Social Discredit

Social Discredit
Author: Janine Stingel
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 316
Release: 2000
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780773520103

In Social Discredit Janine Stingel exposes a crucial, yet previously neglected, part of Social Credit history - the virulent, anti-Jewish campaign it undertook before, during, and after the Second World War. While most Canadians acknowledged the perils of race hatred in the wake of the Holocaust, Social Credit intensified its anti-Semitic campaign. By examining Social Credit's anti-Semitic propaganda and the reaction of the Canadian Jewish Congress, Stingel details their mutual antagonism and explores why Congress was unable to stop Social Credit's blatant defamation. She argues that Congress's ineffective response was part of a broader problem in which passivity and a belief in "quiet diplomacy" undermined many of its efforts to combat intolerance. Stingel shows that both Social Credit and Congress changed considerably in the post-war period, as Social Credit abandoned its anti-Semitic trappings and Congress gradually adopted an assertive and pugnacious public relations philosophy that made it a champion of human rights in Canada. Social Discredit offers a fresh perspective on both the Social Credit movement and the Canadian Jewish Congress, substantively revising Social Credit historiography and providing a valuable addition to Canadian Jewish studies.

Greening the Red, White, and Blue

Greening the Red, White, and Blue
Author: Thomas Jundt
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2014-03-12
Genre: History
ISBN: 019937855X

In popular imagination, environmentalism is often linked to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring and the political activism of the 1960s and '70s that moved increasing numbers of Americans to insist on a better quality of life-open spaces, clean air and water, beautification campaigns. But these interpretations have obscured the significant origins of environmentalism as a moral and intellectual broadside against the growing power of corporate capitalism, both domestically and in the postwar liberal international order the United States was enacting abroad. In Greening the Red, White, and Blue, Thomas Jundt shows how many Americans came to view powerful corporations and a federal government bent on economic growth as threats to human health and the environment. Fallout from atomic testing, air and water pollution, the proliferation of pesticides and herbicides-all connected to the growing dominance of technology and corporate capitalism in American life-led a variety of constituencies to seek solutions in what came to be known as environmentalism. In addition to political and legal campaigns to effect change, an alternative form of civic participation emerged beginning in the late-1940s as growing numbers of citizens turned to what they deemed environmentally friendly consumption practices. The goal of this politically charged consumption was not only to protect themselves and their families from harm, but also to achieve social change at a time when many believed the government was placing the desires of business before the needs of its citizens. Politicians responded to the growing environmental concerns of middle class Americans, but, in the end, continual political compromises with corporate power meant weak laws and lax enforcement. Many citizens sought refuge in an alternative "green" marketplace-including organic foods, natural-fiber clothing, alternative energy, and everyday products designed to have minimal environmental impact. In doing so, they attempted to create a community for those who shared their concerns and frustrations, as well as their vision for a different American Way. Thomas Jundt's work highlights the intertwining of consumerism and environmentalism amidst the growing power of corporate capitalism and government in postwar America.

Delayed Impact

Delayed Impact
Author: Franklin Bialystok
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 340
Release: 2000-08-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 0773568530

Bialystok begins by examining the years immediately following World War II, showing that Canadian Jews were not psychologically equipped to comprehend the enormity of the Holocaust. Unable to grasp the extent of the atrocities that had occurred in a world that was not theirs, Canadian Jews were not prepared to empathize with the survivors and a chasm between the groups developed and widened in the next two decades. He shows how the efflorescence of marginal but vicious antisemitism in Canada in the 1960s, in combination with more potent antisemitic outrages internationally and the threat to Israel's existence, led to an interest in the Holocaust. He demonstrates that with the politicization of the survivors and the maturation of the post-war generation of Canadian Jews in the 1980s, the memory of the Holocaust became a pillar of ethnic identity. Combining previously unexamined documents and interviews with leaders in the Jewish community in Canada, Bialystok shows how the collective memory of an epoch-making event changed in reaction to historical circumstances. His work enhances our understanding of immigrant adaptation and ethnic identification in a multi-cultural society in the context of the post-war economic and social changes in the Canadian landscape and sheds new light on the history of Canadian Jewry, opening a new perspective on the effects of the Holocaust on a community in transition.