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This paper is a study of the demography of the contemporary post-Soviet Jewish Diaspora based on various statistical sources collected from many countries where these Jews live. It examines (post-) Soviet Jewish resettlement, and the demographic transformation of FSU Jews in the wake of the recent mass migration, especially in Israel. Based on this analysis, an update for 2010 of the number of the 'core' Jews (by self-identity) originating from the FSU by country was presented, and the total number of people belonging to the post-Soviet Jewish Diaspora worldwide and their distribution was estimated.

In the 1990s most of the second largest Jewish Diaspora population, which resided in the former Soviet Union (FSU), changed their places of residence. Whereas the majority emigrated to Israel, the rest were divided mostly between the USA and Germany. The aims of this paper are to present (post-) Soviet Jewish resettlement, and to study the demographic transformation in the course of this mass migration.

This paper is the first to compare ethnicity, religion and demographic change among Jews, Russians and Tatars in Russia proper. These three groups were chosen specifically because they represent distinctive religions, as well as greatly differing ethnic backgrounds and cultures. The demographic transition of these three very different ethnic groups was studied for a period of over one hundred years. Ample Russian demographic statistics by ethnic group provided a good basis for such analysis.

This article examines the severe age-sex imbalance and the increasing incidence of mixed marriage on the basis of the results of the 2002 Russian census. The changing marriage pattern and fertility among the Jews are discussed as reflected in the data of this census and a special processing of the birth certificates of 2002. Contemporary trends in family formation as well as the mass emigration led to changes in the “enlarged” Jewish population, and for their assessment new estimates of its size and structure are prepared.

Numerical dynamics of the Jews in Russia as a whole and in its two capital cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg, during the 20th century have been examined in this paper. In an effort to understand the long-term population decline, the dynamics of Jewish marriage, fertility and mortality were analyzed in detail. The role of the negative balance of births and deaths was compared with the influence of emigration. Special attention was paid to the post-war period as a whole, and particularly the period following the start of the recent Jewish exodus from the former Soviet Union in 1989.

This paper is based mainly on the results of the post-war Soviet censuses concerning respondents' native language and second language. The statistical data on Yiddish were studied for the former union republics of the USSR and their capitals. For Belorussia, Ukraine and the Russian Federation, the data were also studied for their different regions. In the 1994 Russian microcensus, a question on the primary language of conversation at home was asked for the first time, and the respective data concerning Yiddish in the city of Moscow and Birobidzhan ("Jewish") oblast were analyzed.

This paper was presented at the conference "Yiddish in the Contemporary World" at Oxford, 19-21 April 1998, and revised in May 2012.

This report presents first results of a new series of demographic projections of the Jewish population in the Russian Republic, the largest component of the Former Soviet Union (FSU). The projection extends over a period of 25 years, between the mid-1990s and approaching the year 2020, and portrays different scenarios reflecting the most likely developments to be expected in conformity with a variety of assumptions.