Hustlers, small black marketeers, and Allied soldiers exchanging goods in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin after World War II - the story of the German capital's black markets has inspired many writers of different genres. This book combines an in-depth historical analysis of the emergence of illegal trading under Nazi rule during the war with a new interpretation of the development of the two postwar German states. By focusing on the everyday practices of black marketeers and the historical setting they acted in, it explains how the experiences in a city of turmoil helped to shape the...