Analysis: A Macat Analysis of Christopher R. Browning's Ordinary Men

De: James Chappel, Tom Stammers

Narrado por: Macat.com

Ordinary Men is one of the most influential works on the Holocaust. Before US historian Browning's 1992 book, most Holocaust scholarship focused either on the experience of the victims or on the Nazi political ideology driving the slaughter. Browning investigates the stories of some who carried out acts of extreme violence, those who literally had blood on their hands. Who were they? What were their backgrounds? And how could they end up committing such unspeakable acts?

Browning focuses on one unexceptional regiment of German reservists, Police Battalion 101, carefully reconstructing the men's personalities. While their orders to kill appalled them at first, Browning shows how a combination of reluctance to challenge authority and peer pressure enabled them to face their gruesome task. These men were not driven by ideology. Rather than being moral monsters, Browning insists they were simply "ordinary men."

While some have criticized Browning's relentless focus on the individual, Ordinary Men is nonetheless an essential work for anybody who wants to understand the Holocaust.

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Good quick summary

Good quick summary Of the novel. Was very good insight into the summary of what happened with this police department. Glad that day included pros and cons of the book and authors that contradicted this book. This way you could make your own judgment into what was the cause of these atrocities.

Get the full audio book

After 30 minutes of this audiobook repeating the exact same thing over and over I gave up and downloaded the book. I was hoping for a summery of the book but the focus was more on the author and why he wrote it.