Nationalism, Anti-Semitism, and Fascism in France (review)

Book Reviews 159 are unexplained references to Boulangism, Opportunism, the Dreyfusards, the law of 22 Prairial, Mirabeau. But these are small cavils in an otherwise impressive work of scholarship. Wm. Laird Kleine-Ahlbrandt Department of History Purdue University Nationalism, Anti-Semitism, and Fascism in France, by Michel Winock, translated by Jane Marie Todd. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998. 351 pp. $55.00. The staying power ofa popular but antidemocratic Right has been a defining characteristic of the French political scene since the late nineteenth century. It made its impact felt at the time ofthe Dreyfus Affair through the street agitations ofNationalist leagues. It continues to exert influence down to the present day in the guise of Jean-Marie Le Pen's xenophobic Front National. The Israeli historian Zeev Stemhell was among the first to draw attention to the novelty ofthe phenomenon. The anti-dreyfusard Right, he argued, with its contempt for parliamentary forms, its antisemitism, and penchant for street action, pioneered a style ofpolitics that would gain widening currency in the interwar years, notjust in Germany and Italy, but in France as well. France was the birthplace of fascism, and by the 1930s its politics had become saturated ("impregnated" is Stemhell's preferred image) with fascist forms of thought and action. Stemhell's theses revolutionized the scholarship in the field. Prevailing wisdom among French scholars understood the Right as a family of political beliefs, born in reaction to the Revolution of 1789, which had changed little since its beginnings. The Dreyfus Affair had reshuffled Right-wing currents to a certain extent but not so much as to warrant talk of a new Right, let alone of a Right that smacked of fascism. Yes, it was acknowledged, there had been fascist movements in the interwar period, but they never plunged roots deep into native soil, remaining more foreign imports than homegrown products. This was the tradition ofscholarship Michel Winock was schooled in. In the wake ofStemhell's onslaught, however, he has proven himselfready to adapt, to modify the traditional paradigm while still preserving certain ofits central claims. Just how creative Winock's response is is evident in the present collection of essays, an artful mix of occasional pieces, biographical sketches, and thoughtful academic analysis. Winock gives ground. The late nineteenth century, he concedes, did indeed mark a turning point. The Dreyfus Affair engendered a "prefascist" Right which went on to expand its range of influence in the thirties. But that is as far as Winock is prepared to go. Prefascist and fascist stirrings there might have been, but, he argues, these were 160 SHOFAR Summer 2000 Vol. 18, No.4 always overshadowed by a more powerful and competing Nationalist currentwhichhad far greater resonance with French audiences. The greatest strength ofWinock's book lies in the portrait he sketches ofthis new Nationalism. The Nationalist was first and foremost obsessed by a sense of national decadence. France had stumbled from a position of greatness, and there were signs of decomposition everywhere: in the declining birth-rate, the spread of alcoholism, the unbridled pleasure-seeking ofone and all. It had not always been so. Not when Joan of Arc strode the land, setting an example ofenergy and martial virtue. Not in the Middle Ages when the principle of hierarchy still held sway and a shared religious faith imparted discipline and a sense of collective purpose to the nation. What then, or who, had caused France's fall from grace? Winock makes clear that the Nationalists of our century were not identical with the die-hard monarchists and Churchmen of the nineteenth who reviled the Revolution of 1789 and dreamed of a restoration of Throne and Altar. Such types were to be found in Nationalist ranks, of course, butthe Nationalists' deepesthatreds were reserved for modem targets. What had begun the nation's ruination, they believed, was the industrial revolution which had tom peasants from the soil to plant them in soulless factories and cities. The average, hardworking Frenchman had not profited from the new industrial order, not half so much as a narrow coterie ofrobber barons and stock-market wheeler-dealers. The economic degradation of the nation had led inevitably to its political decline...