Christopher Robert Browning (born May 22, 1944) is an American historian of the Holocaust. is the 142nd day of the year (143rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1944 (MCMXLIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ... A historian is an individual who studies history and who writes on history. ... “Shoah” redirects here. ...

Education

Browning received his bachelor's degree from Oberlin College in 1966 and his doctorate from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1975. He taught at Pacific Lutheran University from 1974 to 1999, eventually becoming a Distinguished Professor. In 1999, he moved to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to accept an appointment as Frank Porter Graham Professor of History. Oberlin College is a small, selective liberal arts college in Oberlin, Ohio, in the United States. ... “University of Wisconsin” redirects here. ... The university is located near Tacoma, Washington Pacific Lutheran University is located in the Parkland suburb of Tacoma, Washington. ... The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public, coeducational, research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States. ...

Work

He is best known for his 1992 book Ordinary Men, a study of German Ordnungspolizei (Order Police) Reserve Unit 101, used to massacre and round up Jews for deportation to the death camps in Poland in 1942. The conclusion of the book, which was much influenced by the experiments of Stanley Milgram, was that the men of Unit 101 were not demons or Nazi fanatics but ordinary middle-aged men of working-class background from Hamburg, who had been drafted but found unfit for military duty. These men were ordered to round up Jews and if there was not enough room for them on the trains, to shoot them. The commander of the unit gave his men the choice of opting out of this duty if they found it too unpleasant. Browning argued that the men of Unit 101 killed out of a basic obedience to authority and peer pressure not blood-lust or primal hatred. The implication of the book is that most people placed into a group and given the choice between killing and belonging to the group or not killing and not belonging, will choose the former. Additionally the book demonstrates that ordinary people will more than likely follow orders, even those they might personally question, when they perceive these orders as originating from an authority. Flag of the Ordnungspolizei The Ordnungspolizei (OrPo) was the name for the regular German police force that existed in Nazi Germany between the years of 1936 and 1945. ... Stanley Milgram Stanley Milgram (August 15, 1933 – December 20, 1984) was a psychologist at Yale University, Harvard University and the City University of New York. ... National Socialism redirects here. ...

Ordinary Men achieved much acclaim but was denounced by Daniel Goldhagen for missing what Goldhagen considered the importance of German culture for causing the Holocaust. In an extremely hostile book review in the April 1992 edition of The New Republic, Goldhagen called Ordinary Men a book of no scholarly value and accused Browning of manufacturing his evidence. Goldhagen's controversial 1996 book Hitler's Willing Executioners was largely written to rebut Browning's book. Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (born 1959) is an American political scientist. ... Year 1992 (MCMXCII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display full 1992 Gregorian calendar). ... For other uses, see New Republic. ... Year 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full 1996 Gregorian calendar). ...

When David Irving sued Deborah Lipstadt for libel in 2000, Browning was one of the leading witnesses for the defence. Another historian, Robert Jan Van Pelt wrote a report on the gassing facilities at Auschwitz, and Browning wrote a report on the evidence for the extermination of the Jews on a wider scale^[1]. The American journalist D.D. Guttenplan considered Browning to be the most effective of the witnesses for Lipstadt. For other persons of the same name, see David Irving (footballer) and David Irving (politician). ... Lipstadts book: Denying The Holocaust Deborah Esther Lipstadt (born March 18, 1947, New York City) is an American historian and author of the book Denying the Holocaust. ... Auschwitz (Konzentrationslager Auschwitz) was the largest of the Nazi German concentration camps. ...

Browning's interpretation of the Holocaust

Browning is a functionalist in the origins of the Holocaust debate, following the principles of the "moderate functionalist" school of thought, which focuses on the structure and institution of the Third Reich, moving the focus away from Hitler. Functionalist sees the extermination of the Jews as the improvisation and radicalization of a polycratic regime. Functionalists do not vindicate Adolf Hitler yet they recognize that many other factors were involved in the final solution. Functionalism versus intentionalism is a historiographical debate about the origins of the Holocaust as well as most aspects of the Third Reich, such as foreign policy. ... Hitler redirects here. ...

Browning has argued that the Final Solution was the result of the "cumulative radicalization" (to use Hans Mommsen's phrase) of the German state, especially when faced with the self-imposed "problem" of 3 million Jews (mostly Polish) whom the Nazis had forced into ghettos between 1939 and 1941. The intention was to have these and other Jews resident in the Third Reich expelled eastward once a destination was selected. Browning has been able to establish that the phrase "Final Solution to the Jewish Question", first used in 1939, meant until 1941 a "territorial solution". Owing to the military developments of World War II and to turf wars within the German bureaucracy, expulsion lost its viability such that by 1941, members of the bureaucracy were willing to countenance the destruction of that population. In a February 26, 1942, letter to German diplomat Martin Luther, Reinhard Heydrich follows up on the Wannsee Conference by asking Luther for administrative assistance in the implementation of the Endlösung der Judenfrage (Final Solution of the Jewish Question). ... Hans Mommsen (November 5, 1930-) is a left-wing German historian and twin brother of Wolfgang Mommsen. ... Nazi Germany, or the Third Reich, commonly refers to Germany in the years 1933–1945, when it was under the firm control of the totalitarian and fascist ideology of the Nazi Party, with the Führer Adolf Hitler as dictator. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

Browning divides the officials of the Government-General of occupied Poland into two factions. One, the "Productionists", favored using Jews of the ghettos as a source of slave labor to help with the war effort. The other, "Attritionists" favored letting Jews of the ghettos starve and die of disease. At the same time, there were struggles between the SS and Hans Frank, the Governor-General of Poland. The SS favored the "Lublin Plan" of creating a "Jewish Reservation" in Lublin, Poland into which all of the Jews of Greater Germany, Poland and the former Czechoslovakia were to be expelled. Frank was opposed to the "Lublin Plan" on the ground that the SS were "dumping" Jews into his territory. The General Government (in full General government for the occupied Polish areas, in German Generalgouvernement für die besetzten polnischen Gebiete) was the name given by Germany to the governing authority in Poland after its occupation by the Wehrmacht in September and October 1939. ... This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedias quality standards. ... Hans Frank (May 23, 1900 – October 16, 1946) was a lawyer for the Nazi party during the 1920s and a senior official in Nazi Germany. ... Coordinates: , Country Poland Voivodeship Lublin Powiat city county Gmina Lublin Established before 12th century City Rights 1317 Government  - Mayor Adam Wasilewski Area  - City 147. ...

Publications

• The Final Solution and the German Foreign Office : a study of Referat D III of Abteilung Deutschland, 1940–43, New York : Holmes & Meier, 1978.
• Fateful Months : Essays on the Emergence of the Final Solution, New York : Holmes & Meier, 1985.
• Ordinary Men : Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland, New York : HarperCollins, 1992.
• The Path to Genocide : Essays on launching the Final Solution, Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1998, 1992.
• Nazi policy, Jewish workers, German killers, Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2000.
• Collected memories : Holocaust History and Postwar Testimony, Madison, Wis. ; London : University of Wisconsin Press, 2003.
• The Origins of the Final Solution : The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939 – March 1942, Lincoln : University of Nebraska Press, 2004.

References

1. ^ Evans, Richard J. (2002). Telling Lies about Hitler. Verso, 35. ISBN 1-85984-417-0. 

Professor Richard Evans (born 1947) is a British historian of Germany. ...

Further reading

• Bauer, Yehuda Rethinking the Holocaust, New Haven [Conn.] ; London : Yale University Press, 2001
• Guttenplan, D. D. The Holocaust on Trial, New York : Norton, 2001.
• Marrus, Michael The Holocaust in History, Toronto : Lester & Orpen Dennys, 1987
• Rosenbaum, Ron Explaining Hitler : the search for the origins of his evil New York : Random House, 1998.

Yehuda Bauer Yehuda Bauer (born 1926) is an historian and scholar of the Holocaust. ... Michael Robert Marrus (born February 3, 1941) is a Canadian historian of France, the Holocaust and Jewish history. ... Ron Rosenbaum (born on November 27, 1946, New York, New York) is an American journalist and author. ...

External links

• Voices on Antisemitism Interview with Christopher Browning from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
• Review of The Origins of the Final Solution
• Review of Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers
• A Brief Description of Dr. Browning