Between Fascism and Feminism: Women Activists of the British Union of Fascists

Abstract

British fascism, in contrast to fascist movements on the Continent, in Germany and Italy, never acquired state power. The British movement failed to get any parliamentary seats in national elections, and British fascists never enjoyed the same status as their fascist colleagues in other European countries. The influence of British fascism in the political arena was relatively limited. The most important fascist organisation, Oswald Mosely’s British Union of Fascists (BUF), even at its height in 1934, only had between 40,000 and 50,000 members. The BUF received little support in elections, gaining at best about a fifth of the vote in local elections in 1937, in East London. Shortly after the outbreak of World War II, 747 leading British fascist activists, including Oswald and Diana Mosely, were interned under Defence Regulation 18B 1(a).KeywordsChild WelfareWoman ActivistWelfare ServiceBritish WomanSeparate SphereThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.