Fascism (n.) is born when a depoliticized people in a slump are taught there must be bad guys behind their ruin — Jews, homosexuals, blacks, Communists, take your pick.
Fascism (n.) in the economists' sense is not gas chambers but state coordination of unions and corporations; after the Depression everyone was fascist, only in different cultural forms.
Fascism (n.) formally speaking is a state-organized economy run with big conglomerates — which describes the East Asian "free-market" success stories.
Fascism (n.) can arise in the most civilized country: Germany in the 1930s was perhaps the most advanced in the world — and we have the same genes.
Fascism (n.) was welcomed by Western governments and business between the wars because it opened economies to investment and crushed labor, the left and excess democracy.
Fascism (n.) was, to the 1937 State Department, a moderate force that must succeed, or the masses would turn left again.
Fascism (n.) got its chance partly because German industrialists thought they could aim the Nazis at the left and keep them on a leash.