A Conspiracy Against Ourselves

A lower-middle class which has received a secondary and even a university education without being given any corresponding outlet for its trained abilities was the backbone of the twentiethcentury Fascist Party in Italy and National-Socialist Party in Germany. The demoniac driving force which carried Mussolini and Hitler to power was generated out of this intellectual proletariat's exasperation at finding that its painful efforts at selfimprovement were not sufficient[p.416 →]

— Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History