Chase Jenson, Utah Valley University
Social and Behavioral Sciences
In May of 1940 Britain demilitarized the island of Guernsey which created the opportunity for German occupation. Some of the citizens left the island, but those that remained became imprisoned for the next five years. While there is a significant amount of research that is done on the topic of extreme circumstances during World War 2, the archived data of the events and social interactions of the people of Guernsey remains unexplored despite being the only part of Britain under German rule. To address this, final stages of conducting an exploratory study are in progress to discover reasons for resistance and collaboration of the imprisoned island inhabitants by content analysis of secondary data including government records, interviews, and journals.
The records have been coded and analyzed under the following criteria: (1) actual act of resistance or collaboration and any mention of reason behind the action; (2) perceived collaboration or resistance in the community; (3) number of people involved in the act; (4) direct or indirect involvement of uniformed German soldiers; (5) any possibility of reciprocity affecting the action.
In addition to the coding criteria of resistance and collaboration with German forces, other factors, such as the inconsistencies of the German forces in punishment, enforcement of rules, and obedience to the Hauge Conventions of 1890 and 1907, is currently being analyzed for possible confounding variables affecting the actions of the citizens of Guernsey.
If the research continues in the current direction, it is feasible to speculate the majority of the collaboration was for survival purposes while resistance was for autonomy and patriotism to the British Crown. Results of the analysis will hopefully aid in further research into the German Occupation of Guernsey as well as shine light into collaboration and resistance in prison situations during war.