The understanding of fascism in the light of critical thinking of Adorno

• Grant number: 15/17433-2
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: March 01, 2016
• End date: December 31, 2017
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - Ethics
• Principal Investigator: Sinésio Ferraz Bueno
• Grantee: Raquel dos Santos Candido da Silva
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia e Ciências (FFC). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Marília. Marília , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The concepts from psychoanalysis, are important axes for understanding the studies of various authors commonly associated with Critical Theory, especially with regard to the studies of Theodor Adorno on fascism and authoritarian personality, formulated in his critique of fascism. Theodor Adorno engaged in understand regressive tendencies own to fascism, as well as the procedures used by group leaders to reinforce stereotypical images of depreciation ethnic, racial and immigrants in general. Adorno seeks to demonstrate the efficiency of the Fascist leader, in order to provide satisfactions of narcissistic nature, rewarding the real frustrations experienced by his followers, involving a complete inversion of the procedures and proper educational goals of Freudian theory. Fascism, on the contrary, pursues diametrically opposed goals, making the individual dependent on their unconscious processes, neutralizing the emancipatory potential latent in bourgeois society. The elucidation of this contradiction between the degree of maturity and rational trends to collective regression requires consider, according to the author, the emotional gratification of content provided by adherence to this kind of collective.