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Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It

Shane Burley (Goodreads Author)

4.30 · Rating details · 116 ratings · 25 reviews

We can no longer ignore the fact that fascism is on the rise in the United States. What was once a fringe movement has been gaining cultural acceptance and political power for years. Rebranding itself as "alt-right" and riding the waves of both Donald Trump's hate-fueled populism and the anxiety of an abandoned working class, they have created a social force that has the a ...more

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Paperback, 304 pages

Published October 10th 2017 by AK Press

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Dec 08, 2017 Everett Trechter rated it really liked it

This is a really worthwhile read and a fantastic overview of a lot of the different fascist movements and strains of thought active today. Burley goes most in depth into the white nationalist, religious, and militant groupings within what could broadly be described as the fascist movement, and in that he excels. He also goes into what historical tactics have been used against similar movements, and offers some amount of perspective on how those tactics can be employed today, though that is not a This is a really worthwhile read and a fantastic overview of a lot of the different fascist movements and strains of thought active today. Burley goes most in depth into the white nationalist, religious, and militant groupings within what could broadly be described as the fascist movement, and in that he excels. He also goes into what historical tactics have been used against similar movements, and offers some amount of perspective on how those tactics can be employed today, though that is not a focus. I think some of his final points about how the left needs to learn to effectively counter the claims of the right with better tailored education, more insight into the far right's entryism into leftist circles, and filling the same needs and desires that drive people to the right are highly valuable.

I also really appreciated the short section that goes through what has happened since Trump's election and even Charlottesville. It's one of the more hopeful looks at where we stand today that also includes careful, realistic analysis of where the left has fallen short and what dangers lurk ahead that I've read.

I have a few caveats, though they do not detract from the fact that this is certainly a worthwhile read. His focus on the explicitly non-capitalist movements within the far right is certainly welcome, as I know many on the left forget that they do not hold a monopoly on criticizing the failures of capitalism, and this leads to a certain amount of windmill tilting and strange, often unexpected ideological bedfellows. However, in my perception of many far right subcultures, the libertarian and anarcho-capitalist strains of thought are potent drivers of people into more explicit fascism, as the myth of meritocracy allows proto-fascists and fascists themselves to justify and "prove" the existence of a perceived natural order and hierarchy. Leaving this perspective out is a fairly large blind spot. Similarly, Burley only barely scratches the surface of the Dark Enlightenment crowd, which has a fairly large presence in Silicon Valley and the tech world, and so wields an outsized amount of power.

Somewhat less importantly, despite having a fantastic chapter on the types and function of religious thought in fascist movements, he seems to totally leave out any of the Mormon brands of it. This leads to a moment of whiplash as the very next chapter starts out by examining the occupation of the Malheur Wildlife preserve, the perpetrators of which proclaimed a radical, somewhat fundamentalist interpretation of Mormonism to justify some of their complaints against the federal government (one member of the group only referring to himself as "Captain Moroni", even) - but Burley never even so much as mentions that. Several (very good!) pages on Odinism and none on fundamentalist Mormonism seems like an odd balance.

However, I don't really think these are particularly important issues, as no one survey of any political field can ever be fully comprehensive, and for the most part Burley does do a great job with as much as he does cover.

Aside from that, there are a few text issues that I think would have been sorted out with another or more thorough round of editing - as an example, he at some point refers to the subreddit "r/The_Donald_Trump" where I'm 99.9% certain he meant "r/The_Donald" and the organization "Run for Something" gets misnamed as "Run for Nothing". Simple errors probably from mistyping rather than ignorance, but something that should have been caught before going to print.

In the end, one of the best reads I've had in awhile, highly recommended.

...more

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Jan 29, 2018 Sam rated it it was amazing

Gonna be honest, this was sitting on my shelf for a month. And then in my bag for another month. I've been meaning to start down the research rabbit hole of current politics, especially as I'm an organizer and there's a lot more to know besides my limited experience. For some reason, though, I was afraid to pick it up and go.

I realize in retrospect that the fear was simply that it'd strike too close to home. And it did! I live in Portland, and the author lives in Portland, and he was talking ab ...more

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Feb 07, 2020 Clare rated it it was amazing

It has been a hot minute since I read a book on anti-fascism, and so, rather than wait until I could convince my book club to do it, I decided to just get around myself to reading Shane Burley's Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It, which I had picked up at the Lucy Parsons Center over the summer and which has been sitting around my apartment since August.

First things first: This book was published in late 2017, and aaaaaaaaaaaaahahahaha good god will it never not be hilarious to read It has been a hot minute since I read a book on anti-fascism, and so, rather than wait until I could convince my book club to do it, I decided to just get around myself to reading Shane Burley's Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It, which I had picked up at the Lucy Parsons Center over the summer and which has been sitting around my apartment since August.

First things first: This book was published in late 2017, and aaaaaaaaaaaaahahahaha good god will it never not be hilarious to read things that talk about Matthew Heimbach's Traditionalist Worker's Party from when it still existed and was an active threat. The Night of the Wrong Wives still remains, in my opinion, the funniest unforced error/dramatic implosion in the history of modern fascism, and yes, I am keeping up on my Cantwell News (I'm about halfway through the latest I Don't Speak German episode as I write this).

Anyway. The bulk of the book is taken up with a taxonomy of the modern far right, divided up more or less by ideological strain, and with a focus more on what the... uh... "thinking" is and how it works than on individual people and groups (although obviously these feature heavily). While race obviously features pretty heavily in American fascism, as it does in American politics generally, not all fash groups are primarily and explicitly white nationalists, and it's good to see chapters dedicated to things like religion and misogyny, which often get subsumed in popular discourse about what the fascist movement (as one thing) is. Burley points out that these various bigotries aren't always separable; fascists are pretty infamous for making lefty infighting look tame, but when it comes to violently hating on everyone "below" them in a hierarchy, they've got a frighteningly decent handle on this coalition-building intersectional thing. There's a chapter on the pseudoscientific theories of "race realism" and their influence on the far right; there's also a chapter on far-right paganism and mysticism and all that pseudo-medieval stuff. I think it does a pretty good job of laying out the landscape of the far right circa 2017 with a decent degree of thoroughness and in a way that's easy-to-follow enough that it makes a pretty good basis for following the next three years' worth of developments, for which I'd probably recommend staying away from books altogether and just listening to I Don't Speak German instead so you can stay relatively timely.

The last third or so of the book is the "How to End It" part, which gives some history of militant and popular antifascist action through the twentieth century, and discusses the sort of things that go into antifascist action these days--doxxing, pressure campaigns, mass mobilizations, no-platforming, etc. It is perhaps not so much of a how-to as some people would like, judging from some of the reaction I heard to Mark Bray's Antifa: The Antifascist Handbook, but it does give a good look at what kind of things there are to do and what different sorts of organizations can do them. (It is simply not realistic to go into a mainstream, respectable bookstore and get a manual on how to doxx Proud Boys, but a lot of people seem to expect to find one anyway.) There's solid explanations about why these things are done and what sort of results they have actually in fact gotten. (I particularly enjoyed the small cameo by my own city the weekend after the A11/A12 attacks, which was described thus: "The following weekend an Alt Right rally was planned in Boston, but its fifty participants were met by an estimated 40,000 anti-fascists who flooded the streets and crushed the event before it started." An annoying amount of local reporting/discussion on this event focuses on solely on the march route and avoids the bit about shutting the rally down, presumably because liberal reporters find that sort of thing distasteful.) There's discussion about what needs to be done going forward; although this runs a little bit theoretical compared to the rest of the book, the theory is sound.

I learned a good amount from this book, especially where the author discusses subcultures I'm less familiar with (such as fascist creep in heathenism or folk music), although there's also plenty that I already knew, since I have been following the right-wing nutjob beat pretty closely since about Gamergate. The stuff I did already know is quite solid, including plenty of the sorts of details that tend to get left out of mainstream accounts of fascist and anti-fascist activity in order to build false equivalencies (such as Milo's doxx talks, which the mainstream press tended to report on like they were just screeds of abstract bad ideas that could theoretically be argued against).

It probably says something about how much of this sort of content I consume already that I found this a pretty chill and easy read; almost any kind of reporting on this stuff is easier to handle than actually looking at even the lite-est of Alt Lite meme pages with your own tender eyeballs. If you are more squeamish than me you should be aware that this book does discuss some really terrible people who do and believe really terrible things, and it doesn't slow-walk it for you. But if you're over that hurdle it's a good, solid primer on navigating what the fuck is actually going on with these people.

Originally published at If you're a Nazi and you're fired, we did that on purpose. ...more

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Jan 28, 2018 Claire rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction, social-history

This is the third book on fascism that I have read recently, and so far it is the best. (Is it best because it is third and some details are becoming familiar? Maybe.)

What I liked about this one is the detail on the ideas behind fascism, the analysis of how various fascist groups think, especially on race and gender. I also appreciated detailed explanations of how fascist groups overlap with liberal groups, at least superficially. This was followed by ideas to look for to separate them out (hier ...more

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Oct 22, 2020 Viola rated it liked it

Shelves: antifa-antifascism, education, cooperatives, cinema-video-television, http-www-solidarityforeverbook-com

https://truthout.org/audio/mass-prote...

The election is now only a few days away, and organizers and activists around the country are working to get out the vote and preparing to defend the electoral process itself. The Trump administration has been fairly transparent about its plans to invalidate millions of votes and to prevent any transition of power from taking place. We know Trump has the support of people like attorney general, William Barr and Supreme Court Justice, Brett Kavanaugh, who c ...more

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Jan 29, 2018 Dorothy Kim rated it it was amazing

Amazing book. If you want to know what is going on in N. America and Europe now, read this. Essential reading to understand late-fascism.

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Oct 24, 2017 Charlie Boling rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 5-star-favorites, activism, signed-by-author

Due to hearing the term fascism coming up in the news so often the past year I've read several books on the topic to deepen my understanding. None that I have read have done a better job of defining fascism and how it has evolved in the 21st century than Burley's latest work. There probably isn't a better resource for demystifying the "alt-right", due primarily to the fact that Shane was researching the associated groups long before they became a household word. This is also one of the best reso ...more

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Sep 03, 2020 Tommy Anansi rated it it was amazing

I read this book while writing my Master’s dissertation on the alt-right’s emergence from the depths of the online sphere into a neo-fascist insurrection movement. Burley’s detailed and comprehensive history of modern fascism is incredibly important in understanding the modern day Neo-Nazism that is poisoning society and after the events that happened in the Capitol last night, hugely important for as many people to understand just how deeply rooted this all is in the most heinous of ideologies.

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Dec 29, 2017 Laiane rated it it was amazing

This offered a more in-depth look at the current state of American fascist and fascist-adjacent groups than Mark Bray's "Antifa," and seemed more focused as well. I picked it up on a whim and was very satisfied with it. ...more

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Aug 26, 2019 Eric rated it it was amazing

Excellent. Well written, well researched. Essential reading.

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Jan 05, 2021 Ricardo rated it liked it

Un libro sobre el ascenso de grupos fascistas y neo-nazis en USA desde la campana de Trump. Se hace bastante lento de leer ya que se detiene demasiado en ejemplos muy locales, tanto de grupos fascistas como de sus contrapartes antifascistas, en distintos estados de USA.

De todas maneras contiene un sinnúmero de ideas interesantes, especialmente sobre la capacidad camaleónica del fascismo para infiltrarse hacia una población que en principio considerariamos proclive a la izquierda, por el hecho de Un libro sobre el ascenso de grupos fascistas y neo-nazis en USA desde la campana de Trump. Se hace bastante lento de leer ya que se detiene demasiado en ejemplos muy locales, tanto de grupos fascistas como de sus contrapartes antifascistas, en distintos estados de USA.

De todas maneras contiene un sinnúmero de ideas interesantes, especialmente sobre la capacidad camaleónica del fascismo para infiltrarse hacia una población que en principio considerariamos proclive a la izquierda, por el hecho de compartir ciertas ideas con esta, aunque con un origen y finalidades completamente distintos.

-Fascism is an attempt to answer the unfinished equation of capitalism, and, instead of challenging the inequalities manifested through this economic system, it hardens them.

-Fascism grows in the arts, in poetry, in philosophy, in spirituality, in the formation of community bonds, and the ways we see ourselves. Politics is only the public manifestation of a cosmic shift in attitudes and values.

-...while the left critiques capitalism for its inability to deliver broad equality, the far-right critiques it for not being explicitly racialized and unequal enough.

-(in Fascism) Difference cannot be celebrated horizontally; it can only be ranked vertically.

-For the Alt Right, free speech per se has never been an issue of importance, instead it is an easy tool to use to appeal to liberal values and cement their own access to a platform.

-Antifascist work is a piece of the larger mass working-class struggle for survival and progress, and it should come out of the experiences and needs of the class rather than the ideological imposition of experienced organizers.

-Fascism has always fed on weaknesses in the left, the ideological inconsistencies, the internal clashes, and the inability to live up to its own radical promises.

- Often times, in an attempt to venerate the indigenous and find enemies in the current crisis, we find allies in the nightmares of the past, whether real or fetishized.

Esta última frase me hace pensar en donde pueden yacer las trampas de fascismo en Chile. Por ejemplo, en la desesperada búsqueda por cierta identidad (whatever that means) que empuja a parte importante de la población a tragarse tomo tras tomo de supuestas "historias secretas de Chile", a la continua apropiación del imaginario de los pueblos originarios. El fascismo se alimenta de nacionalismos y tribalismos. En enfatizar las diferencias como manera de clasificarnos y separarnos, y no de celebrarnos en nuestra diversidad. ...more

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Jan 11, 2020 Kathleen Kernan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Everyone should read this book. The author brings a great deal of detail and nuance to his exploration of the alt-right and other fascist organizations. He avoids generalizations and considers each group separately. His exploration of the pseudo-science and the highly mythologized utopias that these groups use is fascinating.

The only criticism I have is that, in the second portion of the book where he discusses remedies, his lack of generalization sometimes loses the narrative thread. This defi Everyone should read this book. The author brings a great deal of detail and nuance to his exploration of the alt-right and other fascist organizations. He avoids generalizations and considers each group separately. His exploration of the pseudo-science and the highly mythologized utopias that these groups use is fascinating.

The only criticism I have is that, in the second portion of the book where he discusses remedies, his lack of generalization sometimes loses the narrative thread. This deficiency is worth no more than half a star so I kept it at a five-star review.
Let me summarize for you:
1. Don't give fascist groups a platform. This is less about preventing free speech and more about preventing recruitment and normalization.
2. Out members as fascists--make them pay a price for their beliefs.
3. Make common cause with other groups but carefully research first because some groups have hidden fascist agendas. This can be a problem with environmental groups who want to limit immigration to save the land for white people, for example.
4. Learn from historically oppressed groups like black organizations that do not rely on governmental intervention for protection.
5. Develop a consistent counter-narrative based on our values of inclusion, equality, and commonweal.
6. Support Unions. Give the white working class an opportunity to develop a class identity over ethnic identity. Too often, fascist groups use white identity both as recruitment and as a means of oppression. The white working-class are asked to trade the goods of society for the belief that they are better than people of color. Unions can give them power and identity.

Personally, I would like to add two more items.
1. We need to create working-class jobs. For the past forty years, we have created upper-middle-class jobs and exported or automated working-class jobs out of existence. The cult of personal responsibility is used to wag our fingers and blame the working-class for their fate while wealth and jobs are transferred from the lowest quartiles to the tip-top of the highest.
2. We need to use peaceful methods. The fascist organizations are defined partially by their love of violence. We need to avoid becoming the thing we hate which is all too easy. ...more

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Jul 10, 2018 Chloe rated it really liked it

Shelves: nonfiction

I actually picked up an ARC of this book from my old department's take-one-leave-one shelf when I went back to visit a professor, so I've had it sitting around for a while without much incentive to read it except freaking out about how everything is bad and ideologically on fire in this country now and forever, etc etc. Anyway, the only reason why I didn't give this book a bunch of stars is that it was pretty dry and hard to get through - I put it down several times for a few weeks-months (maybe ...more

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Mar 11, 2018 Sugarpunksattack Mick rated it it was amazing

Shane Burley's book 'Fascism Today' is an excellent addition to the recent literature produced in the fight against fascism. Burley's strength are three fold: they provide an illuminating glossary of key terms/groups, a substantial history and context to old and emerging fascist movements, and crucial section on resisting and destroying fascist threats. The glossary and readability of the book alone makes this one of the best available books on the subject especially for those new to the subject ...more

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Jun 13, 2019 Jo Quenell rated it it was amazing

Writing about fascism in this time is a daunting task. The playing field has shifted somewhat in the scant two years since its release—the TWP has disbanded, Richard Spencer is more a laughing stock than anything, Proud Boy presence has strengthened, and the amount of ‘lone wolf’ fascist violence has horrifically increased. Yet this still remains the most in-depth contemporary analysis on the modern fascist movement I’ve read. The amount of research on both right wing and anti-fascist counter gr ...more

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May 18, 2020 Katharine rated it really liked it

Shelves: mental-health-justice-books, church-ministry

This is one of the books I happened to have check out of the public library before it closed down for the pandemic. Apologies to everyone waitlisted for it because it is an excellent and informative read. As a personalist/Catholic Worker who has slowly slid left from right/center through progressively progressive churches, I found this book, (especially that parts on religion and third position groups) to be productively challenging. Will reread. Highly recommended - especially for others on a t ...more

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Jan 15, 2021 Hope Erin Phillips rated it it was amazing

While reading this I realised that prior, despite how much we talk about facism and antifa, I would not have been able to explain exactly what makes facism exactly facism, and now I can which feels very empowering. Extremely well written -- not too jargony as to be hard to follow and super clear in its x to y to z of how alt right figures develop. I found it especially enlightening wrt why things like paganism, occultism, and folk are so appealing to and rife with fascists. Very good ground work ...more

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Jul 06, 2018 Rebecca rated it really liked it

Shelves: anti-fascism-book-project

As the title suggests, the book weaves together an analysis of contemporary fascism with suggestions for opposition organizing. The discussion of anti-fascist resistance may be the strongest and most original contribution of the book, as it discusses a wide variety of organizing responses to fascist groups in the US, from militant black bloc style, to legal strategies, investigative work,and mass protest organizations.

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Aug 23, 2019 Rob Seimetz rated it it was amazing

The far right and fascist movements have consumed me for the past few months. I have been reading articles and books about it eager to understand more of the context behind what is happening now and how did we get here.

This book connected all the dots for me. It’s clear concise and organized in such a way it’s easy to understand. Shane does a great job of making this a story and not a textbook. He’s a brilliant journalist and now I can say he’s also a brilliant author. Pick up this book.

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Oct 09, 2018 K.G. Delmar rated it it was amazing

Burley creates a writeup that is articulate but also straight to the point and accessible. It manages to avoid a pitfall of academic reads where jargon and endless referential theory makes the whole thing a slog. There's a lot of ground covered in this standard-sized book and it conveys much of that concisely without feeling overwhelming. ...more

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Sep 24, 2020 Katie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: nonfiction

I'm so glad I finally read this. Given the situation we're in, I can't recommend it enough. It's more important than ever to understand what fascism actually is, how fascists try to gain power, and how fascist ideas can creep into our organizing spaces. And it's super important to learn about effective strategies to stop it. Very relevant and helpful. ...more

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Dec 02, 2020 Dale Johnson rated it it was amazing

Shelves: current-events, history

Shane Burley does a wonderful job discussing the current state of Fascism, specifically within the culture and politics of the US today. He discusses multiple factions, and philosophies within the US fascist community as a whole, how they're connected, and most interestingly, how antifascist groups combat different groups, with different tactics. ...more

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Mar 21, 2018 Sue rated it it was amazing

Filled with ideas and information that we need to understand our country in these dark times. I real eye-opener which challenged many of my assumptions about fascism and those fighting it. A must-read.

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