4. The Demographic Policy and the "Neighbour."

The "demographic" policy of the regime is the result of these
premises. The Fascist also loves his neighbour, but "neighbour" is not
for him a vague and undefinable word: love for his neighbour does not
prevent necessary educational severities. Fascism rejects professions
of universal affection and, though living in the community of
civilised peoples, it watches them and looks at them diffidently. It
follows them in their state of mind and in the transformation of their
interests, but it does not allow itself to be deceived by fallacious
and mutable appearances.


5. Against Historical Materialism and Class-Struggle.

Through this conception of life Fascism becomes the emphatic negation
of that doctrine which constituted the basis of the so-called
scientific Socialism or Marxism: the doctrine of historical
materialism, according to which the story of human civilisation is to
be explained only by the conflict of interests between the various
social groups and by the change of the means and instruments of
production.

That the economic vicissitudes--discovery of prime or raw materials,
new methods of labour, scientific inventions--have their particular
importance, is denied by none, but that they suffice to explain human
history, excluding other factors from it, is absurd: Fascism still
believes in sanctity and in heroism, that is to say in acts in which
no economic motive, immediate or remote, operates.