Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers

This volume uses new evidence to shed light on controversial issues in current Holocaust scholarship.

Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers focuses on controversial issues in current Holocaust scholarship. How did Nazi Jewish policy evolve during the first years of the war? When did the Nazi regime cross the historic watershed from population expulsion and decimation ('ethnic cleansing') to total and systematic extermination? How did Nazi authorities attempt to reconcile policies of expulsion and extermination with the wartime urge to exploit Jewish labor? How were Jewish workers impacted? What role did local authorities play in shaping Nazi policy? What more can we learn about the mindset and behavior of the local perpetrators? Using new evidence, this book attempts to shed light on these important questions.

Introduction; Map of Poland; 1. From 'ethnic cleansing' to genocide to the 'final solution': the evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, 1939-1941; 2. Nazi policy: decisions for the final solution; 3. Jewish workers in Poland: self-maintenance, exploitation, destruction; 4. Jewish workers and survivor memories: the case of the Starachowice Labor Camp; 5. German killers: orders from above, initiative from below, and the scope of local autonomy - the case of Brest-Litovsk; 6. German killers: behavior and motivation in the light of new evidence; Postscript; Index.