Defusing the ethnic bomb: Resolving local conflict through philanthropy in the interwar USSR

At first glance, this essay may seemabit oddly placed in a volume dedicated to a reappraisal of the forces behind, and the realities of, anti-Jewish violence in Eastern Eu rope. After all, it often seems that the history of Jewish relations with non-Jewish neighbors can be understood mainly through an interpretive prism of when, how, and why the former inevitably were targeted and victimized by the latter. Or is Jewish history better understood through the looking-glass of when, how, and why governments-be they autocratic, dictatorial, hypernationalist, fascist, or otherwise-repressed their Jews? Such questions are most common in reference to the fate of Jews in Eastern Eu rope.