In the past decade, much ink has been spilled over the question of whether we are witnessing a resurgence of fascism. Those debates have calmed since last November, when Donald Trump casually identified himself as a fascist amid a disorientingly effusive meeting with New York City’s Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani.

Part of the problem with the debate is that fascism can be difficult to define and identify — a point economist Isabella Weber makes at the outset of her new book, Anti-Fascist Economics. Unlike other major political ideologies, fascism has few defining texts, social theories, or economic platforms. However, she adds, there are “unifying themes — and an obsession with restoring the dominance of the chosen group by authoritarian and violent means is key.”

To my mind, fascist ideology is captured well enough by its original symbol, the fasces: a hatchet made of tightly bound rods and an axe head, representing the fierce unity of the nation on the one hand and its outward-facing aggression on the other. As Matt Christman once described it, “The cultural expression of fascism is a Janus face of performative sentimentality and performative cruelty.” To take the point a little further, fascism’s programmatic vagueness means that we may in fact be on better footing if we regard it as a cultural phenomenon with political aspirations. That is more or less the approach offered by Weber and by Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor in their equally insightful new book, End Times Fascism.