David Wolffsohn. Aufsteiger, Grenzgänger, Mediator

Eine biographische Annäherung an die Geschichte der frühen Zionistischen Organisation (1897–1914)
1. Auflage 2013
ISBN: 978-3-525-57028-9
Verlag: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Buch, Deutsch, Band Band 017, 384 Seiten, Format (B × H): 160 mm x 237 mm, Gewicht: 763 g

Reihe: Jüdische Religion, Geschichte und Kultur (JRGK)

David Wolffsohn (1850s – 1914) was the closest assistant to Theodor Herzl and became his successor in the presidency of the World Zionist Organization in 1905. Using him as an example, this study shows how the World Zionist Organization, an internally quarelled, financially and politically uninfluential, loose affiliation in its modest beginnings finally succeeded in acting historically powerful.The study does not present a classical type of biography but an entangled history of a person and an institution, for which Meybohm chose the term 'integrated biography'. By combining the methodological approaches of the new cultural history, social-, political and economic history, person as well as institution will be thoroughly analyzed. The multiperspectivity also covers Wolffsohns network, which includes his colleagues, supporters and opponents. It contextualizes the Zionist organization with other contemporaneous national movements as well as international emancipation movements, such as social democracy or the international women’s movement.Besides domestic and foreign politics, especially the Zionist commercial politics will be analyzed for it is as uninvestigated by recent scholarship as the life and work of Wolffsohn himself.The results of this integrated biography challenge earlier scholarship of Zionism which mostly presents a teleological reading of Zionist history based on the successful founding of the state of Israel in 1948. In contrast to this, using the example of Wolffsohn’s biography, it is possible to show, that the long range success of this extraordinary project could not be forseen in the beginning.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Meybohm, Ivonne

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Jüdische Studien Geschichte des Judentums Geschichte des Judentums: Moderne & Gegenwart
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte des Judentums (Diaspora)
• Geisteswissenschaften Jüdische Studien Geschichte des Judentums Geschichte des Judentums außerhalb Israels/Palästinas

Über Autor(innen)

Meybohm, Ivonne
Ivonne Meybohm arbeitet als Projektkoordinatorin der Online-Enzyklopädie zum Ersten Weltkrieg 1914-1918-online an der FU Berlin.

Dr. phil. Ivonne Meybohm studierte Geschichtswissenschaften und Neuere deutsche Literatur an der Freien Universität Berlin. Sie arbeitet als wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin an der Forschungsstelle für Zeitgeschichte der Universität Hamburg.