Arieh Tartakower

TARTAKOWER, ARIEH (1897–1982), sociologist, demographer, and communal leader. Tartakower was born in Brody, E. Galicia. He lectured on the sociology of the Jews at the Institute of Jewish Sciences in Warsaw. Tartakower was founder and chairman of Hitaḥadut, the Labor Zionist organization in Poland, and also served as an alderman of the city of Lodz during 1938–39. He was a member of the World Zionist Actions Committee from 1927. Emigrating to the United States in 1939, he served as director of relief and rehabilitation of the *World Jewish Congress and deputy director of its Institute of Jewish Affairs. Tartakower settled in Palestine in 1946 and lectured on Jewish sociology at the Hebrew University. From 1948 until 1971 he was chairman of the Israel section of the World Jewish Congress, and from 1959, of the executive committee of the World Hebrew Confederation. In 1971, he headed the World Jewish Congress' Cultural Department. He was a founding member and president of the Israel Association for the United Nations. He was one of a small group of scholars, including A. *Ruppin and J. *Lestschinsky, who developed the study of Jewish sociology. Tartakower wrote many books in Hebrew, Yiddish, Polish, and English and frequently contributed to periodicals in different languages.

Among his main works are Toledot Tenu'at ha-Avodah ha-Yehudit, 3 vols. (1929–31), Nedudei ha-Yehudim ba-Olam (1947²), Ha-Adam ha-Noded (1954), Ha-Ḥevrah ha-Yehudit (1957), Ha-Ḥevrah ha-Yisre'elit (1959), In Search of Home and Freedom (1958), Ha-Hityashevut ha-Yehudit ba-Golah (1959), Am ve-Olamo (1963), and his survey of contemporary Jewish communities Shivtei Yisrael, 3 vols. (1963–69).

Sources: Encyclopaedia Judaica. © 2007 The Gale Group. All Rights Reserved.