Beyond Belonging: The Jewish Identities of Moderately Engaged British Jews -- Highlights of the UJIA Study of Jewish Identity

Many observers and policy-makers in Jewish life conceptually divide the population into two large segments: the affiliated and the unaffiliated, or the engaged and unengaged. While seem- ingly straightforward and intuitively appealing, dividing the population into two parts implicitly connotes an exaggerated distinction between the Jewishly more active and Jewishly less active. For Jews in Britain and in almost any other policy-relevant context within the English-speaking Jewish world, the population may be fruitfully divided into three segments, according to levels of Jewish engagement. Rather than seeing the world as divided statically into two blocs, one imagines the population more dynamically moving between at least three regions on the Jewish identity spectrum. Unlike the less engaged, the moderately engaged report a significant number of points of Jewish involvement (such as congregational membership, Jewish friendship ties and holiday celebration). That said, their Jewish involvement is not so extensive as to indicate a major commitment either to traditional religious piety or to significant leadership in the organized Jewish community. From a Jewish communal policy point of view, the moderately engaged constitute a critical, if not the most critical, Jewish popu- lation segment for Jewish educational intervention on the population-scale. This study relies upon both qualitative (depth interviews) and quantitative (social surveys) research methodologies.