"What role did German big business play in the persecution of European Jews during the Holocaust? What were its motivations? And how did it respond to changing social and economic circumstances after the war? Profits and Persecution examines how the leaders of Germany's largest industrial and financial enterprises played a key part in the catastrophes and crimes of their nation in the first half of the twentieth century. Drawing on evidence concerning the roughly one hundred most significant German firms of the Nazi era, Peter Hayes explores how large German corporations dealt with Jews, their property, and their labor. This study unites business history and the history of the Holocaust to consider both the economic and personal motivations that rendered German corporate leaders complicit in the actions of the Nazi Party. In doing so, it demonstrates how ordinary, familiar thought processes came to serve the ideological purposes of the Third Reich with lethal consequences."
"Featured in the PBS documentary The US and the Holocaust by Ken Burns, Lynn Novick, and Sarah Botstein
A bold new exploration that answers the most commonly asked questions about the Holocaust.
Despite the outpouring of books, movies, museums, memorials, and courses devoted to the Holocaust, a coherent explanation of why such ghastly carnage erupted from the heart of civilized Europe in the twentieth century still seems elusive even seventy years later. Numerous theories have sprouted in an attempt to console ourselves and to point the blame in emotionally satisfying directions—yet none of them are fully convincing. As witnesses to the Holocaust near the ends of their lives, it becomes that much more important to unravel what happened and to educate a new generation about the horrors inflicted by the Nazi regime on Jews and non-Jews alike.
Why? dispels many misconceptions and answers some of the most basic—yet vexing—questions that remain: why the Jews and not another ethnic group? Why the Germans? Why such a swift and sweeping extermination? Why didn't more Jews fight back more often? Why didn't they receive more help? While responding to the questions he has been most frequently asked by students over the decades, world-renowned Holocaust historian and professor Peter Hayes brings a wealth of scholarly research and experience to bear on conventional, popular views of the history, challenging some of the most prominent recent interpretations. He argues that there is no single theory that 'explains' the Holocaust; the convergence of multiple forces at a particular moment in time led to catastrophe.
In clear prose informed by an encyclopedic knowledge of Holocaust literature in English and German, Hayes weaves together stories and statistics to heart-stopping effect. Why? is an authoritative, groundbreaking exploration of the origins of one of the most tragic events in human history."
Join our community for the latest bookish news, reading recommendations, exclusive opening extracts, author events and competitions. It\'s all free. And enter a monthly draw to win a £50 Gift Card. See past winners here
