Is
antisemitism on the rise in Poland today? Does having antisemitic beliefs
influence behavior? How should we
prepare young people?
As we have
studied at Facing History & Ourselves, antisemitism is a trend which will
rise and fall depending on the social, cultural, and political context of the
time. Michal Beliwicz led an incredibly dynamic session for us today on this
very subject. Michal is a young Professor at the University of Warsaw and as a
social scientist he captures survey data on trends and changing attitudes on antisemitism,
prejudices and racism in Poland today.
Michal
shared the results of a soon to be published survey monitoring contemporary antisemitism trends in
Poland. His survey reveals that the two periods,
since 1975, to have seen a rise in antisemitic attitudes and acts of violence were both associated with moments when the
country was under economic pressure.
These were in the early nineties as Poland was transitioning to a market
economy, and the second period was around 2001 where there was a global
economic slowdown because of the events of 9/11 attacks in the United.
His team also divided their survey instrument
to measure three areas: the first considered ideas associated with traditional
antisemitism, the second area monitored ideas associated with secondary antisemitism, and the third area
measure notions of antisemitic conspiracies. The survey results show an
increasing trend of people believing in conspiracy ideas that Jews hold secret
plans to dominate the world and the global economic order, or the idea that
jews are conspiring to control the world.
Michal is
also interested in identifying the sources contributing to antisemitim in Poland today, and the survey indicates
that more people report hearing antisemitic ideas and language through family
and friends and from the internet. This confirms for him the importance of
devising non-formal educational means to reach young people in Poland. This
means that increasingly young poles are learning hateful messages not in school
and not in church but rather in the intimate setting of family or the
impersonal online environment.
He is also
the founder and vice-president of The Forum For Dialogue which is an NGO
working with teachers and students in schools to help them discover the
history, or “blank spots” on the map of
their communities of the no longer existing Jewish community. I was struck that he viewed this work as
being heavily influenced by the Facing History model and he believes that this
is a form of civic preparation for a future Poland which he believes will need
to be democratic, tolerant and increasingly non-homogeneous.
It is interesting to see someone actually trying to parse sources of prejudice. Even better, his work addresses what forms of prejudice are the most potent animators of action. It was interesting that conspiracy theory was the most pernicious form of prejudice i.e. most likely to be linked to taking action. This made sense to me since conspiracies are threatening and it makes sense to address threats.
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