What Difference Does a Husband Make? Women and Marital Status in Nazi and Postwar Germany

Abstract

In October 1946, seven million more women than men lived in occupied Germany. In this study of unwed, divorced, widowed and married women at work and at home across three political regimes, the author traces the transitions from early National Socialism through the war and on to the consolidation of democracy in the West and communism in the East. The study argues that marital status can define women's position and experience as surely as race, gender, sexual orientation and class. It finds that, while the war made the experience of single women a dramatic one, state activity was equally important. As a result, West German women continued to be defined in large part by their marital status. In contrast, by the time of reunification marital status had become far less significant in the lives of East German women.

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