Paying for Hitler’s War: The Consequences of Nazi Hegemony for Europe

Abstract

The Allied occupation of Germany has enjoyed increasing attention in recent years from historians interested in the makings of contemporary Germany. While political, economic, and cultural reforms implemented after 1945 have featured prominently in these accounts, education has received less scrutiny. And of the studies that do concentrate on education, especially those published in English, there has been very little consideration of British efforts to introduce reform to the schools of their zone. Fortunately, David Phillips has authored a new work that does exactly that. His exhaustive study of British educational policy in Germany during the occupation focuses squarely on the individuals charged with administering educational policy and the multitude of challenges they faced during their tenure. Drawing from the words of Robert Birley, Educational Advisor to the British Military Governor, Phillips states that his goal is to describe the ‘attempt at the intentional systematic turning-around of the whole educational system of another country by occupying forces’ (p. xvii). Phillips then offers a periodization of Britain’s educational work in Germany that conceptualizes five stages of control: wartime planning; military administration through September 1945; administration by the Control Commission; transfer of control to German authorities beginning in 1947 and the functioning of the High Commission from 1949 to 1955. His work concludes with the creation of the High Commission in 1949. He also identifies three main objectives the British sought to achieve during their time in Germany: denazification, ‘re-education’ (a problematic term that Phillips rightly explores in his study) and democratization.