The Italian electorate on September 25 has not only voted for an extreme right-wing government, but one in which the leading constituent is a neofascist party that openly admires Benito Mussolini. In a country that had seen a massive struggle against fascism, that once had the largest communist party in the Western hemisphere, whose leaders had included Antonio Gramsci and Palmiro Togliatti, this turning back of the clock is really amazing. True, the Italian Communist party had dissolved itself some time ago; but the incapacity of even the descendants of that party to stem the growth of neofascism, is a source of stupefaction.
An important reason for it is the mass unemployment that is the result of the economic crisis. Traditional nonleft parties, committed to a neoliberal economic order within which there is no solution to the crisis that the order itself has spawned, are obviously incapable of overcoming it. The tragedy is that even parties on the left, hegemonised by liberal opinion into accepting a neoliberal economic regime, find themselves in the same predicament. This creates the conditions for the ascendancy of the right.
The right, however, cannot expand employment; it has no economic agenda other than curtailing immigration, which also it cannot do within the European Union according to EU rules. The pre-election hopes it has generated among the people will inevitably be betrayed; but the residual lukewarm attitude of the big bourgeoisie towards it will be overcome quickly once it is in power. In short, the alliance between neoliberalism and neofascism will come into effect without any amelioration of the crisis, but with heightened repression against immigrants, ethnic minorities, the LGBT community, dissidents, trade unionists, leftists and intellectuals.
The Italian situation has an important lesson: when the left gets hegemonised by neoliberalism, a shift to a neofascist right becomes inevitable. In India there has been much discussion of late about the ascendancy of neofascism. Within this discussion there is a clear dichotomy. A large segment of liberal opinion has linked this ascendancy to a host of exclusively social and political factors without any reference to its economic underpinnings: the increasing aloofness of Congress leaders, the growing communal polarisation following L.K. Advani’s rath yatra and so on.
On the left, however, there is the additional emphasis on the economic crisis of neoliberalism as a factor behind the rise of neofascism: growth under neoliberalism was accompanied by growing poverty, but there was at least the hope that some ‘trickle down’ will eventually occur; with the crisis of neoliberalism not only does the condition of the people become even worse but that hope also vanishes, because of which neoliberalism requires a new prop, an alliance with Hindutva, to sustain itself, while distracting people’s attention from issues of material life, and dividing the working people on communal lines.
These two alternative readings of the rise of Hindutva politics have divergent implications for political praxis. On the first reading, a coalition of Oppositional forces is all that is required to overthrow the hegemony of the Hindutva elements, after which the country can return to status quo ante, that is, the cessation of the vilification and oppression of the targeted minority; the restoration of civil liberties and democratic rights to their earlier state; and the calm pursuit of neoliberal policies in the economic terrain, free from the ‘bull-in-the-chinashop’ syndrome that has come to prevail of late. The second reading considers all these changes to be very important, but insufficient for overcoming neofascism; even if it is temporarily overcome, it will continue to have a lingering presence resulting in a progressive ‘fascification’ of society, and will even come back to power after a short gap. In addition to these changes there has to be an economic agenda that brings tangible material benefits for the people. There is no question therefore of a mere return to the earlier neoliberalism; rather, neoliberalism has to be pushed back in crucial areas: essential services like education and healthcare have to be made free, or at least affordable by common people; the extra foodgrain ration provided during the pandemic as a special measure has to be continued and expanded; employment has to be increased inter alia through a programme of support for petty and small-scale production; a wealth tax to finance welfare measures has to be imposed, and so on.
The United Progressive Alliance-I government had stood out precisely because it had such an economic programme that had a direction contrary to neoliberalism. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Scheme introduced by it with Left support, against the neoliberal drift of the time, proved to be of great value during the pandemic when it provided crucial livelihood support to lakhs of people, who were suddenly retrenched. The mandate given by the people to the UPA during the 2009 elections was not because of its pursuit of neoliberalism, but because of these measures adopted against the drift of neoliberalism.
While the coming together of Oppositional forces is essential, the question still remains: apart from the restoration of equal citizenship, of civil liberties and democratic rights, is it to be a coming together that reiterates neoliberalism or is it to adopt a programme that goes, when necessary, against the drift of neoliberalism, to bring tangible material benefits to the common people? The left has a major role to play for ensuring the second answer; it must not succumb to other political formations’ endorsement of neoliberalism.
Prabhat Patnaik is Professor Emeritus, Centre for Economic Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
