Kamil Kijek

Throughout most of the XX century in the Soviet Union and from 1945 in East Central European "people’s democracies," citizens, including  Jews, were objects of the arbitrary policies of the communist states. The authoritarian model severely restricted political subjectivity, initiative or agency on the part of its citizens. It is thus not surprising that decades of historical research on the Jews under communist regimes studied the Jews first and foremost as victims of the policies of communist states and their various institutions.

More recently, two decades of research on Jews in the Soviet Union has altered this paradigm. New historical, sociological, ethnographic and literary research has revealed various instances where forms of resistance or innovative reactions by individual Jews or Jewish institutions to “Jewish policies” of the state produced unintended effects. While much research on this topic is still required with regard to the different parts of USSR, there is even more work to be done regarding other countries of the post-1945 communist bloc. The goal of the conference is to inspire and to gather together scholars who are working on project with related questions and perspectives.

Conference organizers are inviting researchers from the field of Jewish history and culture under communism. The conference organizers welcome research covering all aspects of Jewish life, including everyday experience, culture in the wider context (literature, theater, film), autobiographies, etc. We ask all the conference participants to prepare papers related to the problems of Jewish agency, subjectivity, or Jewish contributions to the transformation of communist societies. We invite conference participants to focus their research on answering one or more of the following questions:

- Were there initiatives of Jewish individuals or institutions which enabled re-negotiation of the relationship between the state administration and the Jewish population despite the restricted legal setting imposed on the Jews and the society as the whole? Where can we find spaces of Jewish (relative) freedom under communism Should research on Jewish agency under communism include inquiries on Jewish participation in the security, intelligence or other such organs of the communist states? If yes, how should we approach this problem? What was the meaning of the Holocaust experience and of Holocaust memory for Jewish subjectivity and agency under post-1945 communist regimes?

- What are the examples and nature of mutual influences between the Jews and their wider social, political (ideology and praxis) or cultural surroundings in communist period? What were transnational/trans-border relations among Jewish communities in various communist states and with communities from the other side of the "Iron Curtain"?


- Can we identify any elements of continuity from the pre-communist epochs in Jewish activities, social and cultural patterns of behavior, or reactions toward the communist reality? What elements of Jewish tradition were still relevant in the new realities of communist rule and which were suppressed or re-negotiated?


- What is the significance of the "global turn" in contemporary historiography for research on  Jewish history under communism? How may research on Jewish agency under communism better serve the integration of Jewish history with histories of other Eastern European communities of the same period?


We invite papers related to particular communist countries; comparative research among them; and specific case studies, local histories, or biographical research.

The goal of the conference is to discuss the above-mentioned issues and to set new directions in the study of Jewish history and culture under Communism.

Please see the conference programme (Prague, 23-25 May 2017). If you want to attend, please register at stach@usd.cas.cz by 30 April 2017.

The experience of the Jews under the Communist régimes of east-central and eastern Europe has been a hotly debated topic of historiography since the 1950s. Until the 1980s, Cold War propaganda exerted a powerful influence on most interpretations presented in articles and books published on both sides of the ‘Iron Curtain’. Moreover, most works focused both on the relationship between the régime and the Jews living under it and on the role of the Jews in the Communist/Socialist movements and the political events connected with the rise of antisemitism and emigration.

The following topics are of particular importance for us:
1. The legal positions of the Jews of the Communist/Socialist countries of Europe and the institutional opportunities for the Jews there (including religious, cultural, educational, and charitable institutions).
2. The ways of preserving and developing ‘Jewishness’ under the Communist regimes, within and outside the official organizations, in private and in public.
3. Family and gender aspects of Jewish life under Communism.
4. Networks across the ‘Iron Curtain’ and across the state borders in the ‘Soviet bloc’.
5. Yiddish culture and education under the Communist régimes.

This volume provides new, groundbreaking views of Jewish life in various countries of the pro-Soviet bloc from the end of the Second World War until the collapse of Communism in late 1989. The authors, twelve leading historians and anthropologists from Europe, Israel and the United States, look at the experience of Jews under Communism by digging beyond formal state policy and instead examining the ways in which Jews creatively seized opportunities to develop and express their identities, religious and secular, even under great duress. The volume shifts the focus from Jews being objects of Communist state policy (and from anti-Jewish prejudices in Communist societies) to the agency of Jews and their creativity in Communist Europe after the Holocaust. The examination of Jewish history from a transnational vantage point challenges a dominant strand in history writing today, by showing instead the wide variety of Jewish experiences in law, traditions and institutional frameworks as conceived from one Communist country to another and even within a single country, such as Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, East Germany, and the Soviet Union. By focusing on networks across east-central Europe and beyond and on the forms of identity open to Jews in this important period, the volume begins a crucial rethinking of social and cultural life under Communist regimes.

Authors of articles in the third volume of studies prepared under the project Pogromy. Przemoc kolektywna wobec Żydów na ziemiach polskich w XIX–XX wieku i jej wpływ na relacje polsko-żydowskie. Historia. Pamięć. Tożsamość [Pogroms. Collective Violence against Jews in the Polish Lands in the 19th and 20th Centuries and its Infl uence on Polish-Jewish Relations. History, Memory, Identity] were supposed to analyse the phenomenon of pogroms and anti-Jewish violence as a problem of social and political nature. In the collection presented to the readers we find studies dealing with both, an analysis of the scientific output to date (historiography), and the so far applied methodological approaches. A particularly important component of analyses contained in the book are opinions and attitudes of the broadly understood public opinion regarding the phenomenon of collective anti-Jewish violence in the 19th and 20th centuries. Review of reactions to pogroms of Jews of such entities as the Catholic Church, state administration centres, Jewish and non-Jewish organizations, political parties, social environments and layers which we fi nd in the book, is very important.

With respect to events taking place in the territory of pre-partition Poland, chronological range encompasses the 19th century and the years of the First World War. The mid-war period obviously relates to the territory of the Second Republic of Poland. An exception is the article by Gur Alroey, who, due to research matters, exceeds the partition borders, and – naturally – articles regarding the position of British, American, Russian and French public opinion and
diplomacy concerning pogroms of Jews in Poland.

Due to the range and frequency of anti-Jewish violence in the second half of the 19th century and in the mid-war period, this problem takes most space in this volume. The outbreak of war and the related German and Soviet occupation resulted in a new social and political reality, and pogroms history relating to this period is presented in fourth volume of the series.

First volume deals with problems related to representation of pogroms in art and culture. Similarly as in the case of second volume discussing case studies, authors were granted full freedom as to defi nitions, methodology and language. Thus, besides the obvious stock of new information and analyses, readers will find in this volume the whole spectrum of theoretical positions and research stances regarding research on collective violence which occur in
contemporary humanities and social sciences.

Not all problems related to research on anti-Jewish violence and accompanying phenomena are discussed in this volume. Such issues as Catholic Church’s attitude to pogroms of Jews in the mid-war period, and Orthodox Church and Protestant Churches’ position in the 19th and 20th centuries, Jewish self-defence or economic and psychological eff ects of pogroms are not obscure but they need a more thorough research. Nevertheless, the editors hope that the presented analytical material consisting of basic research will provide not only a general outline of the history of collective anti-Jewish violence in Poland until 1939, but will also constitute a necessary and important basis for preparation of further, detailed studies allowing to understand these tragic events.

The authors of studies contained in this volume sometimes use the term “collective anti-Jewish violence” interchangeably with the term “pogrom”, since formulating a precise and clear-cut definition is difficult. So it is not accidental that the fi rst text in the book is Daniel Grinberg’s study; he deals with the history of pogrom defi nition and solutions currently operating in historiography and social sciences.

Mikołaj Winiewski’s text, in which he analyses the cases of collective violence in Poland starting from the beginning of the 19th century till 1946 – the year of Kielce pogrom, from psychological perspective, corresponds with the introductory study of Grinberg.

Further three texts – by François Guesnet, Marcos Silber and Natalia Aleksiun – are historiographic
studies. Th eir authors discuss the state of research on anti-Jewish violence in Eastern Europe, respectively, in the 19th century, during the Great War and after its end, and the way of writing about pogroms in mid-war Poland. The authors of these studies point out weaknesses of the current state of research on pogroms and they present a number of research demands, accomplishment of which will allow for flling the existing research gaps.

The next part of the book contains studies on reaction to pogroms and images thereof in particular environments, state agendas, organizations and institutions, parties and political movements. Th e editors tried to stick to chronological order in about the dozen of texts contained in this part of the book.

Collective anti-Jewish violence in Prussian sector from Poland’s partitions to the outbreak of the First World War is subject to Michael K. Schulz’s research.

The aforementioned Gur Alroey’s text on rapes and violence against women, which always accompany pogroms, slightly differs from the group of articles on opinions and reactions to anti-Jewish violence. His approach to the problem is a new and significant voice not only because of perspective close to gender studies, but also to trends related to psychology of violence, more and more frequently noticeable in this historian’s methodology.

Jekaterina Norkina deals with the image of pogroms in the Polish Kingdom in the 19th and 20th centuries presented in Russian press.

Stanisław Wiech discussed the tsar police’s attitude to the described phenomenon based on police archival materials.

Ilona Zaleska is the author of a study on reaction to pogroms of one of the most important, if not the most important
and impactful social institution in Poland, that is, the Catholic Church.

Polish, especially Warsaw intelligentsia’s attitude toward the Warsaw pogrom in 1881 is subject of Agnieszka Friedrich’s research.

In 1918 and the following years the situation in Poland became subject to the more or less insightful analyses on the state and diplomatic level, and, first of all, of hundreds of articles and press coverages perceived by certain environments – especially in Poland – almost as a propaganda war and anti-Polish hate campaign allegedly incited and supported by the Germans, Jews and Bolsheviks. This is why the editors decided to contain in the book several texts illustrating these discussions and disputes.

Reports on pogroms in the period 1918–1919 in the British press and diplomatic actions are extensively discussed by Dariusz Jeziorny, who concluded that British reactions were usually well-balanced.

Mikhail Mitsel discusses materials of American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee on acts of anti-Jewish violence committed by Polish Army in the years 1918–1919.

Przemysław Różański describes perception of pogroms and anti-Jewish violence by public opinion and government of USA, referring to the wave of pogroms of 1881.

Audrey Kichelewski turned her attention to French public opinion’s position toward pogroms of Jews in Poland in the mid-war period (1918–1939).

Marzena Szugiero deals in her work with Jewish public opinion in Poland and its attitudes toward the 19th and 20th centuries pogroms (until the end of the mid-war period).

Reactions and attitudes toward pogroms and anti-Jewish violence of two main political camps on the opposite ends of Polish spectrum, National Democracy and the broadly understood Left , are subject of the studies by Grzegorz Krzywiec, Waldemar Potkański and Michał Trębacz.  The first Krzywiec’s text deals with anti-Jewish violence until 1918, whereas the second, about such violence in mid-war period; Potkański’s article describes positions of the Left toward these events in the Polish Kingdom and in the so called Taken Away Lands at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. Trębacz analyses attitudes of leftist environments toward pogroms in mid-war period, presenting, without limitation, a nuanced picture of problematic attitude of Polish Left to Jewish Left and to the whole Jewish community in Poland.

It is not surprising that there are so many different attitudes of politically defined environments and groups of intellectual formation nature, as well as of the state and religious institutions expressing their opinions on tragic acts of anti-Jewish collective violence, which are usually called pogroms. But these articles show enormous terminological inconsistence of sources analysed by the authors. It clearly shows that neither the scenario of events nor mechanism
thereof may be a starting point for constructing a new definition of pogroms. Differences in this respect which we observe both, based on the studies contained in the first volume with case studies, and on this collection of studies turn our attention to the spectrum of political meanings, thus, generally, to social imagination system. Maybe the category of “pogrom” is not so useful in the complex description of different cases of collective anti-Jewish violence.
But it becomes more useful when we apply it to analysis of one aspect of this violence, that is, attitudes and social imagination of its perpetrators. Category of “pogrom” is not really useful to understand tragic attacks on Jews occurring in different historical contexts, but it is a useful tool when speaking about the changes in the social world of people who take part in these attacks, are witnesses thereof are aware of them.

The book is a collective study resulting from work on international research project Pogromy. Przemoc kolektywna wobec Żydów na ziemiach polskich w XIX–XX wieku i jej wpływ na relacje polsko-żydowskie. Historia. Pamięć. Tożsamość [Pogroms. Collective Violence against Jews in the Polish Lands in the 19th and 20th Centuries and its Influence on Polish-Jewish Relations. History, Memory, Identity], coordinated by the University of Warsaw in cooperation with
Hebrew and Jewish Studies Department University College London and Th e Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Centre Tel Aviv University.

This volume, one of the four published under the research project, is a collection of case studies containing an analysis of selected pogroms or other collective anti-Jewish actions. Geographically it deals with events which took place in the territory of all parts of partitioned Poland (from the beginning of the 19th century until the First World War) and in the territory of the Second Republic of Poland in the years 1918–1939. All studies are based on a thorough source research and are focused on analysis of unknown cases of collective anti-Jewish violence or
new interpretations of particular cases. Texts are lined up in chronologic order, although this arrangement was subject to minor modifications when it was advisable or necessary.

The first study describes anti-Jewish incidents in Warsaw in 1805. Małgorzata Karpińska called them “a forgotten pogrom”, because since the time when information about this act of violence appeared in tsar documentation relating to it, historians have not been interested
in it.

Michael K. Schulz dealt with perpetrators and instigators of two pogroms in Gdańsk in 1819 and 1821. His conclusions regarding anti-emancipation nature of these tragic events are a new interpretation of the phenomenon of collective violence against Jews in that period.

Aleksandra Oniszczuk presented differentiated ways of describing pogrom as a social phenomenon and a kind of politicization of narration about it using the example of Kalisz pogrom in 1878.

A new interpretation of the well-known and thoroughly analysed in scientific literature Warsaw pogrom of 1881 was proposed by Artur Markowski. Based on archival documents not used so far, the author questioned Russian inspiration of the pogrom, which was emphasized by historians in the foregoing studies on this problem.

A few months later in 1881 dramatic, not really known so far, events took place in Balbieriškis and Prienai in Lithuania, which are described by Darius Staliūnas.

Referring to events in Frysztak Marcin Soboń analyzed certain universal features of authorities’ reaction to acts of anti-Jewish violence, and describing incidents in Nowy Sącz region – a wave of pogroms and anti-Jewish riots of 1898 in Galicia.

Daniel Unowsky writes about Wieliczka in 1893, and refers in detail to religious and social conditions of the pogrom.

Describing incidents of 1900 in Chojnice Anna Magdzińska puts a question, whether it was a pogrom or just “anti-Semitic incidents”. In her interpretation the context of accusation of ritual murder is linked with pogrom; she also mentions definition problems faced by historian
dealing with this problem.

The first 20th century pogrom described in this book is incident of 1902 in Częstochowa. Artur Markowski is not only the first to describe an event rather obscure in historiography, but he also indicates what role it played in the process of shaping “research paradigm” in scientific
discussions about pogroms.

The part describing the period before the First World War ends
with Szymon Rudnicki’s article about pogrom in Siedlce in 1906.
The author uses a new, not known so far, source material and finally, like Anna Magdzińska, mentions problems with definition of this act of violence, since in Rudnicki’s opinion it is similar to certain pogroms
which took place during the Great War, particularly in its first years.

The following case studies in this volume relate to the last years of the First World War and first years of the Second Republic of Poland, when effects of war destructions, death, hunger and dislocation of millions of people included, without limitation, growth of extremely nationalist
and xenophobic moods, general tolerance of violence, and degradation of Polish-Jewish relations. Resultants of these processes were also pogroms, which took place on a large scale at the beginning of Polish independence.

Article of Konrad Zieliński deals with one of the less-known Jewish pogroms in Galicia (Mielec, November 1918), resulting from the desire to plunder Jewish property, practical impunity of these dealings, administrative chaos and provision problems.

Mielec pogrom was like a lens which focused the specifics of events taking place in the whole of Galicia, Eastern and Western, in autumn of 1918 and first months of 1919, even though premises of pogroms in
both parts of the region slightly differed (the author suggests that incidents in Western Galicia were more oft en motivated by economic issues, while “political” issues, such as alleged general support by Jews of the Ukrainians in Eastern Lesser Poland were not so important).
Polish-Ukrainian conflict, accusing Jews of supporting Bolsheviks (phantasm of “żydokomuna” [Judeocommunism]), a desire to take revenge for real and alleged cooperation of Jewish merchants and agents with Austrians and Germans exploiting Poland, economic crisis and growth of nationalism – all these premises, although to a different extent, led to pogroms in various parts of reborn Poland.

Adam Kopciowski writes about an attempt of pogrom, tragic
effects of which were averted thanks to a fi rm attitude of certain representatives of authorities and ad hoc organized, de facto informal Jewish self-defence in Lublin in April of 1919.

Jewish accounts, mainly the press ones, of pogrom in Częstochowa next month are analysed by Wiesław Paszkowski.

In September of the same year a pogrom in Łódź took place and the text by Michał Trębacz is one of the few studies regarding anti-Semitism in “Polish Manchester”. A popularized stereotype of “Judeo communism”, pro-Bolshevik sympathies and the conduct of certain groups of Jewish population during the war of 1920 and a short Bolshevik occupation
resulted in pogroms and war crimes committed, without limitation, by Polish Army.

One of such incidents is described by Alicja Gontarek, who takes into account the local specifics, reasons and effects of anti-Jewish violence in Łuków on 17–18 August 1920 and on subsequent days.

Case studies relating to the period of the Second Republic of Poland (after cessation of wars at its beginning, establishment of borders and of political system) start with Natalia Aleksiun’s study on well-known anti-Jewish riots at Stefan Batory University in Vilnius and outside of it in February 1931. The author conducted a multi-layer analysis of reasons, course and effects of Vilnius incidents, placing them in such contexts as radicalization of student political culture in the thirties or anti-Jewish violence at universities and academic centres as a radical attempt to implement slogans of a homogenous national state.

Next position in the book is Andrej Zamoiski’s analysis of pogrom in Grodno on 7 June 1935. Besides a detailed description of incidents occurring during this pogrom, it is worth mentioning that Zamoiski
breaks up – based on source foundation – with a simplified scheme explaining the majority of notorious anti-Jewish incidents and pogroms of mid-thirties. According to this scheme, any individual fight or killing a Christian by a Jew were supposed to automatically lead to charging
Jewish community with collective responsibility and using violence against it. The author does not negate the spontaneous nature of described events – accidental by-passers joining the pogrom mob – but he also points out the long activity in the city of agitators using the fact of killing Polish sailor by two young Jews at a dancing party and funeral of the murdered man to initiate a pogrom and escalate its course.

The next study is Kamil Kijek’s article describing dramatic incidents which took place in Odrzywół between 20 and 29 November 1935.
Odrzywół events were a failed attempt to initiate a pogrom; when they got out of control of its organizers, they led to dramatic fights of certain local peasants with the police. As a result of these fights twelve peasants were killed. It is worth mentioning that almost all of them were
members of the National Party.

Article by Michał Trębacz describes a pogrom which occured in Częstochowa on 19–21 June 1937. On the one hand he mentions the role of a single incident between representatives of Christian and Jewish community, which was rather typical in the thirties, but on the other he analyses another key factor of the pogrom, namely, the consistent pogrom agitprop conducted among non-Jewish population (party conferences and rallies, but also direct attacks on Jews), which led to collective violence against the whole community.

The last text in this volume was written by Zofi a Trębacz and it deals with a pogrom in Bielsko and Biała Krakowska in September 1937. Th e author described in a thorough and detailed way the event triggering off the pogrom, and escalation of tension through rumours, agitation and
calls to use violence, which led to beating the Jews and destruction of their property in both cities between 17 and 23 September. The strength of the text is also an impressive diversity of source material used by the author, in spite of extreme dispersion of documents created by administration and now available in archives.