Jung and Others on Fascism
A Reply to a Question from a Jungian Center Student
“Fascism is the Latin form of religion, and its religious character explains why the whole thing has such a tremendous fascination.”[1]
“… we are entitled to speak of a collective presence. Similar ‘presences’ today are the Fascist and Communist ideologies, the one emphasizing the power of the chief, and the other communal ownership of goods in a primitive society.”[2]
“… we would not call Fascism or Hitlerism ideas. They are archetypes, and so we would say: Give an archetype to the people and the whole crowd moves like one man, there is no resisting it.”[3]
“Fascism is living Italian history”[4]
“Through Communism in Russia, through National Socialism in Germany, through Fascism in Italy, the State became all-powerful and claimed its slaves body and soul…. The old totalitarian claim of the Civitas Dei is now voiced by the State: one sheep as good as another and the whole herd crowded together,… utterly deprived of all the rights which the man… who called himself a democracy had dreamt of.”[5]
“… the Fascist chiefs we remember best were charismatic. Through one method or another, each established an emotional link to the crowd and, like the central figure in a cult, brought deep and often ugly feelings to the surface. This is how the tentacles of Fascism spread inside a democracy. Unlike a monarchy or a military dictatorship imposed on society from above, fascism draws energy from men and women who were upset because of a lost war, a lost job, a memory of humiliation, or a sense that their country is in steep decline. The more painful the grounds for resentment, the easier it is for a fascist leader to gain followers by dangling the prospect of renewal or by vowing to take back what has been stolen.”[6]
The word “fascism” has been appearing in the news, and several students have asked me about it–what it means, why it is showing up now, and what might Jung have thought about it. Herewith an essay in seven parts, concluding with some warnings about the concept in light of our contemporary reality.
What “Fascism” Means
The dictionary offers several definitions of “fascism.” In general terms it can describe
” a strongly nationalistic movement in favor of government control of industry and labor and opposed to radical socialism and communism…. Any system of government in which property is privately owned, but all industry and labor are regulated by a strong national government, while all opposition is rigorously suppressed.”[7]
More specifically, the term refers historically to “the doctrines, principles or methods of the Italian Fascist party and movement,”[8] which “seized control of the Italian government in 1922 under the leadership of Benito Mussolini and has appeared in other countries since then.”[9]
The Italian origin is reflected in the etymology of the word. It derives from the Latin fascis/fasces, the bundle of rods and an axe carried before the highest magistrates in ancient Rome, as a symbol of high office.[10] The fascist movement under Mussolini was, in other words, a dictatorship harking back to their Roman heritage in its symbolism.
Jung regarded fascism as an “ideology… emphasizing the power of the chief,”[11] as “living Italian history,”[12] as “the Latin form of religion”[13] and as an archetype, the numinosity of which enabled the chief to move “the whole crowd… like one man, there is no resisting it.”[14]
The Historical Background to Fascism
As a political movement, fascism arose in the years between World War I and World War II (1918-1939).[15] These were hard times in Europe: million of men had been killed in the “great war;”[16] the economies of most countries were unstable, with inflation a serious issue;[17] people were traumatized, anxious, fearful and eager for some semblance of order.[18]
Italy, in particular, suffered an economic depression in 1918,[19] which made many feel threatened, and this fear led them to “take refuge in their own form of extremism,”[20] i.e. fascism, which Mussolini “tricked out” as nationalism “with a few radical phrases to win mass support, draped in mystical garments.”[21]
Italy was just the first nation to suffer economic depression. Soon, thanks in part of the harsh reparations laid on Germany in the Treaty of Versailles,[22] the German people also faced impossible economic inflation,[23] and there was widespread discontent. By the last years of the 1930’s both countries had experienced “the revolution of the classes of order.”[24] The masses had become so discontent, desperate for some governmental response to the chaos, that they were easy prey for the slogans of demagogues.[25]
Features of Fascism
Soon the “externals of fascism”[26] appeared: “colored shirts, private armies, mass hypnotism, special salutes, special war cries and ceremonies, mystical glorification of the nation, and a vast program of conquest.”[27] These are just some of the features of fascism.
Other features include:
- spreading lies (now made easier than in the 1930’s, due to social media like Facebook)[28]
- appeals to the masses, with disregard for the individual human being[29]
- lack of concern for human rights[30]
- prosecution and persecution of perceived enemies[31]
- popular sentiment shifting toward extremism[32]
- the slow creation of a totalitarian state, with the suppression of all opposition[33]
- aggression, militarism and expansionistic rhetoric, with calls for war with other countries[34]
- attacks on left-wing movements or organizations[35]
- opportunism (quick shifts of line on any position)[36]
- the leader exploiting widespread dissatisfaction by promising a host of attractive changes[37]
- the skillful use of propaganda to get people to believe what the state wants them to believe, exploiting their fears[38]
- street riots and other forms of discontent becoming more common[39]
- well-dressed people on the street being beaten by mobs angry at the wealthy[40]
- news sources spreading the fascist propaganda[41]
- the reshaping of educational curricula[42]
- non-fascist officials forced to resign[43]
- leading industrialists supporting the fascist government[44]
- the leader taking over the administration of the government, with the willingness to do whatever is necessary to command obedience[45]
- officials being required to express their loyalty to the leader[46]
- elected officials being replaced by fascists[47]
- love of panoply and parades reflecting nationalistic pride[48]
- people traveling long distances to attend rallies with kindred souls keen on restoring traditional values to the community[49]
- nostalgic talk of an earlier world where order reigned[50]
- supporters of the fascist leader being those who lack higher education and are unhappy with their economic circumstances[51]
- the appearance of a demagogue who brings diverse aggrieved groups together, exploiting their discontent[52]
- a push to build self-sufficiency economically[53]
- castigation of foreigners, especially migrants, as threats to national identity[54]
- aggressive foreign policies[55]
What Jung Witnessed in His Life and Times
Jung was 39 when World War I broke out,[56] engulfing Europe. From the safety of neutral Switzerland, Jung watched as the French, eager for vengeance in 1919, forced onerous financial reparations on Germany.[57] As the defeated aggressor, Germany was forced to acquiesce to the terms of the victors.
During the interwar years, Jung had occasion to go to Germany where he observed Hitler during a parade[58]–the goosesteping, salutes, the miasma of the crowd–
and he sensed how der Führer identified himself with the geist of his people.[59] In addition to trips and regular correspondence with German friends and colleagues,[60] Jung also had German patients, whose dreams gave Jung further insight into what was going on in Germany.[61] He told one of his correspondents, Max Guggenheim, that he attempted to “forestall… certain developments in Germany.”[62]
Jung foresaw “continuing divisions and upheavals…for…at least several decades more.”[63] and, as the head of the International General Medical Society for Psychotherapy, he was concerned about the future of psychotherapy,[64] as most psychotherapists in Germany were Jews.[65] As the Nazis’ persecution of the Jews grew worse, Jung was actively involved in getting many of them to England or America.[66]
Jung, in short, witnessed from the safety of Switzerland the phenomenon of fascism which surrounded his neutral country on the west, south and east.
Jung’s Opinion of Fascism
For multiple reasons Jung despised fascism. First, it is an -ism, and the -ism was one of Jung’s bêtes noires–capitalism, socialism, communism, fascism–all of them Jung found thoroughly repugnant.[67] Why? Because they all are ideologies which collectivize people. Jung’s constant focus was on the individual human being. In his practice he never treated anyone the same as another.[68] He repeatedly stressed to his students the uniqueness of their clients, and how we must never level down to some common denominator in dealing with others.[69] So any system that dealt with masses was anathema to him.
Secondly, Jung, as a native of Switzerland, found fascism unpalatable because he cherished the long democratic tradition of the Confederatio Helvetica.[70] His personal experience of both German and Italian fascism taught Jung that any brand of
fascism is not democratic, and fascists work actively to destroy democracy.[71] They do so often with the support of many–as Germans and Italians did in the interwar years as living conditions became untenable.[72] Massive inflation, the inability to feed one’s family, the lack of good employment opportunities, resentments at the “elites”[73] and earlier parties’ policies–all such things can be a toxic brew making voters open to the huckster who promises relief, with high-sounding policies cloaking disinformation and lies.[74]
And thirdly, Jung knew that fascism was dangerous, due to its numinosity.[75] As an archetype, fascism has the power to lull and lure the masses, few of whom are conscious and critical in their thinking. Jung knew that mass-man has the consciousness of a beast[76] and the fascist dictator can exploit this credulity and vulnerability.
Why Fascism Has Been in the News
The word “fascism” became widely used after the 2016 Presidential election brought Donald Trump to the White House.[77] The term was searched on the Merriam-Webster dictionary website more often than any other word in English except “surreal”[78] (when, for a lot of us, the whole campaign and election did, indeed, seem “surreal.”). In the eight years following, the word continued to appear in print and social media,[79] and became even more frequently used in the run-up to the 2024 election.
In the year before the election, responsible journalists authored multiple articles, opinion pieces and news reports,[80] warning voters of the political stakes in the 2024 election. Many of these articles sought to remind us of the lessons of history–how seemingly modern, European nations lost their democratic governments to totalitarian dictators[81]–and others pointed out the totalitarians at work in our 21st century reality, e.g. in Hungary, Poland, Russia and the Philippines.[82] Prescient journalists in late January warned us that Trump “is on a quest for total power,”[83] and every American should be “clear-eyed” about what lies ahead.[84]
A recent cartoon in the News Tribune[85] had two pictures: the first, warning Americans they might lose their democracy, has their uniform response: sleep; the second, warning them they might lose TikTok, has their uniform response: yelling, screaming and gesticulating wildly. This reflects our “culture of distraction,”[86] which, as Juvenal noted over two thousand years ago, is just what dictators love: keep the masses distracted with “bread and circuses”[87] and the slow erosion of rights and liberties will allow the dictator to achieve a “quiet coup.”[88]
Will we allow ourselves to be so distracted? Or will we heed the warnings of knowledgeable people?
Words of Wisdom from Jung and Others
Jung would remind us of how fascist leaders will regard human beings as a herd of sheep “crowded together,… utterly deprived of all rights:”[89] If we should attempt to resist this, Jung warns us of the subtle power of archetypes:
“… we would not call Fascism or Hitlerism ideas. They are archetypes, and so we would say: Give an archetype to the people and the whole crowd moves like one man, there is no resisting it.”[90]
Since we cannot remove the numinosity from the word, we must be mindful of its power, and be alert to avoid the temptation (strong in our extraverted American society)[91] to be “other-directed,”[92] and resist going along with the crowd.
More recently Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State in the Clinton administration, produced a 250+-page book warning us of the dangers of fascism.[93] With her lifelong experience of living under and later dealing with fascist regimes,[94] she calls our attention to “the assault on democratic values that… is dividing America at home.”[95] She would recognize the accuracy of the cartoon–all the people asleep while our democracy is threatened–but she reminds us that “for freedom to survive, it must be defended, and that if lies are to stop, they must be exposed.”[96]
Albright concludes Fascism: A Warning with a list of nine questions[97] which can be a guide for us as we assess Trump and his coterie of oligarchs and toadies:
“Do they cater to our prejudices by suggesting that we treat people outside our ethnicity, race, creed, or party as unworthy of dignity and respect?
“Do they want us to nurture our anger toward those who we believe have done us wrong, rub raw our grievances, and set our sights on revenge?
“Do they encourage us to have contempt for our governing institutions and the electoral process?
“Do they seek to destroy our faith in essential contributors to democracy such as an independent press and a professional judiciary?
“Do they exploit the symbols of patriotism – the flag, the pledge – in a conscious effort to turn us against one another?
“If defeated at the polls, will they accept the verdict or insist without evidence that they have won?
“Do they go beyond asking for our votes to brag about their ability to solve all problems, put to rest all anxieties, and satisfy every desire?
“Do they solicit our cheers by speaking casually and with pumped up machismo about using violence to blow enemies away?
“Do they echo the attitude of Mussolini: “the crowd doesn’t have to know,” all it has to do is believe and “submit to being shaped”?
“Or do they invite us to join with them in building and maintaining a healthy center for our societies, a place where rights and duties are apportioned fairly, the social contract is honored, and all have room to dream and grow?
Albright concludes her book with a warning that Jung, were he alive now, would surely endorse: “For those who cherish freedom, the answers will provide grounds for reassurance or a warning we dare not ignore.”[98]
Bibliography
Albright, Madeleine, with Bill Woodward (2018), Fascism: A Warning. New York: Harper Collins.
________ (2003), Madam Secretary. New York: Harper Collins.
________ (2012), Prague Winter. New York: Harper Collins
Anderson, Nicky (2025), “America, you might lose your democracy,” News Tribune, January 10, 2025; reprinted in The Week, January 31, 2025, 18.
Applebaum, Anne (2024), Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World. New York: Doubleday.
Baradaran, Mehrsa (2024), The Quiet Coup: Neoliberalism and the Looting of America. New York: W.W. Norton.
Bassin, Ian (2022), “Is Civil War Coming?” The New York Times Book Review, January 30, 2022, 11.
Beinart, Peter (2018), “Is Donald Trump a Fascist?,” The New York Times Book Review, September 16, 2018), 12.
Berman, Sheri (2018), “Can It Happen Here?” The New York Times Book Review, May 20, 2018.
Brinton, Crane, John Christopher & Robert Lee Wolff (1960), A History of Civilization, 2 vols. Englewood Cliffs NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc.
Brown, K, (2024), “Post-fascism, or how the far right talks about itself,” Taylor and Francis Online; https://www.tandfonline.com
Cheney, Liz (2023), Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning. New York: Little, Brown & Company.
Cohen, Adam (2020), Supreme Inequality: The Supreme Court’s Fifty-Year Battle for a More Unjust America. New York: Penguin Books.
De Luca, G. (2023), “War, Socialism and the Rise of Fascism,” MIT Economics, January 2023.
Fisher, Max (2022a), The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World. New York: Little, Brown & Company.
________ (2022b), “During Constitutional Crises, Democracies Aren’t Always Democratic,” The New York Times, June 19, 2022, 13.
Griffin, Stephen (2015), Broken Trust: Dysfunctional Government and Constitutional Reform. Lawrence KS: University of Kansas Press.
Hayes, Christopher (2012), Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy. New York: Broadway Paperbacks.
Jung, C.G. (1970), Civilization in Transition. Collected Works, 10. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
________ (19 69), Psychology and Religion, West and East. Collected Works, 11. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
________ (1976), The Symbolic Life. Collected Works, 18. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Kantor, Jodi (2023), “Fruitless Leak Inquiry Heightens Air of Distrust in Supreme Court,” The New York Times, 1, 17.
Keirsey, David & Marilyn Bates (1984), Please Understand Me. Del Mar CA: Prometheus Nemesis Books.
Ladd, Donna (2024), “As Fascism Looms, A Free Press Must Stand…”, Mississippi Free Press (October 25, 2024).
Last (2025), “Trump is at war with America,” The Bulwark, quoted in The Week (January 31, 2025), 4.
Levitsky, Steven & Daniel Ziblatt (2018), How Democracies Die. New York: Crown.
McIntire, Mike, Glenn Thrush & Eric Lipton (2022), “How Gun Makers Harness Fear to Supercharge Sales,” The New York Times, June 19, 2022, 1, 16.
Nelson, Anne (2019), Shadow Network: Media, Money and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Posner, Eric (2020), The Demagogue’s Playbook: The Battle for American Democracy from the Founders to Trump. New York: All Points Books.
Reich, Robert (2023), “Mainstream media is playing into Trump’s neo-fascism,” The Guardian, December 31, 2023.
Riesman, David, Nathan Glazer & Reuel Denney (1955), The Lonely Crowd. Garden City NY: Doubleday.
Scott, A.O. (2019), “Maybe the Joke Isn’t on Hitler,” The New York Times, October 20, 2019; 10AR.
Sykes, Charles (2017), How the Right Lost Its Mind. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Symonds, Alexandria (2023), ” Enraged and Engaged,” The New York Times Book Review, November 26, 2023, 21.
Szalai, Jennifer (2023), “Spotlight,” The New York Times Book Review, June 18, 2023.
Tanenhaus, Sam (2023), “The New News at the New Court,” The New York Times Book Review, May 28, 2023, 10.
Walter, Barbara (2022), How Civil Wars Start and How to Stop Them. New York: Crown.
Woodward, Bob (2018), Fear: Trump in the White House. New York: Simon & Schuster.
________ & Robert Costa (2021), Peril. New York: Simon & Schuster.
[1] Collected Works 18 ¶373. Hereafter Collected Works will be abbreviated CW.
[2] CW 11 ¶224.
[3] CW 18 ¶372.
[4] Ibid.
[5] CW 18 ¶1324.
[6] Albright (2018), 9.
[7] World Book Encyclopedia I, 716.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Lewis & Short (1969), 726-727.
[11] CW 11 ¶224.
[12] CW 18 ¶372.
[13] Ibid. ¶373.
[14] CW 18 ¶372. The lack of resistance is due to its numinosity. More on this later in this essay.
[15] Brinton et al. (1960), I, 459.
[16] Italy lost 650,000 men and one million wounded in the first World War; ibid., 460.
[17] Ibid., 476.
[18] Ibid., 459.
[19] Ibid., 460.
[20] Ibid.
[21] Ibid.
[22] The German people were required to pay five billion a year until 1921, when the final bill (to repair all the damage they created by causing the war) would be presented to them; the effect of such onerous figures was the disturbance of the peace and economy of the world; ibid., 412.
[23] The deutsch mark 1919 was valued at 4.2 to the US dollar; by 1922, its value had fallen, to 7,000 marks to the dollar; ibid., 476.
[24] Ibid., 459.
[25] Ibid., 469.
[26] Ibid., 460.
[27] Ibid.
[28] Albright (2018), 10. This is especially so now (in 2025) after Zuckerberg caved in to Trump and discontinued the fact-checking division of Facebook.
[29] Ibid., 172. Cf. Brinton (1960), 460.
[30] Albright (2018), 168.
[31] Brinton et al. (1960), 460.
[32] Ibid., 461.
[33] Ibid., 462.
[34] Ibid., 463.
[35] Ibid., 462.
[36] Ibid.
[37] Albright (2018), 20.
[38]Brinton (1960), 460.
[39] Ibid., 464.
[40] Ibid., 469.
[41] Ibid., 460.
[42] Brinton (1960), 468.
[43] Brinton (1960), 464
[44] Ibid.
[45]Ibid., 466
[46] Ibid.
[47] Ibid.
[48] Ibid.469
[49] Albright (2018), 63.
[50] Ibid. 223-224.
[51] Ibid., 113.
[52] Ibid., 235.
[53] Brinton (1960), 469.
[54] Albright (2018), 182.
[55] Brinton (1960), 469.
[56] Born in 1875, Jung was still obligated to do a month’s military service each year, a requirement for all Swiss men up to age 65. With Germany right next door, this duty became even more urgent during World War II.
[57] Brinton (1960), 512.
[58] Jung gave a lecture series in Berlin in 1933 [Hannah (1976), 209-212] where he saw Hitler with his own eyes; CW 10 ¶419.
[59] CW 10 ¶419.
[60] E.g. to J. Neinertz (3 July 1939), Egon Freiherr von Eickstedt (3 July 1939), M.R. Braband-Isaac (22 July 1939), Dr. Tochtermann (13 January 1940), as well as Max Guggenheim; Letters, I.
[61] CW 18 ¶1322; cf. Hannah (1976), 209.
[62] “Letter to Max Guggenheim,” 28 March 1934; Letters, I, 156.
[63] “Letter of Albert Oppenheimer,” 10 October 1933; ibid., 129.
[64] Cf. Jung’s letters to Oluf Brüel (2 March 1934) and Gustav Richard Heyer (20 April 1934) in Letters, I, 144-145 & 157-158.
[65] “Letter to Max Guggenheim,” 28 March 1934; Letters, I, 156.
[66] Ibid.; cf Bair (2003), 467-468.
[67] See the essay “The -ism: One of Jung’s Bêtes Noires,” archived on this blog site for an in-depth discussion of Jung’s attitude toward -isms.
[68] Hannah (1976), 202.
[69] “Letter to James Kirsch (26 May 1934), Letters, I, 162.
[70] This is the official name of the nation we think of as Switzerland, reflecting its nature as a confederation of cantons.
[71] CW 18 ¶s1324 & 1335.
[72] Brinton (1960), 467-468.
[73] Ibid., 469.
[74] Albright (2018), 10.
[75] CW 18 ¶372.
[76] Ibid. ¶371.
[77] Cf, Berman (2018), 10; Beinart (2018), 12; Scott (2019),10AR.
[78] Albright (2018), 7.
[79] Cf. Brown (2024), De Luca (2023), Ladd (2024), and Reich (2023).
[80] E.g Ladd (2024), Anderson (2025), Applebaum (2024), Brown (2024), DeLuca (2023), Last (2025), Reich (2023), and Symonds (2023).
[81] Albright (2018), 119.
[82] Ibid.
[83] Last (2025), 4.
[84] Jonathan Last, The Bulwark; quoted in The Week, January 31, 2025, 4.
[85] Nicky Anderson, published on January 10, 2025; reprinted in The Week (January 31, 2025), 18.
[86] For more on this, see Matt Wyss’ article at: https://medium.com@mdw.2000/a-culture-of-distraction-8d07c2eb4b70
[87] Juvenal, Satires, X, 80.
[88] This is the title of Mehrsa Baradaran’s recent book on how quiet, backroom actions, in both law and politics resulted in the “looting of America.” I highly recommend this book, both for its warnings and its explanatory power about why so many Americans are right, in their sense that the “system” has been “rigged.”
[89] CW 18 ¶1324
[90] Ibid. ¶372.
[91] Keirsey & Bates (1984), 25.
[92] This term is defined in Riesman et al. (1955), 34-38.
[93] Albright (2018).
[94] She was born in Czechoslovakia and lived there for the first ten years of her life; as US Secretary of State she had to deal with Orban and the other fascist heads of state; see Albright’s two memoirs [Albright (2003) and (2012)] for her life story.
[95] Albright (2018), 252.
[96] Quoted in Berman (2018), 10.
[97] Albright (2018), 253.
[98] Ibid., 254.
