ABSTRACT
There were substantial differences in the 1930's between the outlook and mentality of French, German, Italian and Spanish middle classes, yet the over-all feeling of alarm before the mounting tide of socialism and communism was almost identical. Similar examples of kinship between socialism (or communism) and various forms of fascism, as well as their common hatred of democracy and the bourgeois state, can be found in Germany. The French candidates to fascism had a head-start over their German, Italian and Spanish contemporaries. Men like Doriot, Pucheu, Marion, Benoist-Mechin, Philipe Henriot and even Drieu La Rochelle were obviously influenced by theories similar to those of Burnham. They saw themselves as the leaders of the coming managerial state in the new Europe freed of English mercantilism, but freed also of Hitler's misty ideology. Italian propaganda thus found a ready terrain in France. Bernanos admits that he was left speechless at this outburst of bitterness.
