Capitalism and Stuttgart’s Savings Banks, 1933–1945
from Part IV - Racializing Capitalism
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 January 2022
Germany’s Sparkassen (public savings banks) were vital to the national economy during the Second World War. They also held a special place in the cultural fabric, as particularly representative of perceived German virtues – hard work, thrift, community – the appraisal of which was heightened during the Third Reich. However, we don’t know much about this sector. How did these “most völkisch” institutions operate during the Nazi era? In particular, how were National Socialism and capitalism intertwined in Sparkassen decision-making and self-representation? This chapter demonstrates that the logics of capitalism remained paramount in the minds of savings bank managers. However, their faith in capitalist principles did not make them any less useful to (or supportive of) the regime. Instead, it allowed bank leaders to rationalize their own behavior and legitimize their support for the dictatorship as good for business.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.