Hans Derks – författare

How was it possible that, in a rather peaceful and, to all intents and purposes, not particularly antisemitic Dutch society, more than 75% of the Jewish population were arrested, deported or murdered in concentration camps during the Shoah? Can all of this be blamed on the Nazi occupiers?The eminent historian, Hans Derks, explains this mystery for the first time by looking closely at the social and religious characteristics of Dutch society. He also unveils the extensive collaboration of the country''s state-bureaucracy with the German authorities. This uniquely perpetratororiented book about the Dutch Shoah offers shocking conclusions about the persistent contribution of Dutch scholars to racist ideologies and eugenic measures aimed at creating a new, racially pure Dutch society under an authoritarian leadership.

This is the first scholarly study in which the production, trade and political effects of opium and its derivatives are shown over many centuries, and in many countries (China, India, Indonesia, Japan, all Southeast Asian countries and some in Europe and the Americas). Starting in the 16th century, slavery and opium became the two means with which the bodies and souls of men and women in the tropics were exploited in western imperialism and colonialism. The first waned with the abolition movement in the 19th century, but opium production and trade continued to spread, with the associated serious social and political effects. Around 1670 the Dutch introduced opium as a cash crop for mass production and distribution in India and Indonesia. China became the main target in the 19th century, and only succeeded in getting rid of the opium problem around 1950. Then it had already been transformed from an “Eastern” into a “Western” problem.

Both Karl Marx and Max Weber inspired the writing of the two volumes of The Market and the Oikos. Weber coined a market versus oikos contradiction, in which oikos not only means house, household or family, but later also the state, while Marx saw a town versus country antagonism. Both scholars, however, explained insufficiently these most complicated concepts, let alone some mutual relationships. This second volume, The Market and the Oikos, Vol. II: The Peasant and the Nomad in History, continues the analysis of their antagonisms in their mutual relationships by providing the main practical characteristics in different historical, economic and sociological contexts, based on the writing of Max Weber as explained in Vol. I. While the first volume tried to characterize the relationships from economic and historical points of view, this second volume takes a historical/sociological angle. In both volumes, Hans Derks' argument proceeds from early world historical examples to the present context of contemporary China, stressing the highly neglected role of nomads in history.

In the third volume of The Market and the Oikos, Hans Derks examines the transformative 30-year period from 1918 to 1948 in Palestine, situating it within the broader context of the decline of Western imperial power and the dissolution of the British Empire. Following World War I, the British Empire sought to reassert its influence in the East, with particular emphasis on the Middle East due to the strategic importance of the Suez Canal and newly discovered oil resources. The author analyzes the complex interplay of British colonial policies, the Zionist settler movement, and evolving geopolitical alliances. This volume offers a nuanced exploration of the origins of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the long-lasting legacies of colonialism. It provides a critical examination of the geopolitics of the early 20th century, highlighting the significant global consequences of the collapse of imperial powers.