„Der Druck auf die alliierten und deutschen Autoritäten, den Transfer von Kapitalerträgen aus Deutschland zu erlauben, darf den Versuchen, die Exporte nach Deutschland zu erhöhen, definitiv nicht untergeordnet werden“, schrieb der niederländische Ökonom P. J. van den Burg in der ökonomischen Wochenzeitschrift Economisch-Statistische Berichten Anfang 1949.1 Seine Beobachtung war nur zu verständlich: In der niederländischen Politik gegenüber Deutschland bestand eine deutliche Ambivalenz zwischen Versuchen, Vorkriegsvermögen zurückzuerhalten, und den Versuchen, niederländisch-deutsche Handels- und Wirtschaftsbeziehungen wiederherzustellen. In den Niederlanden war dieser Dualismus besonders akut, weil Deutschland, seit dem späten 19.Jahrhundert die dominante Wirtschaftsmacht Kontinentaleuropas, seit etwa 1850 der wichtigste Handelspartner der Niederlande gewesen war.2 Zudem hatten niederländische Unternehmen, Banken und Privatpersonen in der ersten Dekade nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg in Deutschland im Allgemeinen und im Ruhrgebiet im Besonderen große Investitionen getätigt. Jedoch verloren niederländische Eigentümer und Firmen 1931, als die Konvertibilität der Reichsmark aufgegeben wurde, die Kontrolle über ihre Besitzungen und Investitionen im Dritten Reich. Die deutsche Besetzung der Niederlande zwischen 1940 und 1945 verschlimmerte diesen Zustand noch. https://doi.org/10.1515/hzhz-2018-0035 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martijn-lak-71793013/
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During an interview at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service one student questioned Prime Minister Rutte about an official apology for slavery. The Dutch Prime Minister assured that each island-nation to whom the Kingdom apologized “has full power to decide to leave the Kingdom. They are not colonized. They are independent.” Rutte described the current role of The Netherlands as that of a “gateway” to bring their products to Europe. The emphasis on trade relationship smacks of neo-colonial interests. Rutte’s portrayal of The Netherlands acting as the “in” to the European market for the former colonies is far from the recovery that one would expect for the descendants of the enslaved. In fact, the Slavery Past Dialogue made a number of recommendations to the Dutch Kingdom, including “active prevention of discrimination and institutional racism throughout society” and “the establishment of a Kingdom Fund […] for structural and sustainable financing of recovery measures.” The Dutch Prime Minister’s comments belie a singular focus on trade with the Caribbean nations rather than a holistic approach, looking at non-pecuniary interests involving the well-being of the descendants and the societies in which they live today. The “republicanization” serves as a backdrop to the years-long journey during which the Dutch government (and the Dutch crown) seemingly dragged their feet, refusing to issue a formal apology for the trade of Africans by the Dutch West Indies corporation. That much-solicited apology was finally issued in December 2022, despite warnings that any gesture that excluded reparations would not be favorably received by the Dutch Caribbean nations.
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Many, many comparisons have been drawn in recent years between the current rise of (right-wing) populism and the financial crisis of 2008 that shook and continues to shake Europe to its core, and the tumultuous and horrifying events of the 1930s, which in the end resulted in the Second World War. A number of recent studies which (partially) focus on this decade carry ominous titles like To Hell and Back, The Age of Catastrophe and The Triumph of the Dark. Referred to by some historians as the second Thirty Years’ War, the period from the First World War to the end of the Second still continues to draw much academic and indeed public attention. In many cases, Germany deservedly plays a central role in the analysis, either in the form of the Kaiserreich or the ill-fated Weimar Republic and, of course, Nazi Germany. The five books under review here discuss European history between 1914 and 1950 in general, and that of Germany in particular, in this period. What do these books tell us about Europe’s and Germany’s path in the first half of the twentieth century, and what new insights do they provide? https://doi.org/10.1177/0265691418777981 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martijn-lak-71793013/
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