Antisemitic elements in the critique of capitalism in German culture, 1850 - 1933

This volume examines selected works of German literature from Gustav Freytag to Joseph Goebbels in relation to ethical, socio-economic, and political texts from the economic «take off» period in the middle of the nineteenth century up to the rise of National Socialism and investigates two aspects of anti-Semitic anti-capitalistic representations contained therein. First it traces how the Jews gained the dubious distinction of being the inventors, even embodiment, of capitalism and elaborates on negative traits assigned to both of them. Second it examines how representations of specifically Jewish capitalists were instrumentalized both to discredit laissez faire and simultaneously to assist in the definition of a specifically «German» socio-economic ethos.