Major Transformative Events Of Ww2

The Second World War was one of the major transformative events of the 20th century, with 39 million deaths in Europe alone. Large amounts of physical capital were destroyed as well through six years of constant ground battles and bombing. Many individuals were forced to abandon or give up their property without compensation and to move on to new lands. Periods of hunger become more common even in relatively prosperous Western Europe. Families were separated for long periods of time especially from their fathers. Many including young children would personally witness the horrors of War as battles and bombing took place in the very areas where they lived. Massive crimes against humanity were committed. Due to WW2, political and economic systems

During WWII, millions of Jews, but also opponents of the Nazi regime, were expropriated, and often sent to concentration camps and died there. Second, the end of WWII was associated with dramatic border changes in Eastern Europe. These border changes often induced millions of individuals to leave their places of residence and flee to other parts of Europe. The Soviet Union annexed territory from some of its neighboring countries, inter alia from Czechoslovakia, Germany and Poland. Poland in term received one part of Germany in compensation. Those Poles having lost their homes in the part occupied by the Soviet Union were moved to the new part, so Poland and with it millions of people were moved westwards. Germany lost about one quarter of its territory. About two million people have been estimated to have died on the flight. After the war, the remaining territory of Germany was divided into 4 occupational zones. About 4 million people fled from the approaching Soviet armies to the British and US zone where the occupation was less severe. In Germany, destroyed cities had to accumulate millions of ethnic Germans from other parts of Europe. A further wave of dispossessions happened in Eastern countries after WWII when private property was nationalized in the socialist and communist economies. Even in France, there was a wave of nationalizations at the end of WWII. Mainly banks, energy and transport firms were nationalized, but there were also some expropriations which happened as penalty for cooperation with the Nazi regime. In the Czech Republic, Germany and Poland more than 5 percent of the respondents experienced dispossession during their lifetime. For respondents living in Germany and Poland, dispossession happened during the war period, while they happened later in Czechoslovakia. Dispossessed individuals are over proportionally born outside of the current borders of