Donald Trump’s name appears only a couple of times in “Late Fascism,” the dense, concise and intellectually ambitious new book from Italian philosopher and political theorist Alberto Toscano. That’s obviously a considered decision, and there are more than enough not-very-veiled references to Trump and the MAGA “movement” to make clear that Toscano understands the symbolic importance of America’s homegrown would-be dictator to the phenomenon he’s trying to delineate.

For that matter, the notorious European political leaders of the 1930s with whom Trump is frequently compared — you know who I mean, the strutting Italian peacock and the little Austrian with the ‘stache — don’t play starring roles in “Late Fascism” either. That’s partly because Toscano is more concerned with political and philosophical theories of fascism and anti-fascism, with the backstage machinery, so to speak, rather than the actors facing the crowd.

But beyond that, it’s because Toscano’s central argument — as I read this admittedly challenging work — is that fascism should be understood as a “dynamic” or a “process” unfolding throughout recent history, not as a “singular event” associated with charismatic leaders, mass rallies and fashion-forward uniforms that emerged during a global economic crisis and then was defeated, only to resurface unexpectedly in the 21st century.

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Toscano writes in his preface that he does not “intend ‘late fascism’ to operate like an academic brand,” meaning a trendy label embraced as an all-purpose explanation, à la “neoliberalism,” “late capitalism” or “globalization.” He may protest too much: “Late Fascism” is so loaded with moments of insight and illumination into the tormented historical, political and psychological roots of our current crisis that such an outcome may be inevitable.

Although Toscano never provides a single straightforward definition of what fascism is or isn’t, his thought and language are so precise and specific that he can’t be accused of flinging the term at every right-of-center political formation that contains elements of nostalgia. Until recently he was primarily known as a translator and scholar steeped in the work of European leftist titans like Alain Badiou, Georges Bataille and Antonio Negri. But with this book he stakes a claim as a major voice in the 21st-century renovation of Marxism, especially alert to the ways that the collision of racism, antisemitism and corporate capitalism have fueled a global mood of crisis and opened the door for a “late fascist” renaissance.

Toscano’s entire book can be read as a taxonomy of fascism, but he comes closest to a working definition in his discussion of German philosopher Ernst Bloch’s “Heritage of Our Times,” a “protean, fascinating and unsettling work” first published in 1935 but not available in English until 1991, which seems startlingly........

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