Fascism and the unsated yearning for the father

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to present Freud’s hypothesis of the primal horde in order to subsequently outline, through Adorno, an understanding of fascism that does not follow the conclusion of this thinker of Marxist inclination. It is argued that authoritarianism does not appear as a historical anomaly or a localized social pathology, but rather as an original and constitutive trait of culture and the human psyche — a phylogenetic legacy that may have shaped the passage from animal to human and that repeats itself ontogenetically. By revisiting the essential characteristics of totemism, the essay discusses how the desire for authority and obedience to the paternal figure remain active in contemporary social formations, manifesting with particular intensity in fascism — when the insatiable longing for the father resurfaces within the political domain of the masses. By placing Freud’s and Adorno’s hypotheses in tension, the article proposes that fascism should be thought not as an anomaly produced by capitalism, but as a structurally grounded, atemporal destiny in updated form: the psychic restoration of a father annihilated by parricide — a return of the horde in new guises.