Can Corporatism and Fascism be used, at least in an economic sense, synonymously? Recently the term corporatism has been getting a lot of run, especially as in rebuttal to the OWS “ant-capitalism” sentiment (as in, “we don’t have capitalism, what we have is CORPORATISM”). Ron Paul, also, is always quick to use the term, which btw I’m not at all convinced very many people know what he’s talking about.
I know that fascism is an extremely loaded term for most people, and many will immediately think of nazism when you talk about fascism. But all that aside, my understanding is that fascism is simply the private ownership of the means of production with an underlying state control. The state sets up terms of international trade, imposes tariffs and such, taxes and regulates. The state can, and does, set production quotas in certain industries, or prices (including wage rates), and during episodes the state determines as being “national emergencies,” it can even nationalize large companies or entire industries. In short, it is the legal marriage between private business and state. Is this not corporatism? Or are there other differences I’m forgetting?