Amir Teicher's Social Mendelism is a well-rounded analysis of one of the core concepts that influenced the eugenics movement. This work explains how Mendelism played an integral role in National Socialism by justifying racial medicine and political exclusion, which ultimately led to the Holocaust. Teicher notes that science is embedded in the cultural environment, and is shaped by cultural institutions, illustrating how Mendelism cannot be dismissed as pseudoscience as this is integrally linked to science as a whole. He specifically states, ‘Neither is it a purely German story. There were great national differences in the way Mendel's theory was received, adopted and applied, and in some nations its influence was marginal’ (p. 11), which is important to recall while reading. These perceptions of Mendelism were regionally situated but altered over time. Teicher's approach positions Mendelism in a wider context beyond Germany and the much-discussed rise of National Socialism. This is a significant strength of the book.

Teicher explains these often complicated concepts of heredity to both a beginner and an expert audience with considerable flair, starting with the most central aspects and developing the argument to include the complex historiography and debates on Mendelism that precede this book. He deals with the theory of eugenics seriously in noting that ‘many of the problems in the theory of eugenics exist to this day … But neither should these faults lead to the repudiation of early eugenics as groundless or ridiculous’ (p. 16), while giving the example of the supposed gene for criminality that was reported in 2016. By opening with situating this theory in its historical era, but providing the reader with a lens through which to view these theories in a contemporary context, Teicher instills the importance of this theoretical understanding in the reader. Teicher details the origins of the family tree, and how this had to be reconceptualized in order to adhere to new emerging theories of inheritance, moving from the fifteenth-century Ahnentafel proving noble origins, to the development of multiple new forms of noting recessive and dominant trait inheritance such as the kinship chart. The role of psychiatry in highlighting the importance of inheritance is detailed, including discussions on the heritability of talents such as creativity, susceptibility to disease, ideas of mental degeneration, and children's birth order influencing their mental health and character development. This also leads on to the problematic designation of biological races, and hereditary charts being shared between prospective married couples.

In Chapter 5, on Mendelizing racial anti-Semitism, Teicher explains that the popularity of Mendelism and hereditary charts was in part due to the legislation for these charts; from 1933 onwards, in order to retain a job in the civil service, one had to provide such a chart and so their popularity increased. He also highlights that the Nuremberg laws made reference to Mendelian inheritance, and so legitimized these racist laws through flawed scientific reasoning. One of the most compelling points of this book was the indoctrination of children through schoolwork, including performing a play in class on heredity, attending productions including Erbstrom, and compiling a family tree which could later be used by the local health office. Most notably, Teicher acknowledges that this covert method of disclosing hereditary illnesses was recognized by children, who refused to participate, much to their teachers’ surprise. He therefore highlights how Mendelism was understood not only as a method of understanding heritability and science, but also as a method to discriminate against others and ensure ‘racial purity’. Teicher reflects on the issue of forced sterilization and the justification of this on Mendelian eugenic grounds into the postwar era, as those who were forcibly sterilized received no compensation.

In ending this work, Teicher emphasizes that this focus on sterilization and eugenics did not suddenly end in 1945, but in fact continued under Allied supervision. Providing that it was not focused on race or religion, and the sterilization was voluntary, such regulation on a eugenic basis was encouraged. In this book the expert reader will find interesting sources analysed with great insight, as well as some skilfully condensed historiographical arguments on eugenics, biopolitics and Mendelian arguments. For those less familiar with Mendelian theories, but with a desire to learn more given the framework of eugenics and Nazism, this work is a wonderful insight with engaging source materials that are well referenced and accessible. It is this reviewer's opinion that this book should become one of the core texts of any eugenics and biopolitics syllabus.