Reviewed by:

• International Jewish Humanitarianism in the Age of the Great War by Jaclyn Granick
• Carole Fink (bio)

Jaclyn Granick's meticulous and compelling monograph is an important contribution to contemporary Jewish history and to the international history of World War I and the postwar era. Adding substantially to Zosa Szajkowski's earlier studies, Granick, drawing on her extensive archival research, not only places the overseas work led by American Jews in a very large diplomatic, political, social, and economic framework but also elucidates its challenges, accomplishments, and uniqueness.

At the center of Granick's narrative is the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC). Created in November 1914 by a union of Orthodox and Reform American Jews, the JDC by 1931 had expended more than $80 million (equivalent to well over $1 billion in today's currency) on its philanthropic work in Eastern Europe and Palestine. Deftly tracing the organization's wartime origins and activities, its postwar projects, and its ties with Jewish and non-Jewish NGOs and with US, foreign, and international officials, Granick depicts the JDC's American leadership and its US and local field workers along with its recurring deliberations and debates over its goals and priorities.

Richly illustrated with photographs, maps, and charts, the book contains a helpful table of acronyms and abbreviations and is supplemented by an impressive bibliography. Granick's introduction explains the complex national and international environment of the JDC's birth and its unprecedented initiatives "to protect, rebuild, and remake Jewish life abroad" (22). Chapter One details the challenges of dispatching aid to Jewish war sufferers in Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean before and after April 1917, which included intensive domestic fundraising, reliance on existing overseas Jewish charitable networks, and close [End Page 210] cooperation with US government officials, along with its intelligence and financial collaboration with other groups, including newly arrived Jewish immigrants in the US.

Moving on to the postwar period, Chapter 2 details the JDC's entry into international politics resulting from its ambitious and arduous campaigns to provide food relief in Poland and Ukraine. Chapter Three examines the JDC's reluctant involvement in the burgeoning refugee problem in which Jews were among the major victims, a fraught and costly undertaking complicated by its competition with rival NGOs, America's rejection of the League of Nations, and the US's sweeping immigration restrictions of 1921 and 1924 as well as by the swell of antisemitism in Europe and the US. After replacing its foreign missions with thematic divisions, the American-led and funded JDC moved from emergency relief to preserving and uplifting the lives of millions of needy Jews left abroad.

Chapters Four, Five, and Six contain richly detailed accounts of the JDC's involvement in three complex and difficult programs: expanding and sustaining medical facilities in Eastern Europe and Palestine; attempting to uplift the next Jewish generation by aiding orphaned and needy children by building technical-training institutions and creating a job-ready population; and forming the basis of financial support and economic development within targeted Jewish communities in Eastern Europe and Soviet Ukraine.

Granick demonstrates convincingly that in the 1920s the JDC, working through local communities—but also relying on US influence and non-Jewish local and state bureaucrats and NGOs—despite its mounting internal and external critics and rivals and its hesitations and setbacks created a unique model of welfare building and international development. Although the organization's decision-making apparatus and its policy shifts and turns were occasionally impenetrable, Granick largely succeeds in explaining how distant benefactors operated under often crisis situations.

This critical, wide-ranging analysis enables us to think anew about Jewish international humanitarianism during a pivotal decade and to revise our understanding of its reach and effectiveness. Granick's epilogue goes even further: although gravely shaken by the economic and political crises between 1929 and 1945, Jewish international humanitarianism has not only survived but also expanded well into the twenty-first century. And the JDC, defying its critics' charges of an elitist project, a global Jewish conspiracy, and an arm of...

审核人：

• 第一次世界大战时期的国际犹太人道主义贾克琳·格拉尼克 (Jaclyn Granick)
• 卡罗尔·芬克（生物）

贾克琳·格兰尼克 (Jaclyn Granick) 细致而引人注目的专着是对当代犹太史以及第一次世界大战和战后国际史的重要贡献。Granick 对 Zosa Szajkowski 的早期研究进行了实质性补充，利用她广泛的档案研究，不仅将美国犹太人领导的海外工作置于一个非常大的外交、政治、社会和经济框架中，而且阐明了它的挑战、成就和独特性.

格兰尼克叙述的中心是美国犹太人联合分配委员会 (JDC)。JDC 于 1914 年 11 月由东正教和改革派美国犹太人联合会创建，到 1931 年，JDC 已在东欧和巴勒斯坦的慈善工作上花费了超过 8000 万美元（相当于今天的货币超过 10 亿美元）。格兰尼克巧妙地追溯了该组织的战时起源和活动、战后项目，以及它与犹太和非犹太非政府组织以及与美国、外国和国际官员的关系，描述了 JDC 的美国领导层及其美国和当地的现场工作人员，以及它反复出现的对其目标和优先事项的审议和辩论。

这本书配有丰富的照片、地图和图表，包含一张有用的首字母缩略词和缩写表，并辅以令人印象深刻的参考书目。格兰尼克的介绍解释了 JDC 诞生的复杂国内和国际环境及其前所未有的“保护、重建和重塑海外犹太人生活”的举措 (22)。第一章详细介绍了在 1917 年 4 月前后向欧洲和东地中海地区的犹太战争受难者提供援助所面临的挑战，其中包括密集的国内筹款、对现有海外犹太慈善网络的依赖以及与美国政府官员的密切合作[End Page 210]，以及与其他团体（包括新抵达美国的犹太移民）的情报和金融合作。

转到战后时期，第 2 章详细介绍了 JDC 因在波兰和乌克兰提供粮食救济的雄心勃勃和艰巨的运动而进入国际政治。第三章审视了 JDC 不情愿地卷入日益严重的难民问题，犹太人是其中的主要受害者之一，这是一项充满挑战且代价高昂的工作，因其与竞争对手的非政府组织的竞争、美国拒绝国际联盟以及美国 1921 年全面的移民限制而变得复杂和 1924 年以及欧洲和美国反犹太主义的膨胀。在用专题部门取代其国外任务后，由美国领导和资助的 JDC 从紧急救济转向保护和改善数百万留在国外的贫困犹太人的生活。

第四、五和六章详细描述了 JDC 参与三个复杂而困难的项目：扩大和维持东欧和巴勒斯坦的医疗设施；试图通过建立技术培训机构和创造就业准备人口来帮助孤儿和有需要的儿童，从而提升下一代犹太人；并在东欧和苏联乌克兰的目标犹太社区内形成财政支持和经济发展的基础。

格兰尼克令人信服地证明，在 1920 年代，JDC 通过当地社区开展工作——但也依赖于美国的影响力和非犹太人的地方和州官僚以及非政府组织——尽管其内部和外部的批评者和竞争对手越来越多，而且它的犹豫和挫折创造了一个独特的模式福利建设和国际发展。尽管该组织的决策机构及其政策转变有时难以理解，但格兰尼克在很大程度上成功地解释了远方捐助者如何在经常发生危机的情况下运作。

这一关键的、范围广泛的分析使我们能够在关键的十年中重新思考犹太国际人道主义，并修正我们对其影响范围和有效性的理解。格兰尼克的结语更进一步：尽管受到 1929 年至 1945 年经济和政治危机的严重影响，犹太国际人道主义主义不仅幸存下来，而且还扩展到 21 世纪。而 JDC，无视其批评者对精英项目、全球犹太人阴谋和...