%0 Journal Article
%T Jewish Self-Defense and Black Hundreds in Zhitomir. A Case Study on the Pogroms of 1905 in Tsarist Russia
%A Stefan Wiese
%J Quest : Issues in Contemporary Jewish History.
%D 2012
%I Fondazione Centro di Documentazione Ebraica Contemporanea  CDEC
%X In a case study, this article re-examines three key aspects of the anti-Jewish pogroms of 1905-1906 in Tsarist Russia: the concept of ¡°Black Hundreds¡± as the major perpetrators, the question of whether state authorities approved pogrom violence, and finally, the significance of Jewish self-defence. Contemporary observers and subsequently modern scholars as well, interpreted the pogrom in the city of Zhitomir in April 1905 as a classic example of those three characteristics of the entire pogrom wave. However, a close examination suggests that the relevance of ¡°Black hundred¡± instigators has been grossly overestimated and the ambivalent behaviour of the police and military forces can largely be attributed to structural conditions of their service, such as a lack of personnel, of resources and of competence. Zhitomir¡¯s self defence unit is portrayed as a contentious generational, emotional, and political project which by its very nature as an instrument of socialist activists pursued more objectives than the mere prevention of anti-Jewish violence. Finally, misperceptions regarding the pogroms are explained by the predominance of the pogrom of Kishinev in 1903 as an interpretive template for the ensuing anti-Jewish riots. The article thus provides interpretations that may lead to a more complex picture of pogrom-style violence in the late Russian Empire.
%K Jews
%K Pogrom
%K Russia
%K Zhitomir
%K antisemitism
%K Russian Empire
%U http://www.quest-cdecjournal.it/focus.php?id=304