Gender and Power in the Third Reich : Female Denouncers and the Gestapo (1933-45)

This book examines the everyday operations of the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police. The Gestapo were able to detect the smallest signs of non-compliance with Nazi doctrines, especially 'crimes' pertaining to the private spheres of social, family, and sexual life. One of the key factors in the enforcement of Nazi policies was the willingness of German citizens to provide the authorities with information about suspected 'criminality'. This book examines women denouncers in Nazi Germany through close examination of the Gestapo files. The author seeks to answer questions about how women in particular used denunciation and why so many ordinary women denounced 'deviants and dissenters' to the Gestapo.