As part of its new academic books series, the Wiener Holocaust Library is delighted to host Dr Andreas Kranebitter, who will speak about the topic of his new book, Die Konstruktion von Kriminellen: Die Inhaftierung von “Berufsverbrechern” im KZ Mauthausen [The Construction of Criminals: The Imprisonment of “Professional Criminals” in the Mauthausen Concentration Camp, published by New Academic Press in 2024]. Dr Kranebitter, whose book is currently published in German and in preparation in English, will discuss his findings with Prof Anna Hájková in this special virtual event.

The Nazi state deported people to concentration camps for a variety of reasons. The department of criminal investigation was authorized to detain people in so-called protective custody and send them to camps. They were labelled “professional criminals” (Berufsverbrecher) because of prior convictions. After 1945, they were not considered victims and were spoken about only behind closed doors.

But who were the “criminal” prisoners of the concentration camps? On what legal basis were they deported? What were their prior convictions? What role did they play in the structure of “prisoner society” in the Nazi concentration camps? And why has this group of victims been stigmatised and largely forgotten? Dr Kranebitter’s work is devoted not only to the Nazi era, but also to the history of criminal policy in Austria and the continued stigmatisation of this group of victims after 1945.

About the Speakers

Dr Andreas Kranebitter is the Director of the Documentation Center of Austrian Resistance (DÖW) in Vienna. The author of two monographs and many studies, his theses were awarded the Herbert Steiner and the Irma Rosenberg prizes. He began his career at the Mauthausen Memorial, where he rose to the directorship of research. Most recently he was director of the Archive of the History of Sociology in Austria at the University of Graz.

Dr Anna Hájková is Reader of modern European continental history at the University of Warwick, UK, and the author of the celebrated monograph, The Last Ghetto: An Everyday History of Theresienstadt (OUP 2020). She has been researching the life of Willy Brachmann, a Hamburg “criminal” prisoner and survivor of Auschwitz, and loybbing for his commemoration.

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This event is free, although registration via the link below is required. Please note that our free events are run by staff volunteers. Thank you for your patience should we have any technical or audio difficulties. We will do our best to correct them but this is not always possible.

Info + Registration: https://wienerholocaustlibrary.org

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