Answer:
Introduction
The field of comparative genocide studies has grown beyond recognition over
the past two decades, though more quantitatively than qualitatively. On the
surface, everything looks good: the number of books on genocide has tripled
within less than a decade; the field of comparative genocide studies has its
own professional association and journals; more and more colleges and universities offer courses on genocide; several research institutions dedicated to
the study of genocide have been established. If we are talking numbers, comparative genocide studies are indeed a great success. Upon close examination,
however, genocide scholarship is ridden with contradictions. There is barely
any other field of study that enjoys so little consensus on defining principles
such as definition of genocide, typology, application of a comparative
method, and timeframe. Considering that scholars have always put stress on
prevention of genocide, comparative genocide studies have been a failure.
Paradoxically, nobody has attempted so far to assess the field of comparative
genocide studies as a whole. This is one of the reasons why those who define
themselves as genocide scholars have not been able to detect the situation of
crisis. This article looks at the conceptual and institutional development of
comparative genocide scholarship and outlines major problems that its practitioners face.
Comparative genocide scholarship is still in its infancy. With the exception of two studies that appeared in 1959 and 1972,1 the scholarly community came Holocaust versus genocide studies
The field of comparative genocide studies was born into the opposition to the
dominant Holocaust discourse.3 What may be seen as an act of revolt has
largely informed the subsequent development of the field and its unduly militant character. Some scholars, who tend to pose as unofficial spokesmen for
genocide studies, have been attacking the Holocaust establishment ever since.
The harshest critic proved to be Henry Huttenbach, who has taken on the U.S.
Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) and the historians associated with it
in the newsletter that he established in 1994. Thus, he called USHMM ‘the Great
to appreciate the work of Raphael Lemkin only in the late 1970s. Another
15–20 years passed before the name of Lemkin acquired its rightful place
among the leading humanists of the twentieth century.2 Until well into the
mid 1990s, the discourse on comparative genocide was largely limited geographically to North America. In Europe, in Germany in particular, ‘genocide’
has long been used as a synonym for the word ‘Holocaust’.
