The People's Car

Bernhard Rieger

“Rieger has succeeded in presenting the first comprehensive account of the truly amazing story of the Volkswagen Beetle. Starting with Hitler’s plans to provide a mass-produced people’s car for his projected ‘Aryan’ society, he shows how this ‘ugly duckling’ became an icon of postwar mass motorization around the world. A compelling read.”—V. R. Berghahn, Columbia University

“Rieger extracts from the history of the Volkswagen not just the story of a product—iconic though it was—but also its significance for Germany’s national image since the 1930s. Deeply researched, this history makes a cracking good read.”—Jane Caplan, co-editor of Concentration Camps in Germany: The New Histories

“With great richness and imagination, Rieger joins economics and social desire, advertising and politics, technology and culture, to track a distinctive German history through a truly transnational arena.”—Geoff Eley, author of Nazism as Fascism: Violence, Ideology, and the Ground of Consent in Germany, 1930–1945

“A fascinating book! Rieger takes readers on the Volkswagen Beetle’s global journey, showing the many meanings of this iconic product in different times and places. His history illuminates the worldwide allure of commodity culture, the spread of socioeconomic inequalities, and the protean meanings of purchased goods.”—Emily S. Rosenberg, editor of A World Connecting, 1870–1945

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