The Legacy of Nazi Occupation
Patriotic Memory and National Recovery in Western Europe, 1945–1965

This book analyses how France, Belgium and the Netherlands emerged from the Second World War.

Pieter Lagrou (Author)

9780521651806, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 13 February 1999

344 pages, 12 b/w illus.
23.7 x 16 x 2.8 cm, 0.675 kg

"As a lean and sinewy study of the consequences of Nazi occupation, this book is spendid." American Historical Review

This volume, in Studies in the Social and Cultural History of Modern Warfare series, examines how France, Belgium and the Netherlands emerged from the military collapse and humiliating Nazi occupation they suffered during the Second World War. Rather than traditional armed conflict, the human consequences of Nazi policies were resistance, genocide and labour migration to Germany. Pieter Lagrou offers a genuinely comparative approach to these issues, based on extensive archival research; he underlines the divergence between ambiguous experiences of occupation and the univocal post-war patriotic narratives which followed. His book reveals striking differences in political cultures as well as close convergence in the creation of a common Western European discourse, and uncovers disturbing aspects of the aftermath of the war, including post-war antisemitism and the marginalisation of resistance veterans. Brilliantly researched and fluently written, this book will be of central interest to all scholars and students of twentieth-century European history.

List of illustrations
Acknowledgements
List of abbreviations
Introduction
Part I. Troublesome Heroes: The Post-War Treatment of Resistance Veterans: 1. Approaching victory and re-establishing the state
2. Heroes of a nation: Belgium and France
3. A nation of heroes: the Netherlands
Part II. Repatriating Displaced Populations from Germany: 4. Displaced populations
5. The challenge to the post-war state: Belgium and the Netherlands
6. Pétain's exiles and De Gaulle's deportees
Part III. The Legacy of Forced Economic Migration: 7. Labour and total war
8. Moral panic: 'the soap, the suit and above all the Bible'
9. Patriotic scrutiny
10. 'Deportation': the defence of the labour conscripts
Part IV. Martyrs and Other Victims of Nazi Persecution
11. Plural persecutions
12. National martyrdom
13. Patriotic memories and the genocide
14. Remembering the war and legitimising the post-war international order
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Social & cultural history [HBTB], Postwar 20th century history, from c 1945 to c 2000 [HBLW3], European history [HBJD]