This essay will revisit several points introduced in earlier essays in this series, and attempt to refine and expand on the issue of how the neurotic authoritarian deals with the stress of financial hardship. Whereas the last three essays in this series dealt with the initial economic insult that creates the potential for a fascist movement to grow, this essay deals with the internal response that the neurotic authoritarian has to that financial hardship. We must remember that in order for a fascist movement to occur, there must be four elements present: first, there must be some kind of economic stress that causes people to suffer a decline in their standard of living; second, there must be an audience of individuals who possess latent authoritarian tendencies; third, there must be a political agitator, who provides the grievance narratives necessary to fuel the “ego maintenance” process; finally, there must be a loyal band of lieutenants, and the presence of some form of mass media that the agitator can use to amplify his propaganda.

There are a number of behavioral traits associated with individuals who possess authoritarian tendencies. For this essay we are using the list of authoritarian traits developed by a team of American Jewish Committee researchers led by Theodore Adorno. (Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J., and Sanford, R. N., 1950). Those researchers, sought to study the behaviors and traits that made someone susceptible to fascist propaganda, in hopes that something like the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany would never happen again. Those behavioral traits may be summarized as:

(a) prejudice (negative attitudes towards the other),

(Winarick, 2018).

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