Der Holocaust und die westdeutschen Historiker

Berg, Nicolas

doi:10.5771/9783835320444

Cited by 13 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…162 Like many whose writings paved the way for murder in Eastern Europe, Seraphim exhibited dissociative patterns of thought, split levels of consciousness, and inconsistent behavioral modes. 163 Like Oberländer and others, Seraphim did not want to admit the diabolical consequences of his intellectual actions. A perfect example is his 1941 memorandum, where he argues out of financial and moral reasons against the maltreatment of the Ukrainian population and prisoners of war, as well as against the mass executions of Jews.…”

Section: Hermann Aubinmentioning

confidence: 95%

Eastern Europe as a "Sub-Germanic Space": Scholarship on Eastern Europe under National Socialism

Beyrau¹,

Keck-Szajbel²

2012

kri

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Section: Hermann Aubinmentioning

confidence: 95%

Eastern Europe as a "Sub-Germanic Space": Scholarship on Eastern Europe under National Socialism

Beyrau¹,

Keck-Szajbel²

2012

kri

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…48 As Nicolas Berg has forcefully argued, Jewish scholars were systematically marginalised or excluded from professional discussions altogether. 49 The European and global dimension of the Holocaust, stressed by the URO and URO-sponsored authors like the young Israeli Max Münz in the late 1950s, would only become an important topic for historical research decades later. 50 Regular contacts between URO leaders and the Munich-based Institute for Contemporary History seemed to have been established only in the late-1960s, when a new generation of historians like Hans Buchheim and Martin Broszat came to institutional power.…”

Section: Expanding the Understanding Of The European Dimensions Of Th...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Lawyers Writing History: The Politics of the Past of the United Restitution Organisation (URO) from 1948 to the 1980s

Siemens

2023

J Mod Eur Hist

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article explores the Geschichts- and Vergangenheitspolitik, or politics of the past, of the United Restitution Office/Organisation (URO) in the post-war years and asks how it impacted on the early historiography of the Holocaust. I demonstrate that the URO leadership took a conscious decision to publicly downplay the role of its organisation in German reparations to maximise its legal and political clout behind closed doors. While this strategy was beneficial for many of URO's clients, above all in the 1950s and 1960s, this self-marginalisation prevented the organisation from becoming a significant voice in the public debates about German moral guilt and its consequences in the 1970s and 1980s. One reason for this development was generational. The URO was an enterprise driven by a particular cohort of German-Jewish lawyers for whom it provided an opportunity to personally ‘come to terms’ with the interruptions of their pre-1933 careers and the persecution during the Third Reich. In the post-war period, their legal expertise as well as their intimate knowledge of the German language and customs allowed them to act as transnational citizen diplomats, successfully mediating between the different parties and interest groups, governments and non-governmental lobby groups. For most of these Jewish jurists, their practical experience with their German peers, politicians and the administrators of the German Wiedergutmachung led to an increasing scepticism and ultimately disappointment – despite the undisputedly impressive results that they obtained for their clients.

show abstract

“…According to Nicolas Berg, some 150 statements were requested from the Institute each year. 81 Some of these appeared in two collections that were published in 1958 and 1966, respectively. 82 Employing historical sources and reports, the judges at the ORG based their depictions of past property transfers on fundamental historiographical research.…”

Section: Narratives Of the Past In The Org's Decisionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding the Third Reich by Means of the Law: The Decisions of the Supreme Restitution Court for Berlin as Sources on the Holocaust and the Development of Holocaust Interpretations

Balz

2023

J Mod Eur Hist

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article introduces the decisions of the Oberstes Rückerstattungsgericht für Berlin (Supreme Restitution Court for Berlin) as historical sources that contribute to a better understanding of how early interpretations of the Holocaust developed. The Oberstes Rückerstattungsgericht für Berlin was established in 1953 as the final court of appeals for restitution matters in West Berlin. Some of its decisions were published in a collection that would later be used by judges, lawyers and claimants. Legal experts and practitioners who dealt with restitution would also discuss these decisions extensively. As no other means of gathering insight into the Oberstes Rückerstattungsgericht für Berlin's work were available, its publications became the most important communicative channel for actors within the Court's jurisdiction. The decisions contained distinct narratives concerning the Third Reich that stressed the importance of authoritative political structures while also focussing on state agencies and the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei as main actors. The accounts given in the decisions were partly based on analyses of historical records that were performed either by the judges themselves or by historians at the Institut für Zeitgeschichte in Munich (Institute for Contemporary History). This article suggests that on a broader societal level, the decisions contributed to the dissemination of state-centred ideas about the Holocaust. At the same time, the text draws attention to their complicated genesis. Situating the emergence of the decisions alongside the concrete implementation of restitution laws, the Cold War in Berlin and Vergangenheitspolitik (politics of the past), I demonstrate that the perpetuation of state-focussed historical concepts, to a large extent, resulted from the judges’ desire to lessen their significant workloads and to work without the interference of political actors.

show abstract

Der Holocaust und die westdeutschen Historiker

Cited by 13 publications

References 0 publications

Eastern Europe as a "Sub-Germanic Space": Scholarship on Eastern Europe under National Socialism

Eastern Europe as a "Sub-Germanic Space": Scholarship on Eastern Europe under National Socialism

Lawyers Writing History: The Politics of the Past of the United Restitution Organisation (URO) from 1948 to the 1980s

Understanding the Third Reich by Means of the Law: The Decisions of the Supreme Restitution Court for Berlin as Sources on the Holocaust and the Development of Holocaust Interpretations

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About