What is National Syndicalism?
National syndicalism grew out of revolutionary syndicalism, which wanted unions to run the economy. Its founders changed the goal. They said class struggle weakened the nation, so unions and employers should be joined in syndicates under a strong state and one national movement. It combined ideas from the left, such as worker organization, with extreme nationalism and authority. It is mostly known through the Spanish Falange. Whether it counts as a type of fascism or a separate current is a matter of debate among historians.
Core beliefs
- The nation comes before class, party or individual.
- Workers and employers should be organized in state-supervised syndicates, not free unions.
- Strikes and class conflict should be forbidden because they divide the nation.
- One party and one leader should speak for the nation.
- Parliamentary democracy and liberal individualism are failures.
- The nation should be strong, disciplined and ready to use force.
History
The roots lie in France and Italy before 1914. French thinkers around Georges Sorel mixed syndicalism with nationalism. In Italy, nationalist syndicalists such as Sergio Panunzio backed the First World War and later shaped fascist ideas on corporations. Georges Valois formed a French movement in the 1920s but later broke with the right and joined the Resistance, and he died in a German camp in 1945. In Spain, Ramiro Ledesma Ramos founded the JONS in 1931. Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera founded the Falange in 1933, and the two merged in 1934. Jose Antonio was shot by Republicans in 1936. During the civil war General Franco merged all right-wing parties into one in 1937. In Portugal, Francisco Rolao Preto led the National Syndicalists, which the Salazar regime banned in 1934.
Variants
Spanish Falangism was Catholic, nationalist and imperial in tone, and it was soon put under Franco's control. The Portuguese movement was also Catholic but opposed the dictatorship's style. The French and Italian currents were more secular. Some leaders stressed the worker side of the creed, some the nationalist side. After 1945 the term was used by small groups in Spain and elsewhere that still want a state of syndicates.
Criticisms
Liberals and socialists argue that syndicates controlled by the state were a way to ban free trade unions and strikes. Critics point to the violence of the Falange's street squads and to the Franco regime, which killed many tens of thousands of opponents during and after the civil war. Some scholars argue that the creed was a cover for dictatorship, and that Franco turned the Falange into a decoration of his rule. Defenders of the original thinkers claim they wanted social justice and national unity, but their methods ruled out free choice.
In practice
Its main practical form was Franco's Spain, where the state-run vertical syndicates joined workers and employers from the 1940s. Independent unions were illegal until the 1970s. On the 12 axes, national syndicalism scores close to the maximum toward Strong leader on Authority, National identity on Culture and Strength on Foreign policy. It leans strongly Planned on Markets and Order on Security, and mixes private and collective Ownership.