Description
Book SynopsisGermany’s transition from Nazism to peaceful, if at times reluctant, integration into the western and Soviet spheres during the decade immediately following the Second World War is one of the most remarkable events of the twentieth century. Shattered relations between Germans and their wartime enemies and victims had rendered prospects for peaceful relations between these groups unimaginable, or a dream belonging to the distant future. However, numerous grassroots initiatives found varying degrees of success in fostering reconciliation.
Drawing on underutilized archival materials, To Forget It All and Begin Anew reveals a nuanced mosaic of like-minded people – from Germany and other countries, and from a wide variety of backgrounds and motives – who worked against considerable odds to make right the wrongs of the Nazi era. While acknowledging the enormous obstacles and challenges to reconciliatory work in postwar Germany, Steven M. Schroeder highligh
Trade Review
'Schroeder's research successfully introduces into the historiography the work of a number of hitherto neglected post-war institutions based on thorough archival digging, which in itself is an important contribution to the social, political and intellectual history of the period.' -- Camilo Erlichman Reviews in History, 19 June 2014 'Both researchers and students will find this book useful as a means of looking beyond the Cold War dynamic and state leaders to understand how prominent individuals, not always for the most altruistic reasons, sought to make Germans respectable again on the world stage after the horrors of Nazism.' -- Andrew Demshuk American Historical Review vol 119:02:2014
Table of Contents
Preface Introduction 1 The German People and Allied Demands: Pressures and Initiatives toward Reconciliation, 1944-1946 2 German Church and Political Groups 3 Steps toward Christian-Jewish Reconciliation 4 Broadening of International Contacts and Reconciliation Work 5 The Politics of Reconciliation in the Two Germanies, 1949-1954 Conclusion Bibliography
