Origins of the Final Solution

Christopher R. Browning is Frank Porter Graham Professor of History at the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill. He is the author of numerous books on Nazism and the Holocaust, including Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers and Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland.

"The definitive work on the road Germany took toward the Final Solution during the crucial first three years of the war."— István Deák, New York Review of Books "This magisterial work does offer us something new—an unrivaled account of how the Nazi leadership ended up with a policy of industrialized mass murder of Jews as it fought a war of territorial expansion against the threats supposedly posed by Polish nationalism and Soviet Bolshevism. Probably no one is better qualified for this task than Christopher R. Browning. . . . In this summation of more than 20 years of research, he explains how the grand design emerged. . . and points the way to a reintegration of the whole subject in a much broader history of nationalist conflict, forced population movements and colonial settlement."—Mark Mazower, New York Times Book Review "Superb. . . .[Browning] has created an eloquent, painstaking narrative of how the Final Solution evolved until it 'could evolve no further in concept. It remained only to be implemented through action.'"—Joshua Rubenstein, Wall Street Journal "Extraordinary. . . . Browning has obviously mastered every pertinent document available—from archives in Germany, the United States, the former Soviet Union, and Israel—and assimilated them all into his sometimes day-by-day account of the development of Nazi policy. In sifting the evidence he makes clear what's known and what's not, what's probable, what's possible, and what's unlikely; with rigor and unusually incisive writing style he places events, decisions, and debates in a precise historical context. . . . And above all, with exactitude he lays bare his own suppositions as he transparently builds his arguments and his narrative. A masterpiece of the historian's art."—Benjamin Schwarz, Atlantic Monthly "The more Nazi leaders talked of radical solutions, fundamental solutions, total solutions, eradication, total liquidation and final solutions, the more obvious it became what finality would consist of. Browning takes us there, step by step, false lead by false lead, with never-failing intellectual mastery. It is difficult to see this work being superseded in the foreseeable future."—Times Literary Supplement "An internationally renowned historian of the Holocaust, Browning explains the evolution of Nazi anti-Jewish policies from discrimination and expulsions to outright systematic murder. . . . Based on a superb mastery of the archival sources and the secondary literature, Browning leads his readers through the step-by-step radicalization of Nazi policies in the critical months after the outbreak of WWII. . . . Even though Hitler rarely issued explicit orders, Browning shows he was intimately involved each step of the way. . . . This book is sure to become the standard work on the emergence of the Holocaust."—Publishers Weekly starred review "Christopher R. Browning firmly ties what the Nazis called their 'war of destruction' against the Soviet Union to the Holocaust. In Mr. Browning's view . . . Germany's mass murders of Jews and non-Jews alike on the Eastern Front crystallized Nazi policy regarding the eradication of European Jewry."—The New York Times "Compellingly reconstruct[s] German policy toward the Jews in the war's first years, shedding new light on its evolution and the role Hitler played in implementing it. . . . Christopher Browning's arguments present a complex and subtle portrait of how policy was transformed and radicalized by the war."—The Jerusalem Report "How, when, and why the Nazis' decision to exterminate Europe's Jews was made remains one of the most vexed and disputed of all important questions concerning the Holocaust. . . .The Origins of the Final Solution by the universally respected historian Christopher R. Browning . . . is a magisterial examination of this subject. . . .While new interpretations are, of course, likely to be offered in the future, it is most unlikely, barring the discovery of new documents of great importance, that we will ever have a clearer picture of this process than the one Browning offers."—William D. Rubinstein, First Things "Browning recounts the sequence of events that led from 'ethnic cleansing' to the mass murder of Europe's Jews. . . . This book is the first in the University of Nebraska Press' new series, The Comprehensive History of the Holocaust, copublished with Yad Vashem. It is the most detailed examination of this aspect of the Holocaust yet published." —Booklist