Abstract: Public concern about antisemitism has increased globally in the twenty-first century, sparking renewed interest from social scientists. However, the crucial question of why trajectories of antisemitic hostility differ between countries remains unanswered due to a lack of studies designed to track temporal and cross-national variation. Addressing this gap, I evaluate the explanatory power of two main lines of argument that divide the literature: generalist and particularist. While generalists see antisemitism as a manifestation of general outgroup hostility common to various forms of prejudice, particularists stress the contextual specificity of antisemitism and posit that its twenty-first-century expressions are distinctively linked to anti-Zionist sentiment (enmity toward Israel and its supporters). I derive observable implications from these positions and conduct a comparative, longitudinal case study of antisemitic hostility in Germany, Sweden, and Russia (1990–2020), using a mixed-methods approach to integrate incident counts, victimization surveys, media analysis, and expert interviews. Findings match predictions from the particularist position, with flare-ups in the Israel–Palestine conflict generating or catalyzing antisemitic hostility depending on the strength of local anti-Zionist sentiment, thus demonstrating the centrality of the “Israel factor” in contemporary antisemitism.
Abstract: What drives antisemitic hostility in the 21st century? Competing theoretical frameworks provide different answers: the generalist framework views antisemitism as a manifestation of general outgroup hostility common to various
forms of prejudice, while the particularist framework posits that antisemitism today is distinctively linked to antizionist sentiment—enmity toward Zionism, Israel, and its supporters. This study evaluates these frameworks through a comparative, longitudinal case study of antisemitic hostility in Germany, Sweden, and Russia (1990–2020), using a mixed-methods approach to integrate incident counts, victimization surveys, media analysis, and expert interviews. Findings suggest that the particularist framework better explains observed patterns of variation in antisemitic hostility, with flare-ups in the Middle East conflict generating or catalyzing antisemitic hostility in other societies depending on the strength of local antizionist sentiment. The results support new directions
in prejudice research that differentiate between generalized and group-specific forms of hostility, where the latter are highly context-dependent.
Abstract: Rising antisemitism in the twenty-first century has alarmed Jewish communities and the general public, but antisemitic hate crime victimization remains understudied outside the US context. This study primarily relies on a comprehensive survey of 16,400 Jews across twelve European countries, supplemented with data from additional sources, to assess individual and country-level predictors of Jews’ experiences and fears of antisemitic harassment and violence. Multilevel models indicate that young age, perceived discrimination, identity visibility, and identification with Israel are pronounced individual risk factors for victimization. On the country level, negative opinion of Israel and Muslim population share predict victimization, highlighting the role of a “new” or Israel-derived antisemitism in the twenty-first century. The factors most strongly associated with fear are young age, previous victimization, perceptions of an ambient antisemitic threat, and recent occurrence of fatal antisemitic violence. Overall, the findings underscore the importance of integrating general theory on hate crime and victimization with context-specific factors when seeking to understand the experiences of targeted groups.
Abstract: Existing scholarship on contemporary antisemitism tends to sacrifice breadth for depth, typically focusing on a specific dimension of the phenomenon or a single national or ideological context. This myopia threatens to limit our understanding of current antisemitism because separate parts of a complex picture are studied in isolation, and because crucial questions about temporal and cross-national variation remain understudied. To help remedy this situation, this article introduces a more comprehensive conceptual and empirical framework along with a new dataset intended to encourage the study of antisemitism as a multidimensional, cross-national, and dynamic phenomenon. The framework provides a model for studying antisemitism in four core dimensions—attitudes, incidents, cultural imagery, and Jews’ exposure—and specifies relevant variables and indicators, thus facilitating future research and data collection efforts. To supplement the framework, the article introduces a new dataset (DIMA—Dimensions of Antisemitism) featuring publicly available data covering three of the four dimensions: attitudes, incidents, and exposure. Based on patterns emerging from these data, hypotheses for further study are suggested. These contributions are intended to prepare the ground for a new and theoretically more ambitious research agenda in the field of contemporary antisemitism research.
Abstract: Quelle est la fréquence des actes antisémites violents dans l’Europe d’aujourd’hui et quelles sont les tendances observables ? Dans quelle mesure les membres de la communauté juive sont-ils exposés dans les différents pays ? Qui sont les auteurs de ces crimes ?
Il est évidemment impératif de pouvoir répondre à ces questions aussi précisément que possible si l’on veut combattre efficacement l’antisémitisme, et en particulier l’antisémitisme violent.
Le travail présenté dans cette note tente d’établir une première comparaison des niveaux de violence antisémite dans différents pays en combinant les données relatives aux incidents fondées sur les rapports de police avec les résultats d’une enquête sur l’antisémitisme réalisée en 2012 par l’Agence des droits fondamentaux de l’Union européenne (FRA). Un échantillon de sept pays (Allemagne, Danemark, France, Royaume-Uni, Norvège, Suède et Russie) permet d’esquisser des analyses mais c’est surtout sur la base des données de quatre pays du panel (France, Royaume-Uni, Allemagne et Suède) que l’étude comparative a été rendue possible. C’est en France que l’exposition des Juifs à la violence antisémite semble la plus forte.
Concernant les auteurs d’actes antisémites violents, les données disponibles montrent, en Europe de l’Ouest, la prédominance de personnes de culture musulmane, alors qu’en Russie le profil qui prévaut est celui de militants d’extrême droite.
Les résultats présentés ici constituent une première contribution à une évaluation rigoureuse de l’antisémitisme violent dans les pays européens. Ce travail appelle à la construction d’indicateurs communs. La définition d’une mesure précise de l’antisémitisme est l’outil indispensable d’une lutte efficace contre ce redoutable préjugé, capable d’engendrer des comportements violents, y compris meurtriers.
Abstract: Hvor ofte forekommer antisemittiske voldshendelser i dagens Europa, og hvilken vei går utviklingen?
Hvor utsatt er de jødiske befolkningene i ulike land? Og hvem står bak ugjerningene? Effektiv forebygging
og bekjempelse er avhengig av at slike spørsmål besvares så presist som mulig, men vi mangler den
nødvendige kunnskapen ettersom svært lite forskning er gjort på feltet. Denne rapporten presenterer noen
tentative funn om voldelig antisemittisme i et utvalg europeiske land og foreslår retninger for videre
forskning.
Ved å bruke hendelsestall basert på anmeldelser i kombinasjon med EUs Fundamental Rights Agency
(FRA) sin spørreundersøkelse om antisemittisme fra 2012, er det mulig å foreta en begrenset og tentativ
sammenlikning av det antisemittiske voldsnivået på tvers av land. I denne rapportens utvalg foreligger
sammenliknbare data kun for Frankrike, Storbritannia, Tyskland og Sverige. Jøders utsatthet for
antisemittisk vold synes å være høyest i Frankrike, mindre i Sverige og Tyskland, og lavest i Storbritannia.
Tall for Norge, Danmark og Russland er ikke sammenliknbare på grunn av mangelfulle data. Vi har
telt 10 hendelser i Norge, 20 i Danmark og 33 i Russland for perioden 2005-2015. Nivået i Russland er
tilsynelatende svært lavt i forhold til vesteuropeiske land og gitt Russlands relativt store jødiske minoritet.
Russland er også det eneste landet der vi ikke har funnet indikasjoner på at jøder unngår å vise sin identitet
offentlig.
Tilgjengelige data tyder på at personer med bakgrunn fra muslimske land skiller seg ut blant dem som
begår antisemittiske voldshandlinger i Vest-Europa, men ikke i Russland, der høyreekstreme aktører
dominerer. Holdningsundersøkelser bygger opp under dette bildet for så vidt som antisemittiske
holdninger er betydelig mer utbredt blant muslimer enn befolkningen generelt i vesteuropeiske land.
Denne rapportens funn er tentative og ment som et oppspill til videre forskning. Bedre data og flere
systematiske studier er nødvendig for å danne et mer presist bilde av fenomenet og dets årsaker, hvilket
igjen er en forutsetning for å kunne bestemme relevante mottiltak.
