America's Jews: Highly Fragmented, Insufficiently Disputatious

Publication Date: January 2003

Publisher:

Author(s): Jack Wertheimer

Research Area: Culture and religion; Social conditions

Keywords: American Jews; Political behavior

Type: Report

Coverage: United States

Abstract:

As for the institutions of the Jewish community - the subject of this essay - organizations that speak for the Jews rarely engage in serious debate with one another. To some extent this absence of sustain debate is inertial: during the middle decades of the 20th century the Jewish community had achieved such widely agreement on key issues that it continues to act as if the earlier consensus is still strong. But on a deeper level many communal leaders fear debate, and they strive instead to paper over differences rather to bring genuine disagreement into the open.