Document Type
Book Review
Publication Title
Holocaust and Genocide Studies
Publication Date
2018
DOI
doi.org/10.1093/hgs/dcy026
Abstract
Weiss-Wendt’s book unpacks what happened to “genocide” as it journeyed along this path of codification. To be clear, codification was conditioned by compromise among states; and states were often motivated by Cold War selfishness, spite, manipulation, and machination. The Convention narrowed—and even mangled—the set of protected groups to national, ethnic, racial, and religious. The Convention, moreover, limited the recognized forms that genocide could take. The title of Weiss-Wendt’s book reflects its argument that the expansiveness of genocide as an idea was “gutted” in the process of codifying it in an international treaty.
Recommended Citation
Mark A. Drumbl, Book Review, 32 Holocaust & Genocide Stud. 297 (2018) (reviewing Anton Weiss-Wendt, The Soviet Union and the Gutting of the UN Genocide Convention (2017)).