Fascism as a system is defined as purity of effort. It comes from the literal Italian word for a bundle of sticks. Alone they are weak. Together and united they are strong.
The cultural element is that it favors uniformity as an element of unity. This is where the militarism comes in but it is not entirely defined by it. It also manifests itself in civic works and progress. It seeks to unify those that are similar. Here one of the key points though. Fascism is okay with the existence of other groups, just that they are not a participant in their system and seeks to bring those that are into the system.
It aligns efforts and systems regardless of their origin towards the goals of the state. This includes corporations and state organizations. It will nationalize organizations that work against the state and ostracize groups that are not aligned with the majority. It roots out internal dissent within government as an inefficiency.
A socialist form of system absolutely can be fascist. A fascist government does not inherently need a dictator but it is inherently authoritarian. It does not matter if the means of production are corporate, individual, or government as it is about unity of effort and uniformity as a force for progress.
These are clearly defined parameters.
You only see fascism come in when citizens see a lack of progress as a result of social issues. It’s not left politics that it is reacting to, it is the violence and chaos on the streets that inspires a strong reaction. People perceive the distribution as the cause of the problems that actually impact them. They literally see the destruction of their property and their neighborhoods being caused by these radicals. They see the inability of the liberal state to stop it because it allows for that dissent and disunity. Voters remember a time when people were united. Then they see these groups coming in and fighting back. They are literally cleaning up the streets and defending their neighborhoods at a ground level. They look and act like them so they trust them. They see that snowball into progress at a larger level and start to increasingly trust the approach and who they are told is causing the issues in society. They saw it for themselves and so they trust that it’s the truth that they cannot see now.
When an outside group refuses to confirm or leave, that’s when you start getting increasingly strong forms of solutions to the perceived problem. This is where you see language around a final solution come from. You can disband organizations but people must be removed.
It does not need to be the left. It actually could be the right. National Socialism was called what it was for a reason. It was reacting to the right in society. It started out as being for the nationalization of resources within Germany. As it gained power, it was okay with corporations as long as it worked on behalf of the state. Fascism is agnostic to socialism vs capitalism until it is working against them. Nazis are not socialists, except they are when the corporations are perceived to be working against the efforts of the majority.
Unity of effort is a powerful and efficient thing. It does not take into account the benefits of diversity or the social benefits of dissent as a force for moderation. When you put fascism against a liberal society, the united liberal society is typically able to innovate around a united but uniform approach against them given enough time. It also wins more allies on average. Unity is typically the challenge as diverse societies have a lot of differences.
So, why is Russia fascist now? The Russian citizens went through an extended period of change that worsened the average Russian’s life. Most remember a time when they were more united or at least felt that way. There’s outside corporations and organizations perceived to be degrading Russian life. There’s chaos on the streets and separatists everywhere and the new modern liberal society is unable to stop it. You have someone come into power that has cleaned up the streets and focused on progress. They’ve focused on defending the average Russian from these inside threats that are rotting Russia from the inside. They are saying that life was better when Russians were united. They want to get back to the way it was and bring Russians back in to the fold. There’s a focus on unity of government, corporation, and culture. There’s a systemic stamping out of dissent regardless of the source.
Russia probably would be faring a lot better if they hadn’t been a huge gainer from the smaller states in the USSR. Only Russians were better under the USSR, not the smaller states. This is why the Holodomor is so significant. Ukrainians were less important for food than the Russians because they dissented. I would argue that the USSR was also a fascist state but it gets a lot muddier in that discussion to the point where it almost doesn’t matter.