Book cover of The Green and the Brown: A History of Conservation in Nazi Germany

Book description

This study provides the first comprehensive discussion of conservation in Nazi Germany. Looking at Germany in an international context, it analyses the roots of conservation in the late nineteenth century, the gradual adaptation of racist and nationalist thinking among conservationists in the 1920s and their indifference to the Weimar Republic.…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Why read it?

1 author picked The Green and the Brown as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Conservation was an offshoot of the Blut und Boden (blood and soil) ideology of the Third Reich, in which Aryan families were linked to the land through a hereditary right and the promotion of rural values.

Native plants and countryside habitats were considered superior and worthy of preservation, and conservation evolved from its 19th-century origins to nationalist thinking in the 1930s. I was particularly intrigued by the Dauerwald (continuous forest), a set of forestry practices in which clear-cutting was replaced by selective cutting, keeping habitats and plant populations intact.

The growing demand for wood in the wartime economy required conservation,…

If you love The Green and the Brown...

Book cover of These Blue Mountains

These Blue Mountains by Sarah Loudin Thomas,

A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.

German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…

Want books like The Green and the Brown?

Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like The Green and the Brown.

Browse books like The Green and the Brown

Book cover of Racial Hygiene: Medicine under the Nazis
Book cover of How Green Were the Nazis?: Nature, Environment, and Nation in the Third Reich
Book cover of Biologists Under Hitler

Share your top 3 reads of 2025!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,340

readers submitted
so far, will you?

📚 If you like The Green and the Brown, you might also like...

Book cover of Foxfire in the Snow

Foxfire in the Snow by J.S. Fields,

It's a time of change, between magic and alchemy.

Born the heir of a master woodcutter in a queendom defined by guilds and matrilineal inheritance, nonbinary Sorin can’t quite seem to find their place. At seventeen, an opportunity to attend an alchemical guild fair and secure an apprenticeship with the…

Book cover of The Main Gate

The Main Gate by Yvonne Kjorlien,

Dr. Elise Marquette has spent years burying the past—until the past refuses to stay buried.

Hired to join Earth’s first interstellar contact team, she hopes the vastness of space will finally offer distance from the ghosts of war and the wounds left by a mother who never let her be…

5 book lists we think you will like!