THE ANGLO-AMERICAN BIOMEDICAL ANTECEDENTS OF NAZI CRIMES An Historical Analysis of Racism, Nationalism, Eugenics and Genocide
Author: | Jeremy Hugh Baron |
Year: | 2007 |
Pages: | 240 |
ISBN: | 0-7734-5502-7 978-07734-5502-3 |
Price: | $179.95 |
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This study seeks to trace the development and implementation of the various Nazi crimes in Europe and to analyze these crimes in relation to certain antecedents prevalent in modern American and British history. By tracing the development and implementation of racism, romantic nationalism, and positive and negative eugenics in the history of these three nations, the author is able to demonstrate the lack of novelty in Nazi actions. Most chapters begin by considering British and American concepts relating to individual Nazi crimes before moving on to illustrate the particular developments in Germany that led to the grotesque reality of the Holocaust.
Reviews
“The longstanding apparent need of humans to categorize each other has, with some frequency, reached expression in the construction of hierarchies of human worth. The justifications for such efforts at social definition have been, over the centuries, based in varying mixtures of mysticism, incomplete science or distortions of the science of the day, as well as statism, religious bias and other forces. The results more often than not have been used to justify a priori views, and have not infrequently resulted in persisting, often brutal, effects. This volume makes plain the grotesque extremes to which such trends were carried in twentieth-century Germany under National Socialism.” – Jeremiah A. Barondess, M.D., President, New York Academy of Medicine
"This scholarly, yet accessible survey is a valuable contribution to the literature on the background to the Holocaust and other Nazi crimes. By exploring the racist and supremacist ideas in the scientific, philosophical and sociological thought of the past, Dr. Hugh Baron is able to illuminate the historical and intellectual setting of the murder of Europe’s Jews. His work offers an antidote to bland historical studies which can lead the reader to believe that Nazi policies arose in an intellectual vacuum. Dr. Baron’s work also highlights the long roots and tenacity of racist thinking in modern Europe – a timely reminder as the expanding European Union absorbs nations in which ethnic and religious hatreds remain causes for concern.” – Ben Barkow, Director, The Wiener Library, London
Table of Contents
Foreword by Jeremiah A. Barondess, M.D.
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 Race and Species
2 Biological, Cultural and Physical Degeneration
3 Darwinism and Eugenics
4 The Mentally Defective and their Segregation
5 Racial Eugenics and Laws of Marriage, Immigration and Citizenship
6 Sterilization by Castration and Ligation
7 Eradication of the Worthless
8 Genocide
9 Experiments on Prisoners
10 Afterword
Index of Persons
Index of Subjects