did not include "antifa" as a considerable threat, while noting white supremacists as the top domestic terror threat.
There have been multiple efforts to discredit antifa groups via hoaxes on social media, many of them
false flag attacks originating from
alt-right and
4chan
4chan is an anonymous English-language imageboard website. Launched by Christopher "moot" Poole in October 2003, the site hosts boards dedicated to a wide variety of topics, from anime and manga to video games, cooking, weapons, television, ...
users posing as antifa backers on
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
.
Some hoaxes have been picked up and reported as fact by right-leaning media.
During the
George Floyd protests
The George Floyd protests were a series of protests and civil unrest against police brutality and racism that began in Minneapolis on May 26, 2020, and largely took place during 2020. The civil unrest and protests began as part of internat ...
in May and June 2020, the
Trump administration
Donald Trump's tenure as the 45th president of the United States began with his inauguration on January 20, 2017, and ended on January 20, 2021. Trump, a Republican from New York City, took office following his Electoral College victory ...
blamed antifa for orchestrating the mass protests. Analysis of federal arrests did not find links to antifa.
There had been repeated calls by the Trump administration to designate antifa as a terrorist organization, a move that academics, legal experts and others argued would both exceed the authority of the presidency and violate the
First Amendment
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...
.
Elsewhere
Some post-war anti-fascist action took place in Romania under the
Anti-Fascist Committee of German Workers in Romania
The Anti-Fascist Committee of German Workers in Romania (german: Antifaschistischen Komitees der deutschen Werktätigen in Rumänien), originally the German Anti-Fascist Committee (german: Deutsche Antifaschistische Komitee; ro, Comitetul Antifas ...
, founded in March 1949.
A Swedish group, ''
Antifascistisk Aktion
The Antifascistisk aktion (AFA) is a far-left, extra-parliamentary, anti-fascist movement in Sweden, whose stated goal is to "smash fascism in all its forms". Some of its members are influenced by the theory of triple oppression, and all of it ...
'', was formed in 1993. The
People's Anti-Fascist Front in
Indian Administered Kashmir
Kashmir () is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. Today, the term encompas ...
was formed after the Indian government led by the far right
RSS
RSS ( RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication) is a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. Subscribing to RSS feeds can allow a user to keep track of many di ...
party attempted an alleged
demographic change
Demography () is the statistical study of populations, especially human beings.
Demographic analysis examines and measures the dimensions and dynamics of populations; it can cover whole societies or groups defined by criteria such as edu ...
in the region.
Use of the term
The
Christian Democratic Union of Germany politician
Tim Peters notes that the term is one of the most controversial terms in
political discourse.
Michael Richter, a researcher at the
Hannah Arendt Institute for Research on Totalitarianism
The Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies (German: ''Hannah-Arendt-Institut für Totalitarismusforschung'', abbreviated HAIT) is a research institute hosted by Dresden University of Technology and devoted to the comparative analysis ...
, highlights the ideological use of the term in the Soviet Union and the Eastern bloc, in which the term ''fascism'' was applied to
Eastern bloc dissidents regardless of any connection to historical fascism, and where the term ''anti-fascism'' served to legitimize the ruling government.
See also
*
Anti-authoritarianism
*
Anti-capitalism
*
Anti-Germans (political current)
Anti-German (german: Antideutsch, yi, אַנטי-דײַטש, Anti-Daytsh) is the generic name applied to a variety of theoretical and political tendencies within the left mainly in Germany and Austria. The Anti-Germans form one of the main cam ...
*
Anti-fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia
*
Anti-fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Serbia
*
Anti-Fascist Committee of Cham Immigrants The Anti-Fascist Committee of Cham Immigrants was an organization created by Cham Albanians, when they were expelled from Greece, with the help of the newly established communist government of Albania. It was established, during the first wave of r ...
*
*
Antifascist Front of Slavs in Hungary
Antifascist Front of Slavs in Hungary (Serbo-Croatian: ''Antifašistički front Slovena u Mađarskoj/Антифашистички фронт Словена у Мађарској'', Hungarian: ''Magyarországi Szlávok Antifasiszta Frontja'') was ...
*
Anti-Stalinist left
*
Denazification
*
Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee
The Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, ''Yevreysky antifashistsky komitet'' yi, יידישער אנטי פאשיסטישער קאמיטעט, ''Yidisher anti fashistisher komitet''., abbreviated as JAC, ''YeAK'', was an organization that was created i ...
*
All-Slavic Anti-Fascist Committee
The All-Slavic Anti-Fascist Committee, later known as the All-Slavic Committee of the Soviet Union, was an anti-fascist public organization established in Moscow in 1941 during the Second World War. Its main task was to unite all Slavs in the figh ...
*
Laws against Holocaust denial
Sixteen European countries, along with Canada and Israel, have laws against Holocaust denial, the denial of the systematic genocidal killing of approximately six million Jews in Europe by Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Many countries also h ...
*
Resistance during World War II
Resistance movements during World War II occurred in every occupied country by a variety of means, ranging from non-cooperation to propaganda, hiding crashed pilots and even to outright warfare and the recapturing of towns. In many countries, r ...
*
Redskin (subculture)
*
Slovak National Uprising
The Slovak National Uprising ( sk, Slovenské národné povstanie, abbreviated SNP) was a military uprising organized by the Slovak resistance movement during World War II. This resistance movement was represented mainly by the members of the ...
*
Squadism Squadism (or sometimes "Squaddism") was the practice of physical, anti-fascist direct action. The term, often used pejoratively by liberal anti-fascists eschewing violence, originated in the Anti-Nazi League, an anti-fascist campaigning organisat ...
Notes
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
* David Berry
'Fascism or Revolution!' Anarchism and Antifascism in France, 1933–39 ''Contemporary European History'' Volume 8, Issue 1 March 1999, pp. 51–71
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* Brasken, Kasper.
Making Anti-Fascism Transnational: The Origins of Communist and Socialist Articulations of Resistance in Europe, 1923–1924" ''Contemporary European History'' 25.4 (2016): 573–596.
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* Class War/3WayFight/Kate Sharpley Librar
Interview from ''Beating Fascism: Anarchist Anti-Fascism in Theory and Practice'' anarkismo.net
* Copsey, N. (2011) "From direct action to community action: The changing dynamics of anti-fascist opposition", in
* Nigel Copsey & Andrzej Olechnowicz (eds.),
Varieties of Anti-fascism. Britain in the Inter-war Period', Palgrave Macmillan
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Gilles Dauvé
Gilles Dauvé ( pen name Jean Barrot; born 1947) is a French political theorist, school teacher, and translator associated with left communism and the contemporary tendency of communization.
Biography
In collaboration with other left communis ...
Fascism/Antifascism, libcom.org
* David Featherstone
Black Internationalism, Subaltern Cosmopolitanism, and the Spatial Politics of Antifascism ''Annals of the Association of American Geographers'' Volume 103, 2013, Issue 6, pp. 1406–1420
* Joseph Froncza
"Local People's Global Politics: A Transnational History of the Hands Off Ethiopia Movement of 1935"''Diplomatic History'', Volume 39, Issue 2, 1 April 2015, pp. 245–274
* Hugo Garcia, ed,
Transnational Anti-Fascism: Agents, Networks, Circulations'' ''Contemporary European History' Volume 25, Issue 4 November 2016, pp. 563–572
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* Renton, Dave.
Fascism, Anti-fascism and Britain in the 1940s'. Springer, 2016.
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Enzo Traverso
Enzo Traverso (born 14 October 1957) is an Italian scholar of European intellectual history. He is the author of several books on critical theory, the Holocaust, Marxism, memory, totalitarianism, revolution, and contemporary historiography. His bo ...
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"Intellectuals and Anti-Fascism: For a Critical Historization"''New Politics'', vol. 9, no. 4 (new series), whole no. 36, Winter 2004
External links
Centre for fascist, anti-fascist and post-fascist studies Teesside University
Remembering the Anarchist Resistance to fascism
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anti-Fascism
Political movements