Union of Jewish Women
Influenced by their American counterparts, Anglo-Jewish women organized a Conference of Jewish Women in 1902. This conference led directly to the foundation of a national organization, the Union of Jewish Women. The UJW determined the social service agenda for English Jewish women until World War I. Its success was rooted in following the precedents set by Jewish women’s social service organizations abroad and gentile women’s activism in Britain, and adapting them for the specific needs of the Anglo-Jewish community. The UJW adopted the ostensibly scientific methods of social service promoted by the late Victorian “scientific philanthropy” movement. Its professional staff trained upper- and middle-class Anglo-Jewish women as volunteers for a range of educational and philanthropic organizations, serving as a direct link between charitable institutions and women who needed help.
Formation of the Union of Jewish Women
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Leadership
The well-connected leadership of the UJW took care to leverage its social power as it initially vied for publicity and new members. Leaders included Julia Cohen, whose husband’s family was heavily involved in London’s Jewish Board of Guardians, and several Rothschilds and other prominent Anglo-Jewish women. The leadership also reflected the UJW’s link to the secular movement for women’s rights that was then sweeping Western Europe and America. The chair of the International Council of Women (ICW) joined the Executive Committee, initiating the process that eventually led the ICW to join the international women’s movement, drawing the UJW closer to the broader women’s movement simultaneously. The ICW was the umbrella organization for women’s social service organizations around the world and its leader’s presence on the UJW’s Executive Committee publicly identified that organization as part of the international women’s movement.
Indeed, the Union declared itself to be an “all-embracing sisterhood,” forming a “bond between Jewish women of all degrees and all shades of opinion, religious, social and intellectual.” That said, the UJW before World War I was composed primarily of upper-class women who came in contact with the working class only when providing charitable services.
Strategy
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Expansion and Affiliations
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Addressing Inequality in Jewish Religious and Communal Life
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Gibbon, Monk. Netta. London: Routledge and Keegan Paul, 1960
Kuzmack, Linda Gordon. Woman’s Cause: Jewish Woman’s Movement in England and the United States, 1881–1933. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University press, 1990.
Lipman, V. D. Social History of the Jews in England, 1850–1950. London: Watts, 1954
London Jewish Chronicle (1902–1933).
London Jewish Guardian (1921–1926).
The Jewish World (London), (1890-1934).
Union of Jewish Women. Leaflet. London: 1914.
Union of Jewish Women. Reports 1902–1933. London: 1933.
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