This workshop brings together historians and social scientists to examine a single core problem: how pre-war socioeconomic structures interacted with discrimination and wartime institutions of violence to shape exposure to persecution and survival strategies, the appropriation and redistribution of Jewish property, and postwar social stratification, mobility, and urban change.
A menorah from the Museum of the History of Polish Jews collection
Accepted submissions (listed in alphabetical order):
- Wealth and property distribution in interwar central Poland. Jewish and Christian population in Końskie County (Szymon Antosik, Adam Mickiewicz University);
- SS-WVHA and its function as a hybrid economic–genocidal institution (Ethan Cordes, University of Wellington);
- Jewish Return and Property Restitution in post-Jewish towns in Lublin region in Poland – social networks, their key social actors, and crucial social relations (Marta Duch-Dyngosz, Humboldt University Berlin);
- Finnish-Jewish survival strategies and war time economic history (Laura Ekholm, University of Helsinki);
- The Mechanics of Dispossession: Property Transfer and Local Agency in Otwock, 1939–1946 (Zachary Mazur, POLIN Museum & Institute of History, Polish Academy of Sciences);
- Uncertainty and Mortal Threat- Lublin Jewish Community 1863-1939-1945. Spatial Political Economy of Germany’s slide to Totalitarian Night in Occupied Poland (Sylvia Sztern, Hebrew University of Jerusalem);
- The role of German law and the judiciary in the expropriation of Jewish businesses, property, and wealth during the Holocaust (1939-1942) (Judith Vöcker, Uppsala University);
- Holocaust Dispossession in a Multimodal Perspective: Official and ‘Unofficial’ Modes of Dispossession within German-Occupied Small-Size Communities of East-Central Europe (Magdalena Waligórska Humboldt Univeristy Berlin);
- Interwar Senses and Sensibilities (Stephanie Weismann, Leibniz-Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO), Leipzig);
- The Economics of Destruction: WWII, the Holocaust, and Poland’s Long-Run Development (Marcin Wroński, SGH Warsaw School of Economics).
The workshop will be conducted in English. Selected contributions will be invited for submission to a special issue of Historical Social Research (to be confirmed). All submissions will undergo internal screening and external peer review, and final publication decisions will be based on the outcome of the review process.
Deadlines
- Submission of completed papers: August 15th 2026
- Peer-review August – September 2026
- Workshop: October 19th – 22th 2026
- Submission of revised papers: November 30th 2026
- Publication of special issue: 2027
Organizational information
- Date: October 19-22, 2026
- Location: Warsaw, SGH Building S (Street address: Batorego 8)
Organizers do not cover travel & accommodation costs.
Workshop is supported by POLIN’s Global Education Outreach Program.
The workshop is made possible with support from Taube Philanthropies, William K. Bowes, Jr. Foundation, Libitzky Family Foundation and the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland.
