Caesarism describes compromise regimes without equating fascism with capitalism

Evidence

“Caesarism”, for Gramsci, is a concept which does not merely refer to fascism, but can have a wider application—e.g. to the British National Government of 1931, etc.; it is thus not identical to Marx’s concept of “Bonapartism”, although it is clearly related to it. “Caesarism” represents a compromise between two “fundamental” social forces, but 1. “The problem is to see whether in the dialectic ‘revolution/restoration’ it is revolution or restoration which predominates”, and 2. “It would be an error of method to believe that in Caesarism … the entire new historical phenomenon is due to the equilibrium of the ‘fundamental’ forces. It is also necessary to see the interplay of relations between the principal groups … of the fundamental classes and the auxiliary forces directed by, or subjected to, their hegemonic influence.” Thus, in the specific case of the fascist regime in Italy, the problem, in Gramsci’s eyes, is 1. to analyse the “passive revolution” which fascism perhaps represents, and 2. to analyse the specificity of the social forces which produced it—i.e. rejecting absolutely the crude equation fascism = capitalism. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 823

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines Gramsci’s Caesarism as distinct from Marx’s Bonapartism while establishing the revolution/restoration dialectic and the refusal to reduce fascism to capitalism.
• XREF: The ‘revolution/restoration’ dialectic and hegemonic auxiliary forces connect foward into how Islamophobia scholarship analyzes states managing intergroup tensions through scapegoating regimes.