Early Memorialisation of the Holocaust: American and Scandinavian Perspectives

Abstract

This concluding chapter discusses how the American Jews’ memorialisation of the Holocaust in the post-war years was associated with their commitment to liberalism. They manifested this in their political behaviour but also in the ways they defined and presented their religion and civic activities. The Denmark-Sweden rescue story provided the Jews of the United States an opportunity to believe in the possibility of human progress. In a similar way, Swedish Jews, and increasingly more non-Jews, expressed a rather positive commitment to Swedish society where the rescue missions became a bedrock of hope for a better future against the backdrop of the horrors and tragedies of the Holocaust.