Social Action in the United States

Many articles in Tikkun Magazine and at www.tikkun.org

click here	Michael Strassfeld and Sharon Strassfeld. The Third Jewish Catalog – Creating Community: With a Cumulative Index to all 3 Catalogs. Jewish Publication Society, 1980.
click here	Michael Lerner. The Politics of Meaning: Restoring Hope and Possibility in an Age of Cynicism.  Addison Wesley Publishing Company, 1997.

Socialaction.com has as one of its goals to “stimulate and support social action as an expression of Jewish identity and as an integral part of Jewish communities and organizations”.  

The Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action  - www.jalsa.org - describes itself as “a new membership-based non-profit organization based in Boston . We are dedicated to being a strong, progressive, inter-generational voice, inspired by Jewish teachings and values, for social justice, civil rights, and civil liberties.”

Progressive Jewish Alliance describes itself as “a young, non-profit, non-denominational, inter-generational membership organization for those who are committed to social change. We believe that to kvetch is human, to act … divine.”  

Jewish Organizing Initiative focuses on community organizing as a strategy for social change offering young adults a chance to work for justice as part of a Jewish community.

“We the Unreasonable” by Jeff Gates

“Tikkun Environmentalism – Toward a New Realism”

Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life – COEJL  was founded in 1993 to promote environmental education, scholarship, advocacy and action in the American Jewish community.

Jewish Fund for Justice  

The Shalom Center is involved not only in Israel/Palestine peace efforts but many domestic and global issues especially the environment and ecology.

Mazon: A Jewish Response to Hunger – its website says that since 1985 it “has provided food, help and hope to hungry people of all faiths and backgrounds. It has done so through donations from the Jewish community which, in turn, are allocated to the most effective hunger relief organizations in the United States , Israel and in poor countries worldwide.”  

AVODAH: The Jewish Services Corps is a year long program that combines work on poverty issues in New York City with Jewish study and community building

“The Other War” by Charles Derber “While he is attacking Iraq , George W. Bush is also waging a war at home on the American people”.

“Reversing the Cancer Epidemic” by Samuel S. Epstein M.D. “What then is the predominant cause of the modern cancer epidemic? A strong body of scientific evidence points to the role of run-away industrial technologies.”

“When Healing Becomes a Crime – The Surprising Facts Behind ‘Unproven’ Cancer Therapies” by Kenny Ausubel “… is the medical standard of proof a double standard?”

Two thoughtful articles on education by Svi Shapiro.  “Educating Against Violence”  and  “The New Crisis in Education. Who is Cheating Whom?”

“Circumcision – The Kindest Un-Cut – Feminism, Judaism, and My Son’s Foreskin”  by Michael S. Kimmel (a well researched and thought provoking article about whether to circumcise his son) 

“From Sukkah to Ma’akeh – The Halachah of Housing”  by Jill Jacobs “Rarely, however, do we consider the needs of those who are housed, but whose housing is so inadequate or temporary that it is virtually impossible for them to lead a fully functional life.”