Chapter Fourteen. The New Russian-Jewish Diaspora In Israel And In The West: Between Integration And Transnationalism

Abstract

The concept of transnationalism, described as an integral part of the globalization process, is becoming increasingly popular in social and political sciences. Most recent studies of transnationalism focused on the immigrants who moved from the economically disadvantaged countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America to the West, mainly the US, Canada and Western Europe. In this chapter, the author is trying to apply this concept to another stream of the late-twentieth century migrations: those from the socialist Eastern Europe to Western or Westernized countries. The chapter is an attempt at comparative analysis of diasporic and transnational trends among Russian Jews who live in the four main host countries of post-communist migrations. Israel is a country of 'ethnic return migration' whose very raison d’etre is offering shelter and a symbolic home to scattered groups of diasporic Jews. Keywords: Russian Israelis; Russian-Jewish diaspora; transnationalism