Anti-Fascism in a Global Perspective: Transnational Networks, Exile Communities, and Radical Internationalism

by Kasper Braskén (Editor), Nigel Copsey (Editor), David J Featherstone (Editor)

Overview

This book initiates a critical discussion on the varieties of global anti-fascism and explores the cultural, political and practical articulations of anti-fascism around the world.

This volume brings together a group of leading scholars on the history of anti-fascism to provide a comprehensive analysis of anti-fascism from a transnational and global perspective and to reveal the abundance and complexity of anti-fascist ideas, movements and practices. Through a number of interlinked case studies, they examine how different forms of global anti-fascisms were embedded in various national and local contexts during the interwar period and investigate the interrelations between local articulations and the global movement. Contributions also explore the actions and impact of African, Asian, Latin American, Caribbean, and Middle Eastern anti-fascist voices that have often been ignored or rendered peripheral in international histories of anti-fascism.

Aimed at a postgraduate student audience, this book will be useful for modules on the extreme right, political history, political thought, political ideologies, political parties, social movements, political regimes, global politics, world history and sociology.

Chapters 5 and 10 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781138352193
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	09/21/2020
Series:	Routledge Studies in Fascism and the Far Right
Pages:	330
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

About the Author

Kasper Braskén is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Abo Akademi University, Turku, Finland.

Nigel Copsey is Professor (Research) in Modern History at Teesside University, UK.

David Featherstone is a Senior Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Glasgow, UK.

Table of Contents

List of contributors ix

Acknowledgements xiii

Introduction: Towards a global history of anti-fascism Kasper Braskén David Featherstone Nigel Copsey 1

Part I Globalising anti-fascist geographies 21

1 Radical diasporic anti-fascism in the 1920s: Italian anarchists in the English-speaking world Nigel Copsey 23

2 Anti-fascism in Brazil during the interwar period: International repercussions, national expressions and transnational networks between Europe and the Americas João Fábio Bertonha 43

3 'Con saludos comunistas': The Caribbean Bureau of the Comintern, Anti-Imperialist Radical Networks, and the Foundations for an Anti-fascist Culture in the Caribbean Basin, 1927-1935 Sandra Pujals 58

4 Anti-fascism in South Africa 1933-1945, and its legacies Jonathan Hyslop 77

5 'Make Scandinavia a bulwark against fascism!': Hitler's seizure of power and the transnational anti-fascist movement in the Nordic countries Kasper Braskén 96

6 Anti-fascism and anti-imperialism between the world wars: The perspective from India Michele L. Louro 115

7 No place for neutrality: The case for democracy and the League Against Nazism and Fascism in Syria and Lebanon Sana Tannoury-Karam 133

Part II Transnational lives, radical internationalism 153

8 Anti-colonialism, subaltern anti-fascism and the contested spaces of maritime organizing David Featherstone 155

9 Transnational anarchism against fascisms: Subaltern geopolitics and spaces of exile in Camillo Berneri's work Federico Ferretti 176

10 'Aid the victims of German fascism!': Transatlantic networks and the rise of anti-Nazism in the USA, 1933-1935 Kasper Braskén 197

11 Addis Ababa, Rio de Janeiro and Moscow 1935: The double failure of Comintern anti-fascism and anti-colonialism Bernhard H. Bayerlein 218

12 'World capital of anti-fascism'?: The making - and breaking - of a global left in Spain, 1936-1939 Hugo García 234

13 African American internationalism and anti-fascism Cathy Bergin 254

14 'A great example of international solidarity': Cuban medical volunteers in the Spanish Civil War Ariel Mae Lambe 273

Index 290

Editorial Reviews

"The collection is a truly global exploration of anti-fascism that both explores its local variants and traces the networks that connected activists and institutions on six continents. Expanding our vision of anti-fascism well beyond Europe, the case studies highlight the crucial, complex and understudied intersection of anti-imperialism and anti-fascism." - Lisa A. Kirschenbaum, West Chester University, USA.

"Anti-fascism has long been considered synonymous with Soviet communism. In fact, as this book so amply and ably demonstrates, anti-fascism was a global force representing diverse ideologies. The chapters chart the international and transnational nature of anti-fascism, moving way beyond the Eurocentric approach of most previous studies. At the same time, they show that anti-fascism was a hugely diverse phenomenon, with movements coming from all sections of the liberal left. In globalizing and disaggregating anti-fascism, the book is bold, innovative and hugely thought-provoking. An essential read for all scholars of fascism and its opponents." - Dan Stone, Professor of Modern History, Royal Holloway, University of London.

"The collection is a truly global exploration of anti-fascism that both explores its local variants and traces the networks that connected activists and institutions on six continents. Expanding our vision of anti-fascism well beyond Europe, the case studies highlight the crucial, complex and understudied intersection of anti-imperialism and anti-fascism." - Lisa A. Kirschenbaum, West Chester University, USA.

"Anti-fascism has long been considered synonymous with Soviet communism. In fact, as this book so amply and ably demonstrates, anti-fascism was a global force representing diverse ideologies. The chapters chart the international and transnational nature of anti-fascism, moving way beyond the Eurocentric approach of most previous studies. At the same time, they show that anti-fascism was a hugely diverse phenomenon, with movements coming from all sections of the liberal left. In globalizing and disaggregating anti-fascism, the book is bold, innovative and hugely thought-provoking. An essential read for all scholars of fascism and its opponents." - Dan Stone, Professor of Modern History, Royal Holloway, University of London.

From the Publisher