Fascism

One of the major forms of government of the 20th century is called fascism. The name is derived from the Latin fasces, a symbol of authority in ancient Rome Fascism, along with Communism (and to some extent, Socialism), holds to the notion that the state is supreme over the individual. It is therefore the responsibility of all individuals to work together for the betterment of the state. The word fascism was first used by Benito Mussolini in Italy to describe the form of government he brought to that nation in the 1920s. Fascism, on the other hand, forges a political alliance with capitalism, working with those who control production, for the better economic functioning of the nation. It exalts the nation (or, as in Germany, the nation and race) as the supreme value, and it uses the police and military powers of the state to enforce its policies.

Nationalism

nationalism is the highest loyalty. It makes no difference if the nation is made up of one or many ethnic groups. The attachment called nationalism, or patriotism, can be equally intense.

Genocide

Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction of racial, religious, ethnic, or political groups. A less violent form of genocide is the systematic destruction of a people’s culture. The word genocide is from the Greek genos, meaning race, nation or tribe, and the Latin cide, meaning killing. The word was coined in about 1944 by a jurist named Raphael Lemkin.

Xenophobia

xenophobia or fear of strangers is a tendency to cling together, while excluding outsiders, it is also called tribalism. Since the remotest antiquity, groups of people forming their own little worlds have been suspicious of and hostile to many other groups.

Segregation

The Latin word grex means flock. From it comes the word segregation, which basically means separate from the flock. When applied to human beings it means the separation of some people within a society from others. This separation may be traditional: in some religions men and women occupy different parts of a temple or mosque during worship services. Segregation may also be voluntary: people of similar interests, values, or social status tend to associate often to the exclusion of others. Many of the immigrant groups who arrived in the United States during the 19th and 20th centuries voluntarily settled in neighbourhoods with people of similar backgrounds. Thus New York City and Chicago, for example, each had a Little Italy, while San Francisco developed a Chinatown. Conversely, wealthy members of society often have homes near each other in such exclusive places as Beverly Hills, Calif.; Kenilworth, Ill.; or Larchmont, N.Y.

When the word segregation is used today, it usually refers to a system of forced separation. As such it can be either a legal or an illegal means of preserving the economic and social privileges of a majority over a minority. Most frequently such separation is based on ethnic or racial differences. The segregation may be geographic, or it may be in terms of social status. Examples of physical, or geographic, separation have occurred in Russia and South Africa. In Russia the Pale of Settlement came into existence as a result of the incorporation of large numbers of Jews into the country when Poland was partitioned in the late 18th century. Jews were required to live within the pale, which by the mid-19th century had come to include Russian Poland, Lithuania, Belorussia, the Crimea, Bessarabia, and most of the Ukraine.