"The Doctrine of Fascism" ("La dottrina del fascismo") is a seminal essay signed by Benito Mussolini and officially attributed to him, although it was most likely written by Giovanni Gentile. It was first published in the Enciclopedia Italiana of 1932, as the first section of a lengthy entry on "Fascismo" (Fascism). The entire entry on Fascism spans pages 847-884 of the Enciclopedia Italiana, and includes numerous photographs and graphic images.

The Mussolini essay leads off the entry: :DOTTRINA A second section of the essay is titled: "Dottrina Politica e sociale."

The Mussolini entry starts on page 847 and ends on 851 with the credit line "Benito Mussolini." All subsequent translations of "The Doctrine of Fascism" are from this work.

A key concept of the Mussolini essay was that fascism was a rejection of previous models: "Granted that the XIXth century was the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy, this does not mean that the XXth century must also be the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy. Political doctrines pass; nations remain. We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the 'right', a Fascist century. If the 19th century was the century of the individual (liberalism implies individualism) we are free to believe that this is the 'collective' century, and therefore the century of the State."

Mussolini recalled and destroyed all available copies of "The Doctrine of Fascism "in April 1940 after he had second thoughts about certain phrases in it. (O'Sullivan, 1983) However copies in Italian and English survived, and are available in many libraries around the world.