Over the course of the past 20 years, significant and intentional attempts to restore the reputations of Holocaust-era criminals and certain fascist organizations have become increasingly frequent. These threaten honest engagement with Holocaust history, undermine resilience against fascism, and encourage so-called “memory wars” that can have disastrous consequences at both the international and domestic levels. Stated differently, rehabilitation has the potential to encourage the dangerous distortion of historical knowledge and awareness — real consequences in a milieu of extremist nationalism — and seems to contribute to rising antisemitism and other forms of racial, interethnic, or religious prejudice.
Acts of rehabilitation and valorization can inspire and accompany the development of politics, societies, or cultures that normalize the hatred of Jews and other ethnic or religious groups. They can increase tensions between regions and states, erode respect for the legacies of the Holocaust and related atrocities, and undermine public support for democratic institutions and international structures. As recent events have shown, these acts can serve as a form of disinformation that precedes or accompanies aggressive international rhetoric and military conflict or other manifestations of violence.
This lecture features Robert Williams, Finci-Viterbi Executive Director of the USC Shoah Foundation, who will focus on the phenomenon of rehabilitation, an umbrella term that refers to attempts to absolve, exculpate, heroize, or otherwise gloss over the words and deeds of individuals and organizations complicit in the Holocaust and related crimes of the Second World War.
Sponsored by the Office of the Provost.
