Stefanie Coché's Psychiatric Institutions and Society: the Practice of Psychiatric Commital in the “Third Reich,” the Democratic Republic of Germany, and the Federal Republic of Germany, 1941-1963 )(London: Routledge, 2024; translated by Alex Skinner) probes how the serious and sometimes fatal decision was made to admit individuals to asylums during Germany’s age of extremes. The book shows that - even during the Nazi killing of the sick - relatives played an even more important role in most admissions than doctors and the authorities.
In light of admission practices, this study traces how ideas about illness, safety, and normality changed when the Nazi regime collapsed in 1945 and illuminates how closely power configurations in the psychiatric sector were linked to political and social circumstances in the early years of both German successor states.
Paul Lerner)* is Professor of History at the University of Southern California where he directs the Max Kade Institute for Austrian-German-Swiss Studies. He can be reached at [email protected] and @PFLerner.*
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