Europe as Nation: Oswald Mosley, Neo-Fascism, and the Europeanism of the Extreme Right, 1947-1954 4 views

“Europe as Nation” explores the post-Second World War neo-fascist embrace of European integration through Oswald Mosley’s formulation of “Europe a Nation” and its reception among the extreme right in Europe. While scholars have focused primarily on Mosley’s interwar leadership of the British Union of Fascists, he remained an active political participant in the postwar period, reformulating his fascist politics through a European lens and contributing to an international community of fascists who likewise reimagined fascism through the vehicle of a united European union instead of a particular nation. “Europe a Nation” attracted support from other extreme right-wing neo-fascist parties and figures across Europe, an embrace that led to the publication of the German-language journal Nation Europa to serve as an outlet for fascist formulations of Europe. Seeing nationalism as the reason for fascism’s failure, Mosley’s “Europe a Nation” proposed the creation of a single European state, with no internal borders governed by an autarkic and corporatist economic order he termed “European Socialism.” An idea of Eurafrica was central to this vision, imagined as a single united unit. Africa, colonially integrated into united Europe, would be subject to a continental Apartheid order that would separate white and Black populations in order to sustain empire, support European development, and enable Europe to compete as a viable third force in the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. While Mosley and his supporters on the continent did not find much political success at the time with their neo-fascist Eurafrican model, parties which supported “Europe a Nation,” like the predecessor to the governing party of Italy, the Fratelli d’Italia now have significant power in national and European parliaments. “Europe as Nation” argues that Mosley’s vision, while utopian and unsuccessful, provided a language for fascism to reconstitute a political movement through journals like Nation Europa and is an underacknowledged vision of European integration.

MA (Master of Arts)

European History; British History; Oswald Mosley; European Integration; Intellectual History; Political History; Eurafrica ; Fascism

English

All rights reserved by the author (no additional license for public reuse)

2026-04-22