You said fascism is when business
controls government and that isn't true in any historical or factual sense of the ideology/system and its goals. Government
still controls businesses, just NOT to the extreme level of communism... Under fascism, government bureaucratizing the economic activities of the nation meant less freedom, less control for businesses/corporations, not the other way around! A forced "merger" (or else!) with the State by a violent, totalitarian, revolutionary party-in-charge isn't something that sounds like a deal that is going to yield more freedom/control for a business/corporation afterwards... Only if you're using the term as an epithet the way that it is typically used does your statement make sense. If your definition is serious, then I still don't see any merit to it given what you posted.
Whether you're gonna refer to say Mussolini's corporatism principle as a state-directed, regulated market economy that is dedicated to the nation or "state socialism turned on its head" as he did, the State/the Party was STILL the boss and more so than before! A generic Wiki definition of corporatism is, "Italian Fascism involved corporatism, a political system in which the economy is collectively managed by employers, workers, and state officials by formal mechanisms at the national level." OK, that still sounds like the State is the boss! And if the boss comes to you and says, cooperate with our agenda, you'll get to keep most of your profits, or face the alternative of you and your family disappearing (hint hint), which do you choose ? I think I'm going to choose to live, cooperate and make profit !!
Fascists weren't free market capitalists and they weren't communists either, though they hated the latter by the end, they did work with them in the past (
Mussolini praised the October Revolution that brought Lenin to power and Italy was the first to recognize the Soviet Union under his regime, then there's stuff like the Hitler-Stalin pact, carving up Poland, etc.). They felt they were surgical in terms of trying to carve out a socialist position between the two destructive extremes that they saw (capitalism v. communism). Italy nationalized a lot of industries (e.g. Petroleum), Germany not so much (though their original charter called for complete nationalization), and they did go through a period of privatizing, but still, their ideology was a type of socialism in economic areas which meant MORE government control of corporations, not less and certainly not the other way around! And given the totalitarian aspects of their ideology, making opponents and other "undesirables" disappear, your choice as a corporation (or whatever else) to cooperate was pretty clear... This sounds about right,
"While Fascism claimed that corporatism gave workers power alongside employer in workplaces in reality the concept of "Fuhrerprinzip" gave employers and State-appointed workplace managers absolute control over the workplace as dictated by the State-owned German Labor Front."Your Ford automobile plant story demonstrates a point: That plant used to make cars, then the State came along and
forced it into making tanks for its war effort! They nationalized it for their purposes! That's not respect for private property rights or free market capitalism... I suspect that the German owner of that particular plant was faced with a choice, cooperate or disappear! Maybe he was a Nazi supporter and did it voluntarily, maybe not, I dunno, but if he stood up and said "I reject this war and I wanna continue to make cars," what would happen in that particular time period?
I think the point I'm trying to make is,
under such circumstances, what kind of excessive (or otherwise) counter-influence or counter-control over government could corporations/businesses have exerted over Fascist regimes when talking WWII-era Germany/Italy and how frequent was it, IF I am to take your definition seriously ?? I don't see it; I do understand there's a view that corporations had a cozy relationship, that is, if the corporation behaved itself, towed the Fascist party line, did what it was told to do when necessary, it would be rewarded with policies to help make it more profitable... And given the possible punishment for not cooperating, why would their behavior of choosing profits over standing up to a mad regime be surprising ? You can't kill/intimidate everybody that opposes you (
although, heh, these guys made millions disappear, they sure tried) and you don't want the entire population hating you all at once, etc. so if you can "buy" support at times with some kind of kickback in exchange for cooperation, that's good enough in the meantime while you consolidate more state power.
Finally, your noting that US bombers were given orders to avoid bombing this plant, that's a criticism of the US government who at this point was waging war against a Fascist regime! Ford, a US business, telling the US government, "
Hey, if possible, could you avoid bombing that plant we built over there, because, well, maybe after the war we can rebuild/restore it, you know ??" and our government complying with that request is a type of, I dunno, cronyism, bad judgement, etc. Ford had a powerful influence over our government which actually affected military strategy and if more tanks made it out on the battlefield because orders were given to spare this plant, they have blood on their hands. In any case, whatever that was, it wasn't "fascism" unless it's being used as an epithet. That is an interesting story BTW, I didn't know about it!
9. Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
One more quick point, I dunno who this writer is, but at least when it comes to the Italian fascists, they came to power through
violent revolution, killings, occupations, seizing train stations, post offices, etc. just like the Bolsheviks. Whether they had a corporation or two to help finance the revolution, I dunno, but even focusing on the "mutually beneficial relationship" comment, that doesn't tell you who controlled who! I don't think it's ambiguous given all the history that's available nor in the direction you state (
business controls government), further down in that link you find:
The Fascist regime created a corporatist economic system in 1925 with creation of the Palazzo Vidioni Pact, in which the Italian employers' association Confindustria and Fascist trade unions agreed to recognize each other as the sole representatives of Italy's employers and employees, excluding non-Fascist trade unions. The Fascist regime first created a Ministry of Corporations that organized the Italian economy into 22 sectoral corporations, banned workers' strikes and lock-outs, and in 1927 created the Charter of Labour, which established workers' rights and duties and created labour tribunals to arbitrate employer-employee disputes. In practice, the sectoral corporations exercised little independence and were largely controlled by the regime, and employee organizations were rarely led by employees themselves but instead by appointed Fascist party members.
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