Purchasing power: the economics of modern Jewish history

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Abstract (may include machine translation)

Rebecca Kobrin and Adam Teller begin the volume’s introduction with the observation that in Jewish history, economics has been somehow put to the side-lines in recent decades. This, they argue, can be at least in part attributed to the social and cultural turns in historiography. While intense research has been conducted on cultural, religious, ideological and other trends, ‘other crucial topics – most notably, the economic circumstances that formed the context for […] this wealth of intellectual, cultural, and political development’ (p. 2) have often been neglected. The editors offer an overview of scholarly assessment of the so-called Jewish question in regard to the economy, stretching well over 150 years, brilliantly contextualizing the different interpretations of Jewish economic activity in their historical and political contexts. They thereby implicitly challenge the concept of the Jews’ alleged special relationship with capitalism, explained through their position as a minority. Eventually, the antisemitic delusion, linking Jews to economic power, for a long time hovered over the field, somewhat hampering research on the topic, as many feared an antisemitic backlash. However, Kobrin and Teller argue, new research shows a ‘a very strong swing away from the kind of essentialist views that find causes of Jews’ economic choices in their religion or culture’ (p. 17), opening up the field for new, innovative research; several examples of this new approach are collected in this volume.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)823-825
Number of pages3
JournalEuropean Review of History
Volume24
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - 2017

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