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In previous chapters we have introduced the notion of third party policing, described its dimensions, and surveyed both its legal status, tools and effectiveness. These chapters have given a snapshot of how third party policing works in various situations, and of what we know about its effectiveness in preventing or responding to crime. We have shown that the use of third party policing is largely episodic, hidden and outside of most police programmatic responses. Despite this, and based on the limited evaluative evidence available, it appears that third party policing is a highly effective tactic. But to examine only the effectiveness of third party policing is to consider only half the equation – despite its apparent effectiveness, there has been limited examination of the side-effects, fairness and equity of third party policing. We need to examine the intentional and unintentional, positive and negative, impacts of third party policing on the partners who work with police (regulators, property owners, business owners), as well as on other groups in the community (schools, community groups), on the ultimate targets and their families and communities, and even on the police organizations themselves. How does third party policing affect the community in which it is practised? How equitably does it affect different communities, both internally and in comparison to other communities? Just as importantly, who is held accountable for the outcomes and impacts of third party policing, and how? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

it is a mistake to claim, as had often been the case until recently, that Germans in general and German businessmen in particular did not “confront the National Socialist past” after World War II. The real problem is the manner in which they did so. Recent research on West German industry has shown that its leaders were preoccupied and — in cases where they were subjected to lengthy denazification proceedings or threats of socialization — even obsessed with the Nazi past and their role in it. They developed both personal and organized ways of trying to deal with that past that were personally bearable but that also permitted them to present a case to the outside world that at once legitimized the personal rehabilitation of those who were accused of working with the National Socialists and made the case for reconstruction of German industry along traditional lines. As shall be demonstrated here, this was also true of the leaders of the insurance business and of the insurance industry itself. Indeed, this confrontation with the Nazi period was an inescapable necessity for three reasons. First, business leaders were subject to denazification. If, in retrospect, the denazification appears to have been poorly conceived and inconsistently and inadequately implemented, it nevertheless required the filling out of lengthy and detailed questionnaires, liability to internment in some instances (aswell as dismissal and blockage of accounts in many others), and subjection to legal proceedings that could lead to significant penalties if those appearing before the tribunals did not succeed in exonerating themselves. In the last analysis, the entire enterprise proved something of a monument to two American manias, questionnaires and letters of reference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

the term “community of danger” belonged to the language of the politically correct in German insurance circles, but that National Socialist Germany itself was a “community of danger” in a quite literal sense was not lost upon those leading the industry. The greater the drift toward war, the more obvious this became. Although Hitler's willingness and ability to take great risks and revise the Treaty of Versailles “peacefully” until 1939 — and then move on to yet further triumphs in 1939—1941 — may have been viewed with admiration and satisfaction, those involved in the management of the German insurance industry, as was the very nature of their enterprise, remained anxious to minimize risk but also to maximize opportunity. This meant constant assessment of the situation, and the two goals were inextricably related to one another. Risk reduction was an imperative when Germany faced war before 1939 and when Germany faced defeat after 1942, while opportunity maximization was of greatest importance during the period when it appeared that Germany might be victorious. Nevertheless, it was the very nature of the regime to insist that peace was being maintained while it was driving toward war and to speak of final victory while facing total defeat. Thus for only a brief period was there some correspondence between claims and reality. Especially after 1942, those who managed to maintain their capacity for rational perception inevitably faced an increasing tension between their engagement with the regime and their effort to continue “doing business,” on the one hand, and such measures as they could take to deal with the manifest disaster they were confronting, on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

INDIRECT CONFISCATION OF JEWISH LIFE INSURANCE ASSETS on November 17, 1938, the directors of Isar Life Insurance Company sent an urgent request to the RWM and the RAA for permission to refuse payment to Jews seeking to cash in their life insurance policies at their current repurchase value. As company directors Paul Riebesell (who, ironically enough, had been driven out of his position as head of the Reich Group for Publicly Chartered Insurance for helping a Jewish student) and Eckert reminded the government authorities, Isar had taken over the German portion of the Austrian Phönix life insurance stock when that company collapsed in 1936 and — with the financial support of the Party, the government, and its corporate backers — had managed to guarantee the acquisition of this portfolio and to acquire a considerable amount of new business since then. As discussed in Chapter 4, Isar Life Insurance Company's portfolio was guaranteed by the entire German insurance industry, which of course included Allianz. Isar company directors warned that its successes were now threatened by Jewish cancellations because 20%—25% of Isar policyholders were non-Aryan. Although policy cancellations had increased significantly prior to November 9—10, the demands of the previous few days had been such, Riebesell and Eckert alleged, as to threaten the very existence of the company. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If diamonds had begun the transformation of southern Africa, the industrialisation which followed the discovery of vast seams of underground gold on the Witwatersrand in 1886, followed by the renewed assertion of British supremacy in the interior of southern Africa, greatly accelerated the forces making for change over the entire region, and set the pace for much of the twentieth century. In the 1880s the sub-continent was still composed of a cluster of independent African kingdoms and Afrikaner republics, British colonies and protectorates; the huge new German acquisition of South West Africa was still largely unconquered. By 1910, with the political unification of the South African colonies, British ambitions of creating a southern African confederation seemed well on the way to fulfilment, while, to the north, British imperial frontiers stopped short only at Katanga and Tanganyika. All over southern African the annexation of African polities meant the establishment of colonial states, with government departments and courts, alien soldiers and policemen. By 1910 railroad arteries, often built at enormous human cost, connected the coast with mining centres as far afield as Bwana Mkubwa and Elisabethville (Lubumbashi), opening up new markets and releasing new sources of labour. Boundaries had been drawn which were to last beyond the colonial period, and it was accepted by the colonial rulers that the Zambezi was to be the boundary between the ‘white south’ and the ‘tropical dependencies’ of east and central Africa, although British Central Africa uneasily straddled the divide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction In the early modern era, the system of public finance of the northern Netherlands constituted a most singular type among its neighbouring countries. This tiny nation, without large resources of its own, was extremely successful in raising sizable quantities of funds for public purposes, in particular for warfare. Various larger monarchies experienced enormous difficulties in making both ends meet. Powerful princes went bankrupt, but not this conglomeration of sovereign provinces. Distinguished ambassadors of foreign authorities reported home on how the Dutch managed their astonishingly high levels of public debt. Within this state, the commercial and financial strength of the province of Holland constituted the major backbone. In the course of the sixteenth century, Holland had developed a system of provincial public finance which enabled the ascent of a secured public debt against relatively low rates of interest. This so-called ‘financial revolution’ (Tracy 1985a, p. 3; Dickson 1967) acted as a most welcome safety-valve for unforeseen and exorbitant military expenses. The reverse side of the coin was an enormous incidence of taxation. Loans, after all, had to be serviced by duties that had to be paid by the populace. In 1595, a young English traveller by the name of Fynes Moryson noted the paradox of this burden: The Tributes, Taxes, and Customes, of all kinds imposed by mutuall consent – so great is the love of liberty or freedome – are very burthensome, and they willingly beare them, though for much lesse exactions imposed by the King of Spaine… they had the boldnesse to make warre against a Prince of such great power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]