Accommodating national minorities in Lithuania: the case of Jewish autonomy, 1918-1925

ENThe problem of national minorities in nation states is still as important today as in the past. Because of this significance the history of the social experiments in Eastern Europe after the First World War is still a subject with clear contemporary relevance. An unprecedented social experiment, aimed at accommodating Lithuanian Jewry in a framework of national personal autonomy, occurred between 1918-1926. Lithuania became the only country where the concept of Jewish National Personal Autonomy was, though incompletely, implemented after the First World War. Jewish Autonomy became the main principle in the State's politics towards its Jewish minority and evolved significantly in the period when it was maintained. This dissertation explores the intellectual origins and the political history of Jewish Autonomy in Lithuania between 1918-1926, its genesis, institutionalization, and decline. The situation of the Jews will be discussed in the context of the policy towards other minorities, above all, the Belorussians and Germans, who attempted to institutionalize their status in the newly born State and whose position had a certain resemblance to the Jewish situation. Attention is paid to Jewish-Lithuanian relations and cooperation before 1918, to the resurfacing of the seemingly forgotten issue of autonomy, and to the dilemmas inherent in its functioning in 1939-40 after Vilnius's incorporation into Lithuania.This work will add a new dimension to the historiography on Jewish and Lithuanian history. It will provide a useful comparative study on the accommodation of different interests in a nationally heterogeneous society. It will also provoke discussion of urgent problems related to nationalism and modern attempts to accommodate and protect national minorities. The dissertation will help us to understand better inter-war politics in Lithuania, the complex relations between political right and left which have echoes in all countries of East Europe. This dissertation will become a modest contribution to the reconciliation of the "galut optimists" and "galut pessimists" by drawing insights about the different aspects and complexity of Jewish political life in the murky waters of the Lithuanian republic.