Socio-economic determinants of survival in a nazi concentration camp: the experience of Spanish prisoners at Mauthausen

Abstract

This paper advances the literature on the determinants of survival in contexts of indiscriminate violence through a case-study of Spaniards in the Mauthausen concentration camp. We benefit from the high-quality individual information collected by Spaniards with administrative jobs at the camp. Although our analysis also examines the role of age, marital status, and religious self-identification, our main focus lies in the role of social class in survival, with social class determined by the occupation prior to the deportation. We hypothesize individuals from higher social classes display higher survival probabilities through their greater capacity to fill relevant positions in the camp, their more central location in support networks and probably better command of the German language. Using Cox models, the results support our main hypothesis. The risk of death was highest amongst unskilled agricultural workers, followed by unskilled non-agricultural workers.