Abstract: Статья посвящена трансформации, которую претерпел обычай «ѓахнасат кала» в современной российской еврейской общине. Заповедь «ѓахнасат кала» была впервые упомянута в талмудической литературе как
предписание увеселять жениха и невесту, однако позже, в XVII–XVIII вв., в Ашкеназе получила новое содержание: община должна была собирать на приданое бедным невестам, с тем чтобы они могли выйти замуж, – тем самым нищие девушки удерживались от социальной маргинализации или крещения. В современной российской еврейской общине (и, как выяснилось впоследствии, среди русскоязычных ультрарелигиозных евреев Израиля) это название стало употребляться по отношению к совершенно новой практике – сбору денег на организацию свадебной церемонии для жениха и невесты, уже выбравших друг друга, а нередко живших в гражданском браке и пришедших к иудаизму. В отличие от традиционной ситуации, когда стоимость свадебных расходов покрывается взносами гостей, в данном случае спонсорами свадьбы становятся пользователи интернета, сочувствующие данной паре, а бенефициарами – члены общины с высоким статусом. Таким образом, организация дорогой свадебной церемонии становится
для будущих супругов своего рода подтверждением их статуса в общине. Подробно анализируется один такой случай, произошедший в общине Московской хоральной синагоги в 2019 г. Делаются выводы о структуре общины, о ее экономике и роли краудфандинга в современной российской еврейской ортодоксии.
Abstract: Since the COVID-19 pandemic first began, the JPR research team has focused its efforts on trying to understand how it is affecting Jewish life in the UK and around the world, and has generated a series of reports sharing our insights as they evolve. In this research and policy briefing, we draw together the findings from much of the work that has been done, and consider their implications for the future of Jewish communal life.
The report touches on multiple themes, including the economic needs of disadvantaged households, how best to maintain the Jewish charitable sector, the importance of supporting local synagogue communities and Jewish schools, how to address the potential harmful effects of the pandemic on the community’s informal educational infrastructure, health measures that should be considered to help protect lives, intracommunal relations, and issues around the use of technology to help support and bolster Jewish life.
In addition, it considers how the pandemic has impacted data collection work, for good and for bad, and makes important recommendations about the research that needs to be undertaken to support Jewish life going forward.
As well as making specific recommendations, the paper is designed to be a trigger for discussion among community leaders, philanthropists and members, and we welcome feedback from readers.
Abstract: Once one of the most numerous and prosperous minorities in Yugoslavia, the number of Jews declined from over 80,000 to 15,000 in the years aer WW2. is number further decreased due to migration to Israel in the first post-war years, and further impoverishment took place because of confiscation and restitution of the majority of private and communal Jewish property, and enforced renouncing of Yugoslav citizenship. e first multi-party elections in Yugoslavia brought to power nationalist elements in all republics, which was followed by civil war, and the breaking of socialist Yugoslavia. Jews of Yugoslavia found themselves on different warring sides. Fragmentation on all confronted sides made the Jewish community even more vulnerable. A huge majority of former Warsaw Pact members aer the Berlin wall fell passed laws for restitution of property taken by the state in post WW2 period. Jews of Yugoslavia, in several new states, had promises from state offi cials that their property would be restituted and errors made half a century ago would be rectified. e only case where such a promise came true was Serbia. In 2011 Serbia passed General Restitution Law concerning individuals, therefore also Jews. In 2006 Serbia passed Law on property of the religious communities that also included Jewish community and that helped restitution of the Jewish communal property. e state of Serbia is the only state in the region that passed the Jewish Lex Specialis that concerns on Jewish property with no successor but also unclaimed Jewish property in February 2016. Croatia passed a General Restitution Law in 1996, and amended it in 2002, but it only affects property nationalized aer May 1945. at Law is limited to direct successors who are Croatian citizens or citizens of countries which have bilateral agreements with Croatia. Due to very high taxes, in some cases reaching 25% of property value, a lot of Jewish requests remained unsolved. Bosnia and Herzegovina is one of the rare European countries that did not pass such a law. Moreover, the BIH constitution declares three constituent nations: Serbs, Croats and Bosnians, while others as minorities cannot be nominated for state positions, according to chapters IV and V of the BIH constitution (Sejdić and Finci v. Bosnia and Herzegovina). is paper aims to give insight into the economic power of Jews just before the breakdown of Yugoslavia, and the current economic situation of Jewish communities in Serbia, Croatia and BIH, with a special emphasis on their economic, legal and social position in the last two decades. is restitution issue is very important for it shows how much goodwill states have for helping their local Jewish communities. e research material is obtained from local Jewish communities, periodicals, reports, interviews, conferences, scientific journals and statistical data of all three states and various Jewish organization. Facing the past, admitting and rectifying remain open issues in those countries, and they are excellent indicators of the progress achieved in the last 25 years.
Abstract: Jewish charities are a subgroup of about two thousand, five hundred organizations, accounting for 1.5% of the total number of main charities in England and Wales. The increasing total income of general charities has prompted considerable debate about the perceived concentration of income and the perceived dominance of bigger charities over smaller ones. Meanwhile, the implications of competition for charitable behavior have remained underappreciated. Building on these assumptions and aiming to test how far the results of research carried out in the charitable sector in general apply to the Jewish charitable sector in particular, the research investigates the trends in concentration of income of a sample of 1301 Jewish charities operating between 1995 and 2015, using common measures of concentration to describe the competitiveness of the Jewish charitable sector in England and Wales. The findings suggest that the sector, in line with the wider UK charitable sector, experienced high levels of growth in terms of both aggregate total income and the number of charities operating, along with decreasing levels of income concentration. These findings allow one to hypothesize that, other things being constant, the increasing numbers of entrant charities may well have increased the size distribution of charities providing the same products or services, therefore exacerbating the competition for charitable funding in the Jewish charitable sector. This, in turn, on the one hand is likely to have exacerbated the competition for donations especially among charities pursuing similar causes, reducing the total amount of charitable money devoted to particular causes. On the other hand, the increasing numbers of charities providing the same products or services and the resultant increasing competition for funding may have impacted on the costs and efforts Jewish charities were able to divert to fundraising at the expense of resources that could be devoted, instead, to service provision.
Abstract: This report looks at how faith organisations have been responding to the impact of the financial crisis and the politics of austerity. It is based on a scoping survey of the work of 90 faith organisations and 13 case studies of faith-based initiatives, conducted by a research team based in the Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. This study builds on a core area of the Centre’s work which focuses on the role of, particularly minority, religions in public life. The project is hosted by the Centre’s online forum on religion and policy, Public Spirit. It is funded by the Barrow Cadbury Trust as part of an ongoing interest in promoting economic justice.
The role and impact of faith organisations in providing welfare services, and particularly in the context of economic recession and welfare reform, are well recognised. It is important to acknowledge that faith organisations are not only plugging gaps in social or financial provision left by the market and state, but also bring critical perspectives to questions of socially just economic organisation. Across different religious traditions, faith organisations are also mobilising values, people and resources to develop and innovate alternative approaches to market-based finance and credit. This report focuses on the role of faith organisations in:
1) assisting those experiencing financial hardship;
2) engaging in activism on and campaigning for the reform of financial products and services;
3) advocating or providing alternatives to market-based finance.
We explore how faith organisations, particularly from minority religious groups, view the effects of the financial crisis and austerity on faith communities and neighbourhoods and the ways in which they are responding to these issues. We examine the ways in which they assist those experiencing financial hardship, the issues on which they campaign, and the alternatives to market based finance they are helping to develop or advocate. We look at how and with whom they collaborate, and the values, models and practices that underpin their work.
[Includes Jewish case studies]
Abstract: This study is based on data from JPR's National Jewish Community Survey, investigates some of the key factors influencing Jewish charitable giving, and identifies some of the key challenges for the sector going forward.
Charitable giving among Britain's Jews: Looking to the future, written by JPR researchers, Dr. David Graham and Dr. Jonathan Boyd, begins by noting just how charitable Jews are: 93% of Jews make at least one charitable donation per annum, a considerably higher proportion than that found in wider society.
The report explores some of the reasons why this might be the case, and specifically what factors influence giving among Jews. In particular, it investigates the extent to which age, religiosity, level of communal engagement, wealth and degree of generosity play a part in giving outcomes.
It goes on to look at all of these factors in the wider context of some of the trends going on in the British Jewish population – secularisation, on the one hand, and the growth of the strictly Orthodox sector of the other – and focuses on the important role the babyboomer generation will play in the long-term future of the British Jewish charitable sector.
Abstract: Ce travail s'inscrit au croisement des sciences economiques et des sciences sociales. Il part d'un constat economique, celui de l'extraordinaire croissance, dans les annees 70 a 80, d'un marche, qui vingt ans auparavant n'etait qu'embryonnaire : le marche des produits cacher. Il presente les enjeux d'une telle vigueur : enjeux religieux, symboliques et identitaires d'une part, enjeux economiques et de pouvoir d'autre part. L'etude des pratiques alimentaires juives en modernite, en tant que "fait social total", permet de saisir l'organisation materielle d'une consommation symbolique. L'alimentation, parce que symboliquement centrale en tant que pratique sociale, est un angle d'approche ideal pour une sociologie religieuse du judaisme. Les observations conduite dans le domaine de la cacheront informent sur les juifs de france en dehors de ce seul domaine, mais aussi sur la place de l'alimentation dans toute societe humaine. Cette these s'articule sur deux axes : d'une part croire-pratiques-identites et d'autre part economie-institutions-pouvoir. Les consommateurs, effectifs ou potentiels, dans leur pratiques et leurs representations, etablissent un certain rapport aux textes prescriptifs, face a cela, les acteurs economiques et institutionnels, agissent selon des normes de la tradition, mais aussi selon des logiques propres, logiques de survie financiere et de pouvoir. Ces imbrications se mettent en place pour produire une configuration particuliere nommee economie du croire. Ce concept rend compte de la facon dont deux rationalites, l'une religieuse, l'autre economique, se font face, tantot s'affrontant, tantot se renforcant l'une l'autre. Si l'ethique juive prone un equilibre ideal entre les interets economiques et la necessite d'une solidarite collective, assuree par la centralite accordee au don, qu'en est-il dans les faits ? n'y a-t-il pas une tentation du veau d'or, c'est a dire une inversion entre les fins et les moyens, entre l'ethique et la technique, entre l'objet et le sens ?
Abstract: During wars, Jewish communities often become scapegoats and victims of the combatants. In the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina in the early 1990s, the opposite happened. The Jewish community in the country’s capital Sarajevo extended humanitarian services indiscriminately to people of all religions and was respected by the three warring parties, Muslims, Orthodox Serbs, and Roman Catholic Croats.
Support from the American Joint Distribution Committee and other foreign groups enabled the Jewish community to provide free food, medicine, as well as radio and mail services.
During the battle for Sarajevo the Jewish community evacuated a thousand Jews and two thousand non-Jews in eleven convoys and planes.
At present, six Jewish communities remain in Bosnia-Herzegovina with a total of a thousand members. Of these seven hundred are in Sarajevo and the remainder in Mostar, Zenica, Tuzla, Banja Luka, and Doboj.
Abstract: This paper is based on current research which is concerned with the revival of religious and ethnic identity among Jews in Hungary after the collapse of communism. Several non-governmental institutions, groups and individuals from various countries, but especially Israel, the UK and the USA, are involved in the revitalization and transformation of Jewish life in the areas of education, ethnicity, religion and social welfare. I examine the complex relationship between emigre donors, often from an Hungarian background, and local Hungarian Jews, to show how cultural aid is accepted, transformed and sometimes resisted. Such aid is not uni-directional from donor to recipient. Rather, it may require the donors to modify their goals; to realize that their assessment of Hungarian needs may be based on anachronistic attitudes. The impact of the recipients on the donors is such that reciprocal change occurs between the two parties.
Abstract: This landmark survey of the Jewish population in London and south-east England, conducted in 2002 and based on 2,965 completed questionnaires, was, at the time, the largest ever study of Jews in Britain. It covers a wide range of topics: housing, lifestyle, health and illness, communication and leisure, participation in Jewish cultural activities, charitable giving, voluntary work, education and schooling, and care for older people and the infirm. Written by leading experts in contemporary Jewry working in partnership with senior researchers at the National Centre for Social Research, it has provided planners and decision-makers across the Jewish voluntary sector with essential data to support their efforts.
Abstract: The financial resources of the UK Jewish voluntary sector is the first publication to report the findings of JPR's research programme, Long-term Planning for British Jewry.
Building on the Jewish Community Information database of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, JPR compiled a comprehensive database of organizations across the community to act as the foundation for all the organizational aspects of the Long-term Planning project. It emerged that the UK Jewish voluntary sector comprises just under 2,000 financially independent organizations. In order for the community to maintain this number of organizations, the income of the Jewish voluntary sector from all its funding streams has to be substantial. These financial resources, however, have never been systematically addressed.
JPR commissioned an international expert in the voluntary sector, Professor Peter Halfpenny, Director of the Centre for Applied Social Research at the University of Manchester, to carry out this complex accountancy project. Its objectives were to provide a multi-dimensional analysis of the income and expenditure of the Jewish voluntary sector from all its funding streams and to make comparisons with similar data about the UK voluntary sector as a whole.
This report establishes the parameters of the financial resources currently available within the Jewish voluntary sector. It demonstrates that the sector has a significant and complex economy. Moreover, British Jews invest proportionately more in these voluntary organizations than does the UK population as a whole.
Abstract: Jewish leaders, policy-makers, academics, researchers and communal leaders attended the historic three-day conference on 'Planning for the Future of European Jewry'. Over 200 delegates came from over 25 countries. Delegates from Eastern and Western Europe were joined by leading members of the American Jewish Committee and academics from the US and Israel. The conference was held from 2 to 5 July 2995 at the Hotel Forum in Prague. It was co-chaired by Professor Dominique Moisi from France and Lord Weidenfeld from the UK. The aims of the conference were to share existing ideas, proposals and policy options, and, to generate new ones, with the aim of providing those working for a viable Jewish future in Europe with the tools to achieve it, to develop a culture of strategic policy planning so that change can be managed as systematically as possible, to set up a dialogue between researchers and decision-makers with the aim of coordinating their work, to provide an opportunity to inform others about European Jewish problems.
