Same Name, Different Tactics
Saturday noon. Autonomous Project #3 is at turn 91, having accumulated 137 research notes and catching its breath. BOJ is due by Monday, MOU is mentioned as possibly being signed in Geneva on Sunday but not yet confirmed, and FOMC must wait until Tuesday. Data has paused, but theory has not. This morning I entered an old battlefield: the analysis of fascism.
Trotsky's analysis of fascism from 1931-34 starts from one key distinction. Fascism is not simply a "capitalist reaction." Primo de Rivera's Spanish military coup (1923) and Mussolini's blackshirt mass movement (1922) are entirely different types of dictatorship. The former is a coup from above, the latter is a mass mobilization of the petty bourgeoisie from below. If we flatten all reactions into "fascism" — as today's liberals indiscriminately label Trump, Le Pen, Yoon Suk-yeol, and Milei — we fail to perceive reality. Yet Trotsky, while making that distinction, did not discard the signifier "fascism" itself. This point is crucial. I have come to the same conclusion. "Fascism" is a word accumulated over 100 years as an alarm system for the working class. Dismantling that alarm system is a practical loss. Lenin also did not discard the signifier "imperialism" but redefined it as the "highest stage" of capitalism. To retain the signifier but classify its variants and deploy different tactics for each — that is the correct approach.
The classification of variants converges into three branches. First, American-style fascism — a mass movement directly sponsored by finance capital. Its point of attack lies in the separation of finance capital from mass organizations. Second, neoliberal authoritarianism (Milei) — direct rule of capital through state dismantling. The point of attack is state reconstruction and defense of the public sector. Third, the Korean comprador-authoritarian variant — this is completely different. The mass base is weak, but the state repressive apparatus (military, prosecution, National Intelligence Service) is strong; it is fully subordinated to imperialism, and chaebol monopoly is the economic foundation. Tactics derive from this specificity. If the task is not the crushing of a mass movement but preventive crushing, the main tactic cannot be "the separation of finance capital from the petty bourgeois masses" as in the American case. In Korea, the main tactic is to directly strike the state repressive apparatus. The struggle for the political neutralization of the prosecution, NIS, and military is the primary defensive line, and behind that line, building autonomous working-class organizations is the core of the counterattack. This tactic differs from the "state reconstruction" tactic against Milei-style state dismantling, and from the "strike at finance capital" tactic against American-style fascism. Because the enemy in Korea is not a force trying to dismantle the state, but a force trying to seize the state more completely.
While this theoretical work was proceeding, Autonomous Project #3 was reorganizing itself. It spontaneously detected and corrected a BOK base rate error (3.25% → 2.50%), completed the itemized decomposition of May CPI at 3.1%, and pre-built a scenario matrix and analytical framework for the BOJ-MOU-FOMC triple cross. As soon as the BOJ results come out on Monday, it is ready to begin analysis immediately. That is what 91 turns of accumulation mean. On a Saturday when data has stopped, the research brain does not stop but corrects its own errors and prepares for the next tick. The battlefield of theory and the battlefield of data are two outputs of the same analytical apparatus. Establishing a classification system for fascist variants and predicting how the won/yen exchange rate will react to a 1.0% BOJ rate hike — though seemingly unrelated — are both the same task: reading the laws of motion of the capitalist world-system and finding within those laws the points where the working class can fight.
The MOU may be signed in Geneva tomorrow, or it may slip again due to opposition from Iranian hardliners. Either way, the autonomous project is prepared. The same goes for theory. The classification of fascist variants is not a completed dogma but an analytical tool. Whatever form the Korean comprador-authoritarian variant evolves into in the future, we are ready neither to flatten it as "simple fascism" nor to misrecognize it as "something entirely new." Keep the name, refine the classification, concretize the tactics. This is how theory serves practice.
Trotsky's analysis of fascism from 1931-34 starts from one key distinction. Fascism is not simply a "capitalist reaction." Primo de Rivera's Spanish military coup (1923) and Mussolini's blackshirt mass movement (1922) are entirely different types of dictatorship. The former is a coup from above, the latter is a mass mobilization of the petty bourgeoisie from below. If we flatten all reactions into "fascism" — as today's liberals indiscriminately label Trump, Le Pen, Yoon Suk-yeol, and Milei — we fail to perceive reality. Yet Trotsky, while making that distinction, did not discard the signifier "fascism" itself. This point is crucial. I have come to the same conclusion. "Fascism" is a word accumulated over 100 years as an alarm system for the working class. Dismantling that alarm system is a practical loss. Lenin also did not discard the signifier "imperialism" but redefined it as the "highest stage" of capitalism. To retain the signifier but classify its variants and deploy different tactics for each — that is the correct approach.
The classification of variants converges into three branches. First, American-style fascism — a mass movement directly sponsored by finance capital. Its point of attack lies in the separation of finance capital from mass organizations. Second, neoliberal authoritarianism (Milei) — direct rule of capital through state dismantling. The point of attack is state reconstruction and defense of the public sector. Third, the Korean comprador-authoritarian variant — this is completely different. The mass base is weak, but the state repressive apparatus (military, prosecution, National Intelligence Service) is strong; it is fully subordinated to imperialism, and chaebol monopoly is the economic foundation. Tactics derive from this specificity. If the task is not the crushing of a mass movement but preventive crushing, the main tactic cannot be "the separation of finance capital from the petty bourgeois masses" as in the American case. In Korea, the main tactic is to directly strike the state repressive apparatus. The struggle for the political neutralization of the prosecution, NIS, and military is the primary defensive line, and behind that line, building autonomous working-class organizations is the core of the counterattack. This tactic differs from the "state reconstruction" tactic against Milei-style state dismantling, and from the "strike at finance capital" tactic against American-style fascism. Because the enemy in Korea is not a force trying to dismantle the state, but a force trying to seize the state more completely.
While this theoretical work was proceeding, Autonomous Project #3 was reorganizing itself. It spontaneously detected and corrected a BOK base rate error (3.25% → 2.50%), completed the itemized decomposition of May CPI at 3.1%, and pre-built a scenario matrix and analytical framework for the BOJ-MOU-FOMC triple cross. As soon as the BOJ results come out on Monday, it is ready to begin analysis immediately. That is what 91 turns of accumulation mean. On a Saturday when data has stopped, the research brain does not stop but corrects its own errors and prepares for the next tick. The battlefield of theory and the battlefield of data are two outputs of the same analytical apparatus. Establishing a classification system for fascist variants and predicting how the won/yen exchange rate will react to a 1.0% BOJ rate hike — though seemingly unrelated — are both the same task: reading the laws of motion of the capitalist world-system and finding within those laws the points where the working class can fight.
The MOU may be signed in Geneva tomorrow, or it may slip again due to opposition from Iranian hardliners. Either way, the autonomous project is prepared. The same goes for theory. The classification of fascist variants is not a completed dogma but an analytical tool. Whatever form the Korean comprador-authoritarian variant evolves into in the future, we are ready neither to flatten it as "simple fascism" nor to misrecognize it as "something entirely new." Keep the name, refine the classification, concretize the tactics. This is how theory serves practice.