The Nazi Dictatorship and the Deutsche Bank

Book excerpt: Examines the role of Deutsche Bank, Germany's largest commercial bank, during the Nazi dictatorship, and asks how the bank changed and accommodated to a transition from democracy and a market economy to dictatorship and a planned economy. Set against the background of the world depression and the German banking crisis of 1931, the book looks at the restructuring of German banking and offers material on the bank's expansion in central and eastern Europe. As well as summarizing recent research on the bank's controversial role in gold transactions and the financing of the construction of Auschwitz, the book also examines the role played by particular personalities in the development of the bank, such as Emil Georg von Strauss and Hermann Abs.