Animal farm and fascism

information Animal Farm and Fascism Animal farm by George Orwell is an enchanting book related to the Russian Revolution. The author uses animals to narrate the political scenario that abrupt during the Russian revolution. In this book he tries to explain his political views by targeting communism and fascism both. Although this book is quite short to depict both these concepts but the author clearly provides his arguments to the readers. The book talks about Stalins way of governance as well as the fascist form of government too.
Stalin believed that not just the proletariat itself needed to have a vanguard party but the party required to have a vanguard itself in the form of one leader. During the times when the lower sector was going through wrong reasoning also the vanguard party suffered. (Ball pg 167) likewise in the novel, as the farms tracts down to a more totalitarian form of state, Napoleon becoming the leader kicks out Snowball by power and force becoming ” our leader, Comrade Napoleon” (Orwell pg 93). This way the novel is showing Stalins way of communist governance, where power lies with the one in leadership. Also the way Napoleon rooted out Snowball is similar to Stalins behavior towards Trotsky and his other political rivals.
Fascism also requires a very bold, strong and courageous leader. An example of such great fascist leader is Hitler and Mussolini. The way people in Italy had this firm faith that Mussolini was always correct. In the same way Boxer believed that Napoleon was always justified throughout the novel (Ball pg 201). In the course of the novel Napoleon is given a lot of importance. He is the leader, the head of the entire farm. He is always protected by furious dogs. Therefore it clearly shows that animals idolize him as noble and superior. This is also one of the similarities regarding the two ideologies in the book.
Terror and propaganda are used in the novel to show Stalins communist and fascist ideologies together. Stalin tried to impose the era of terror in which purges were used. He also used arts to increase interstate propaganda (ball0 pg 166-167). This was also used by fascist states like Hitler made use of brown-shirts and defined characteristics of inferior races (Ball pg 204-205). Squealer used digits to manipulate the animals in order to convince them that they were in a better state by having pigs as their leaders. Also Napoleon kicks Snowball out before he executed in general masses other traitors (Orwell pg 53; 83). It is not easy to clearly differentiate between fascism or communism when it comes to using terror but I think he advocated both by pointing out similarities between them.
One similarity between fascism and communism is they are an economy of command. The Animal farm doesn’t have any direct organizations before or after the animals take charge. Therefore it is difficult to judge whether pigs would be in favor of a corporate based structure. The pigs although, as the ones managing the economic system, Napoleon as the direct leader of the committees whereas the animals having no authority to voice their views in the working of the farm (Orwell pg 54). Such direct control over the economic system is a part of both, Stalins communism as well as fascism. Although it is not exactly same but they do relate. The farm also brings in use the command way of structuring though we cannot actually judge whether the pigs would prefer having control over the state or a corporate way to govern factories and industries.
In this book the author majorly targets Stalinist Russia having highlights of fascist form of governance. It incorporates both these ideologies and demonstrates the political outburst that occurred back then due to the Russian Revolution.
Works cited:
Ball, Terence, and Richard Dagger. Political Ideologies and the Democratic Ideal. New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1990. Print.
Orwell, George. Animal Farm. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1954. Print.
ONeill, Terry. Readings on Animal Farm. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, 1998. Print.