Comparative Analysis of the Israeli and Jewish Centers of St. Petersburg: Practices and Representations

With the increasing level of migration and the role ethnicity plays in politics, studies of organizational functioning are important in understanding the current state of ethnic minorities and diaspora in host countries, how do they represent and identify themselves. Jewish diaspora is depicted quite widely in St. Petersburg, what allows us to study correspondent organizations – primarily, the Jewish and Israeli ones. Therefore, the main goal of this research is to analyse how Israeli and Jewish ethnic centers in St. Petersburg presented in terms of their goals, practices and representation. The work is based on various ethnic and, in particular, diaspora studies and discovers the objectives, activities of the centers, as well as its target audience and programs offered. Several qualitative methods of data collection, as interviews, observation, and online platform analyses are applied. According to the results of the analysis, several interorganizational differences were revealed, based on the objectives of organization, its target audience, place of its origin and the degree of oragnizational religiosity. The similarities of the centers were also identified, as well as their interaction with each other and with other structures. Moreover, the current perception and understanding of the Jewish community and Jewish culture is depicted.