Liberal Fascism

by Slavoj Žižek

Genres: Philosophy, Politics

200 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2026

About the author

Slavoj Žižek is a Slovene sociologist, philosopher, and cultural critic.

He was born in Ljubljana, Slovenia (then part of SFR Yugoslavia). He received a Doctor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Ljubljana and studied psychoanalysis at the University of Paris VIII with Jacques-Alain Miller and François Regnault. In 1990 he was a candidate with the party Liberal Democracy of Slovenia for Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia (an auxiliary institution, abolished in 1992).

Since 2005, Žižek has been a member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

Žižek is well known for his use of the works of 20th century French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in a new reading of popular culture. He writes on many topics including the Iraq War, fundamentalism, capitalism, tolerance, political correctness, globalization, subjectivity, human rights, Lenin, myth, cyberspace, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-marxism, David Lynch, and Alfred Hitchcock.

In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País he jokingly described himself as an "orthodox Lacanian Stalinist". In an interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! he described himself as a "Marxist" and a "Communist."

Reviews

[Plch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una stella in meno perché dubito fortemente che il problema della sinistra siano il politicamente corretto e john oliver, Žižek ne azzecca parecchie anche se spesso è dispersivo ma tocca appena i problemi del centro-sinistra istituzionale.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Dietro la cieca bestialità delle SA si celava spesso un profondo odio e risentimento verso tutti coloro che erano socialmente, intellettualmente o fisicamente superiori a loro, e che ora, come se si realizzassero i loro sogni più sfrenati, erano in loro potere. Questo risentimento, che non si estinse mai completamente nei campi, ci colpisce come un ultimo residuo di sentimento umanamente comprensibile. Il vero orrore iniziò, tuttavia, quando le SS presero in mano l'amministrazione dei campi. La vecchia bestialità spontanea lasciò il posto a una distruzione assolutamente fredda e sistematica dei corpi umani, calcolata per distruggere la dignità umana; la morte veniva evitata o posticipata indefinitamente."

[Knecht René · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love these series of pockets because they focus on some central question and connect the different insights from the entire work of Žižek on a central theme.

I only quote what you can also find in earlier works and on Youtube-talks: interesting for this book is how these quotes, deep insights are actual today or can be applied to today's actuality.

ìn this way the quote from Walter Benjamin becomes throughout the book very clear: "Behind every fascism is a failed revolution (P.149)

Actuality
This time Žižek reflects on concrete geopolitical situations, tensions and contemporary catastrophes: Israel and Gaza, the rise of the populist Right, ecological collapse while using the insights of failed revolutions.

One of the central enigmas in the political landscape today:
“..why did the revolution failed, i.e., why did the new Right and not the Left succeed in capturing the rage and fury of many so-called ordinary people?” (p. 149)

Žižek does not approach the contemporary crisis with nostalgia for older forms of socialism, nor with liberal optimism.
“Our only realistic option is therefore to fully accept this absence of an actual alternative.” (p.150)

He speaks of the paralysis of contemporary academic thought, quoting Otto Paans:
“Professional academic philosophy has a moral duty to change direction radically, because of the absence of real, serious philosophy diminishes virtually to zero the chances of genuine political change or resistance against intellectual dictatorship in either of its politically incorrect or neo-fascist subspecies.” (P.150)

Earlier Revolutions
What can we learn from earlier revolutionary moments (the French Revolution, Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, and Stalin) ?
Not out of nostalgia, but to show how radically our political horizon has changed.

Trotsky, for example, understood “the inertia of the masses,” while the revolutionary tradition itself is reread through the lens of contingency rather than historical certainty. (cf. P.46-47)

About Stalinist “scientific socialism”:
“Following the Stalinist turn, Communist revolutions were grounded in a clear vision of historical reality (‘scientific socialism’)… In theory, revolution was thus deprived of the dimension of subjectivity proper, of radical cuts of the real into the texture of objective reality.” (P.151)

==> Against this deterministic logic, Žižek invokes Saint-Just’s famous line from 1794:

“Ceux qui font des révolutions ressemblent au premier navigateur instruit par son audace.” (P.152)
==> The revolutionary act here is not grounded in historical guarantees, but in an audacious leap into uncertainty. That idea becomes crucial for Žižek’s understanding of the present. We no longer possess a stable ideological map of history. As he writes elsewhere in the same section, today we navigate “uncharted territories, without a global cognitive mapping.”

quoting: T. S. Eliot:
“There are moments when the only choice is the one between heresy and non-belief. When the only way to keep a religion alive is to perform a sectarian split from its main corpse.” (P.153)
“==> Lenin did this with regard to traditional Marxism, Mao did this in his own way… Today, the Left has so far failed to do it - it was Trump that enacted a heretic break with global neoliberalism.” (P.153)

Žižek is not endorsing Trump: he is pointing to the Left’s inability to occupy the space of rupture and antagonism, allowing the populist Right to monopolize dissatisfaction with neoliberal globalization.

From there, Žižek arrives at one of the book’s central claims:

“So we do need a heresy, but a heresy that will work, with a chance of becoming hegemonic.” (P. 153)

MAMDANI?
Interestingly, he even refers to Mamdani’s victory in New York as a sign that such a “heresy” may still be possible. (cf. .141)


ABANDON ALL HOPE?
The final pages become almost apocalyptic in tone. Žižek discusses Tehran’s approaching “Day Zero (==> no spoiler alert here, I recommend reading the whole book for the Grand Finale)

"What goes on now in Tehran is such a sign from the future ..." (P.157)

Highly recommended. Every Chapter contains some interesting insights applied to today's reality.

[Massimo Colletti · Rating 4 out of 5]

Molte osservazioni di Žižek sono, come al solito, rivelatrici. Spiace per la visione sulla guerra in Ucraina che perde la solita lucidità e razionalità arrivando ad allinearsi alla propaganda mainstream.

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always interesting. This one I have plenty of disagreements with his views, but among the other leftists, Zizek is the most honest and forthright in recognizing the left's failures and limitations.