The ‘Patriotic Left’ and the ‘Jewish Question’ at the Dawn of the Second Republic

Abstract

This chapter examines the stance of the Polish ‘patriotic left’ towards the ‘Jewish question’ in the formative years of the Second Republic. The term ‘patriotic left’ (lewica niepodległościowa, literally ‘pro-independence left’) is generally used to describe the progressive wing of the Polish national movement. During the period under discussion, the patriotic left was composed of socialist and peasant parties, unaffiliated radicals and progressives, army officers, and former revolutionaries, the vast majority of whom acknowledged the leadership of Marshal Józef Piłsudski. The chapter aims to sketch the rough outlines of Polish progressive thought regarding the place of the Jews in the imagined community of the Polish nation, with special emphasis on the followers of Piłsudski, who would later play the leading role in Polish politics. It also examines the implications of these empirical findings for understanding Polish–Jewish relations in the interwar period and the scope and limits of so-called ‘civic nationalism’, both in Poland and more generally.