Abstract
This article attempts an assessment of the putative similarities between generic fascism and the revolutionary nationalism of Sun Yat-sen. Whatever characteristics the two ideologies have in common can be traced to similarities between Sun's thought and pre-Fascist Italian Nationalism. The latter was only one of the elements that contributed to Italian Fascism. A distinction is then drawn between Sun's ideology and that of the Italian Nationalists by identifying the latter nationalism as “exacerbated.” Further distinctions are attempted between such nationalisms and the mature ideology of Italian Fascism. Italian Fascism is viewed as a subspecies of revolutionary nationalism, while revolutionary nationalism itself is understood to include a relatively pacific and potentially democratic species and an exacerbated, potentially authoritarian one.
