The Struggle for the Files

Astrid M. Eckert is Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Emory University. Eckert's dissertation on the history of the captured German records, which forms the basis of this book, won the Hedwig Hintze Prize from the German Historical Association and the Friedrich Meinecke Award from the History Department of Free University Berlin. Her work has been supported by grants from the Fulbright Foundation, the German National Academic Foundation, the Fox International Fellowships at Yale, and the American Academy Berlin. She has published articles in Central European History, Studies in Contemporary History and Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte.

• 1. The confiscation of German documents, 1944–9; 2. The first German calls for restitution; 3. The positions of the United States and Great Britain; 4. Negotiation marathon; 5. Ad fontes: the captured German documents and the writing of history; 6. Conclusion.

'Eckert's book does far more than trace the wartime and postwar fate of German archival records. It manages to incorporate a detailed and impeccably researched treatment of 'ownership' with a broader discussion of the international debate about the path of German history and the future of Germany. This issue interests a much wider audience within the field of German history and within the discipline of history as a whole. The other characteristic of this work that deserves emphasis is its transnational character. Eckert is so well versed in the history of Germany, Britain, and the United States that she can carry off a narrative of their interaction in the postwar period with success and with verve.' Richard Breitman, Distinguished Professor, American University