The Palgrave Handbook of State-sponsored History After 1945

This handbook provides the first systematic integrated analysis of the role that states or state actors play in the construction of history and public memory after 1945. The book focuses on many different forms of state-sponsored history, including memory laws, monuments and memorials, state-archives, science policies, history in schools, truth commissions, historical expert commissions, the use of history in courts and tribunals etc. The handbook contributes to the study of history and public memory by combining elements of state-focused research in separate fields of study. By looking at the state’s memorialising capacities the book introduces an analytical perspective that is not often found in classical studies of the state. The handbook has a broad geographical focus and analyses cases from different regions around the world. The volume mainly tackles democratic contexts, although dictatorial regimes are not excluded.

Berber Bevernage is Assistant Professor of Historical Theory at Ghent University, Belgium. His research focuses on the dissemination, attestation and contestation of historical discourse and historical culture in post-conflict situations. He has published in journals such as History and Theory, Rethinking History, Memory Studies, Social History and History Workshop Journal.

Nico Wouters is Director of the Belgian Centre for War and Society (CegeSoma, State Archives), Guest Professor at Ghent University, Belgium, and Honorary Research Fellow at Kent University, UK. His research interests include the Second World War, (state-sponsored) politics of memory, comparative history and oral history.