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Notes -
Depends upon the relative political positions of the board and the CEO, of course.
It's something I see often. I recall once reading an online discussion of the political slant in Adorno's Authoritarian Personality and "F-scale," and more recent attempts to address left-wing authoritarianism. Specifically, I saw someone defend the political slant, and argue that there's no such thing as "left-wing authoritarianism." Not that the left can't do the things of hold the attitudes that are used to describe authoritarianism, but that these things are not inherently authoritarian, but only depending on who is doing them; and that under the "proper" definition, these things are only "authoritarian" when done by the Right, not the Left, so that "left-wing authoritarianism" is impossible by definition (because it's different when they do it).
It's the slogan of "no bad tactics, only bad targets" taken to it's conclusion, in the naked tribalism of Lenin's "who, whom?" When they, the bad guys, do it, it's fascism; when we, the good guys, do it, it's antifascism.
You might notice that neither side in my example scenario had any political descriptors attached.
Would you, personally, use the form of reasoning you're describing and come to the conclusion that one or the other side in my example scenario is "Fascist Authoritarian"? If so, please describe how you used that reasoning to reach that conclusion.
Which is exactly why your question cannot be answered. It's like asking if a blouse would pair better with a light-colored skirt, or a dark-colored skirt, without specifying the color of the blouse. Since the answer depends entirely on the blouse's color, it's impossible to answer either way without that answer.
Similarly, it's impossible to answer your original question of whether the board's actions against the CEO are "Fascist Authoritarian" or not — because the answer does not lie in the nature of the acts, but their political direction.
I can't recall which book by which historian it was, but I remember many years ago an author writing about the origins of "fascist tactics." He talked about Mussolini's early days with the Communists, and went on to detail about how the tactics used by the early Italian Fascists, the early Nazi party, the early Falangists, so on, had all been used by various Communist groups first, and that all the early 20th century "fascist" movements could be seen as starting with people on the right deciding to use the (far) left's own tactics against them. He did this not to excuse the fascists, or reduce any opprobrium against their methods, but only to argue that methods themselves are not inherently fascist. That there are no "fascist tactics," only tactics that are "fascist" when used by the right against the left (and never when used by the left against the right). That whether these tactics are good or evil depends entirely on whether they are used to "punch right" or "punch left."
Now, in the past, when I was more of a linguistic prescriptivist, I might have pushed back harder against this sort of thing. But at a certain point, one has to bow to common usage. And IME, the common usage of words (again, including by plenty of notable academics) like "fascist" and "authoritarian" defines them in this way.
In your scenario, the acts of the board against the CEO make them "Fascist Authoritarians" if and only if the board is to the right of the CEO and they are "punching left"; and they are not "Fascist Authoritarians" (and the CEO probably is) if they are to the left of the CEO and they are "punching right."
Ok, great. Glad to know that you would not be able to conclude that either side in the example scenario is a "Fascist Authoritarian". Now hopefully we'll find out what @WandererintheWilderness thinks we can conclude.
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