The Periphery’s Relation to the Center: Difference and Solidarity in the Political Organizing of the Bund

How should movements in the periphery organize in relation to movements in the center of empire? This paper will outline the approach to this developed by the General Jewish Workers’ Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia. From its foundation, the Bund displayed an eloquent framing of and approach to this relationship. On the one hand, they articulated a “politics of difference” – organizing in the Pale of Settlement (the area of the Russian empire where Jewish people were allowed to live) demanded diligent work in the workers’ own language (Yiddish) based on everyday concerns at work and in the community, as well as encouraging self-organization of the Yiddish-speaking workers. Simultaneously, they articulated a “politics of solidarity” – reaching out to make links and forge bonds of solidarity with non-Jewish workers and activists in the center of empire, as part of an “all-Russia” movement. The relation between difference and solidarity is something with which we grapple still, and disinterring and critically examining the contribution of the Bund might well be of interest in our own century. Methodologically, the paper is based on original translations, from Russian to English, of relevant documents from the era as well as a review of the relevant literature.