In this major reassessment of Russian labor history, Charters Wynn shows that in Imperial Russia's primary steel and mining region the same class that posed a powerful challenge to the tsarist government also undermined the revolutionary movement with its pogromist violence. From the last decades of the nineteenth century through Russia's First Revolution in 1905, the revolutionary parties succeeded in inciting the predominantly young, male "peasant-workers" of the Donbass-Dnepr Bend region to take part in general strikes, rallies, and armed confrontation with troops. However, the parties were never able to control the unrest their agitation helped unleash: Wynn provides evidence that the workers also committed devastating pogromist attacks on Jews, radical students, and artisans. Until now the prevailing image of the Russian working class has been largely based on the skilled and educated workers of St. Petersburg and Moscow. By focusing on the unskilled and semi-skilled laborers of the ethnically diverse Donbass-Dnepr Bend region, Wynn reveals the "low consciousness" that coexisted with radicalism within the Russian working class and traces its origins in the bleak and violent frontier culture of the pit villages and steel towns. Originally published in 1992. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Newly arrived in New York in 1882 from Tsarist Russia, the sixteen-year-old Bernard Weinstein discovered an America in which unionism, socialism, and anarchism were very much in the air. He found a home in the tenements of New York and for the next fifty years he devoted his life to the struggles of fellow Jewish workers. The Jewish Unions in America blends memoir and history to chronicle this time. It describes how Weinstein led countless strikes, held the unions together in the face of retaliation from the bosses, investigated sweatshops and factories with the aid of reformers, and faced down schisms by various factions, including Anarchists and Communists. He co-founded the United Hebrew Trades and wrote speeches, articles and books advancing the cause of the labor movement. From the pages of this book emerges a vivid picture of workers’ organizations at the beginning of the twentieth century and a capitalist system that bred exploitation, poverty, and inequality. Although workers’ rights have made great progress in the decades since, Weinstein’s descriptions of workers with jobs pitted against those without, and American workers against workers abroad, still carry echoes today. The Jewish Unions in America is a testament to the struggles of working people a hundred years ago. But it is also a reminder that workers must still battle to live decent lives in the free market. For the first time, Maurice Wolfthal’s readable translation makes Weinstein’s Yiddish text available to English readers. It is essential reading for students and scholars of labor history, Jewish history, and the history of American immigration.

Robert Weinberg examines the tumultuous events of the 1905 Revolution in Odessa, the fourth-largest city in the Russian Empire at the turn of the twentieth century, and explores why workers in Odessa were the driving force in the near-toppling of autocratic rule. Weinberg offers a compelling analysis of labor's militancy and politicization in 1905 and provides insights into the social dynamics of labor activism in late Imperial Russia. He pays close attention to how the intersection of national developments, local events, and the workers' daily experiences prompted Odessa workers to claim rights of citizenship, challenge authority, and assert greater control over their working lives. The book also sheds light on the notorious Jewish Question in tsarist Russia and the impact of ethnic conflict on the events of 1905. Jews constituted one-third of Odessa's population, and the bloody October pogrom that left hundreds dead reveals how ethno-religious tensions affected the labor movement and influenced the outcome of the revolution in Odessa. By demonstrating the intricate relationship among labor unrest, politics, and anti-Semitism, The Revolution of 1905 in Odessa enriches our understanding of the multifaceted dimensions of revolution in the Russian Empire.

FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD * SHORTLISTED FOR THE LIONEL GELBER PRIZE “The mass killings of Jews from 1918 to 1921 are a bridge between local pogroms and the extermination of the Holocaust. No history of that Jewish catastrophe comes close to the virtuosity of research, clarity of prose, and power of analysis of this extraordinary book. As the horror of events yields to empathetic understanding, the reader is grateful to Veidlinger for reminding us what history can do.” —Timothy Snyder, author of Bloodlands Between 1918 and 1921, over a hundred thousand Jews were murdered in Ukraine by peasants, townsmen, and soldiers who blamed the Jews for the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. In hundreds of separate incidents, ordinary people robbed their Jewish neighbors with impunity, burned down their houses, ripped apart their Torah scrolls, sexually assaulted them, and killed them. Largely forgotten today, these pogroms—ethnic riots—dominated headlines and international affairs in their time. Aid workers warned that six million Jews were in danger of complete extermination. Twenty years later, these dire predictions would come true. Drawing upon long-neglected archival materials, including thousands of newly discovered witness testimonies, trial records, and official orders, acclaimed historian Jeffrey Veidlinger shows for the first time how this wave of genocidal violence created the conditions for the Holocaust. Through stories of survivors, perpetrators, aid workers, and governmental officials, he explains how so many different groups of people came to the same conclusion: that killing Jews was an acceptable response to their various problems. In riveting prose, In the Midst of Civilized Europe repositions the pogroms as a defining moment of the twentieth century.

The first book-length analysis of how the Bolsheviks responded to antisemitism during the Russian Revolution.

The first scholarly account of massive and fateful pogrom waves, interpreted through the lens of folk culture and social psychology.