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How Could This Happen? Explaining the Holocaust

Events | Headline and Cultural Forums

While there is no shortage of excellent scholarship and historical research on the Holocaust, there has been little that has adequately answered the vital question: How was such a nightmare possible in the heart of Western civilization? Historian Dan McMillan distills the vast body of Holocaust research into a compelling analysis that looks at a combination of factors—from Germany's failure to become a democracy until 1918, widespread acceptance of anti-Semitism and scientific racism, aftermath of World War I, and the class and political divisions it produced, etc. Along the way, McMillan puts the Holocaust into context with other tragic genocides including  Rwanda, Cambodia, Armenia, ultimately offering a compelling argument for how the perfect storm of bleak circumstances, malevolent ideas, and damaged personalities unleashed such terrifying atrocity and answering the question of whether it could happen again. 



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