Editing Zeev Sternhell (section)

==Research==
Zeev Sternhell considered [[fascism]], in its ideological form, to be a synthesis of anti-materialist socialism and nationalism.<ref name="Griffin" >Roger Griffin,[https://books.google.com/books?id=aQFUAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA6 ''The Nature of Fascism,''] [[Routledge]] 2013 {{isbn|978-1-136-14588-9}} p.  6.</ref> He traced its roots to ideas that emerged in the [[Counter-Enlightenment]] in reaction to the historical turning point of 1789, when the [[French Revolution]] destroyed the  [[Ancien Régime]].<ref name="Lerner" /> He identified various strains in this reactionary movement, linking them to the three traditional right-wing families cited by [[René Rémond]] – [[legitimists|legitimism]], [[Orléanist|Orleanism]], and [[Bonapartism]] together with anarchic/leftist labour movements. The main cultural  influences, according to Sternhell were:
*The [[Populism|populist]] reaction to ''Boulangisme'', a  movement led by [[Georges Boulanger]] who almost succeeded in his attempt at a coup d'état in 1889;<ref>Peter Davies, [https://books.google.com/books?id=5dyAAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA63  ''The Extreme Right in France, 1789 to the Present: From de Maistre to Le Pen,''] [[Routledge]] 20002 {{isbn|978-1-134-55297-9}} pp. 63–64</ref>
* [[Georges Sorel]]'s variety of [[revolutionary syndicalism]], which had a notable impact on currents among Italian anarcho-syndicalists.
* The synthesis of ideas crystallised by the publications of the [[Cercle Proudhon]] around the years 1910–1912.<ref name="ZSA" >Zeev Sternhell, Mario Sznajder, Naia Asheri, ''Naissance de l'idéologie fasciste', [[Fayard]] 1989 p. 46</ref>

The First World War provided the key circumstances that would prove favourable for transforming these French ideological trends - fascist ideology essentially had been incubated in France, he argued, in the milieu of the 1880s - into a political force in Italy in the aftermath of war.<ref name=rw83>Robert Wohl 1991 p. 83.</ref><ref name="ZSA" /> Historians challenge his view that the key ingredients of fascism were formed in that early period, in France. The essential synthesis was a consequence of World War I, and not specifically French.<ref name=rw83/>

His research has sparked criticism, in particular from French scholars who argue that the [[Vichy France|Vichy regime]] (1940–1944) was of a more traditional [[conservatism|conservative]] persuasion, although belonging to the far-right, than it was [[counter-revolutionary]], counter-revolutionary ideas being a main characteristic of fascism. [[René Rémond]] has questioned Sternhell's attribution of [[Boulangism]] to the revolutionary right-wing movements. Some scholars say that Sternhell's thesis may shed important light on intellectual influences of fascism, but fascism in itself was not born of a sole [[ideology]] and its sociological make-up and popularity among the working classes must also be taken into account.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Wohl |first1=Robert |title=French Fascism, Both Right and Left: Reflections on the Sternhell Controversy |journal=The Journal of Modern History |date=1991 |volume=63 |issue=1 |pages=91–98 |doi=10.1086/244261 |jstor=2938528|s2cid=143789500 }}</ref>

[[Stanley G. Payne]], for example, remarks in ''A History of Fascism'' that "Zeev Sternhell has conclusively demonstrated that nearly all the ideas found in fascism first appeared in France," though it first developed as a political movement in Italy.<ref>{{cite book |author=Stanley G. Payne |author-link=Stanley G. Payne |title=A History of Fascism |year=1995 |publisher=University of Wisconsin Press |isbn=978-0299148744 |page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780299148744/page/291 291] |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780299148744/page/291 }}</ref>

Sternhell's identification of [[Spiritualism (religious movement)|Spiritualism]] with fascism has also given rise to debate, in particular his claim that [[Emmanuel Mounier]]'s [[personalism]] movement "shared ideas and political reflexes with Fascism". Sternhell has argued that Mounier's "revolt against individualism and materialism" would have led him to share the ideology of fascism.<ref>See Zeev Sternhell, "Sur le fascisme et sa variante française", in ''[[Le Débat]]'', November 1984, "Emmanuel Mounier et la contestation de la démocratie libérale dans la France des années 30", in ''Revue française de science politique'', December 1984; also John Hellman's  ''Emmanuel Mounier and the New Catholic Left, 1930–1950'', [[University of Toronto Press]], {{isbn|978-0-802-02399-5}}1981. Sternhell was unfamiliar with Hellman's work at the time he wrote his book ''Neither Right nor Left''. See Zeev Sternhell, Preface to the paperback edition, [https://books.google.com/books?id=ccgIu6oYkREC&pg=PA305 ''Neither Right Nor Left: Fascist Ideology in France,''] [[Princeton University Press]], 1996   {{isbn|978-0-691-00629-1}} p.305, n.12</ref>