The Tasks of Peace: Rebuilding Western European Societies after World War II
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Editors
Keywords
World War II, Post-war, Democratisation, Resocialisation, Welfare, Veterans, Refugees
Abstract
In 1945, as the Second World War came to an end, social rebuilding began. Across Europe, societies faced urgent questions of justice, welfare, and democracy. Former collaborators had to be punished or reintegrated. Prisoners of war, refugees, and displaced persons required housing, education,and help with repatriation. Veterans, resistance fighters, and victims needed recognition, compensation, and support.
The Tasks of Peace examines the difficult transition from warfare to welfare in Western Europe after 1945. It shows how post-war reconstruction was not simply a return to normality, but a contested process in which states, resistance and veterans’ organisations, welfare institutions, and civil society sought to define and shape post-war society.
Drawing on case studies from Denmark, Finland, Italy, Britain, and Norway, the book explores how punishment, social assistance, democratic education, compensation, and institutional reform became part of the same struggle to secure peace and stability. It reveals how postwar welfare and democracy were shaped not only by political visions, but also by everyday administrative decisions about deservingness, danger, and belonging.
The book is written by an international group of scholars and edited by Søren Werther Kjær Rasmussen, PhD and postdoc at the University of Southern Denmark.
Published in collaboration between Aalborg University Open Publishing and Nord Academic / Gads Forlag.
Recommended citation:Rasmussen , S. W. K. (Ed.). (2026). The Tasks of Peace: Rebuilding Western European Societies after World War II. Aalborg University Open Publishing & Nord Academic/Gads Forlag. https://doi.org/10.54337/aau.tasksofpeace
Chapters
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IntroThe Tasks of Peace Await
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Chapter 1From Revenge to Probation Service: Convicted Wartime Collaborators in Denmark after World War II
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Chapter 2The Braintree Experiment: Demonstrating the “British Way of Life” to German Prisoners of War in Post-War Britain
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Chapter 3Adult Education in German Refugee Camps in Denmark following the Second World War: Study Circles and Democratic Learning
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Chapter 4Teaching Democracy: Denazification and Democratisation among German Refugees in Denmark, 1945–1947
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Chapter 5In the Absence of a Plan: The Rehabilitation of Non-German Displaced Persons in Denmark, 1945–1953
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Chapter 6Sacrifice, Service and Reciprocity: The Moral Economy of Resettlement in Post-war Finland
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Chapter 7From Hiding in Darkness to Entering the Spotlight: Finnish Military Deserters and Their Return to Post-War Society
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Chapter 8From Criticism to Celebration: Intelligence Officers, Memory Wars, and the Recasting of Honour in Post-war Denmark
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Chapter 9Compensation Policies for Danish Resistance Fighters and World War II Victims 1941–2026
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Chapter 10Social Aid and Gender in Post-War Denmark: Women and the Practices of the Compensation Law, 1945–1948
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Chapter 11Defining Veteran Status in Post-war Norway and Denmark 1945–1969
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Chapter 12Entangled Transitions: Trade Unions, Welfare Institutions, and Social Conflict in Post-War Italy, 1943–1948
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Chapter 13The “Two-Faced Janus” of Social Collaboration: The Consigli di Gestione in Italy between Corporatism and Industrial Democracy, 1943–1949
Author Biography
Søren Werther Kjær Rasmussen is a historian and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southern Denmark. He holds a PhD in History and specialises in the social and political consequences of war, with particular emphasis on welfare policies, compensation schemes, veterans, resistance fighters, and other war victims of the Second World War. His research combines social, political, and cultural history and examines post-war reconstruction, reintegration, refugee history, memory culture, and the development of welfare institutions. He also works with public history and regularly contributes to exhibitions, lectures, media, and other forms of historical dissemination.