The history of the Jews in interwar Poland (1918–1939) is relatively poorly researched. This is surprising because a proper analysis of this subject is crucial to understanding the Holocaust and the Polish past after 1939. Moreover, within this large field of interwar Polish-Jewish studies, there are minor but important issues that are wholly neglected. One of them is the participation of the Jews in the urban self-government and city councils. A few studies on this topic do exist, but they are devoted to individual urban centers. The book under review presents a broader picture of the activities of Jewish local government officials in Poznań, Kraków, and Warsaw. These three major cities are taken as being representatives of three different parts of Poland, previously controlled by Germany, Austria, and Russia, and, after 1918, reunited into one independent Polish state.
Dr. Kozińska-Witt is an experienced scholar and prolific author educated in Kraków...
