GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

DEFINITIONAL UNCERTAINTY:

BANALIZATION VERSUS MORALIZATION IN THE TERM “COLLABORATION”

HIST 606: COLLABORATION IN WWII

DR. AVIEL ROSHWALD

BY

SEAN P. MCBRIDE

WASHINGTON, DC

24 FEBRUARY 2010

AD MAIOREM DEI GLORIAM

McBride, 1

Since its conceptual emergence out of World War II, historians have struggled with the

use of the term “collaboration.” Ben Cion Pinchuk writes that “the use of the term

‘collaboration’ in research is problematic at best and misleading at worst” largely due to its

strong association with negative moral judgment and treason.1 This paper seeks to examine how

historians have conceptually used the term “collaboration” when writing about the Jedwabne

massacre and the history of the Łódź ghetto. This paper argues that Pinchuk is correct in his

assessment of the problematic nature of the term “collaboration.” Due to the emotionalism

inherent in the term, definitions of collaboration have varied in order to selectively cast judgment

on certain parties, highlighting an underlying battle between banalization and moralization.

Much of historians’ difficulty with the term collaboration derives from its loose

conceptual framework. Due to the term’s emotional association with treason, a universal

definition of collaboration has been especially difficult to establish. Numerous authors have

attempted to create more meaningful conceptual distinctions, such as through the thematic

contrast of collaboration versus collaborationism or collaboration versus accommodation, but no

single usage has become commonly accepted. Further complicating the matter is the injection of

“resistance” into debates over collaboration. From the perspective of a victorious resistor or an

investigator with what Pinchuk calls “unwarranted moral superiority,” even passive acceptance

of “enemy” authority seems to bleed over into resistance.2 Both of these problematic

perspectives are present in the historiographical debate over the classification of the Poles in the

Jedwabne massacre and Rumkowski in the Łódź ghetto as “collaborators.”

Treatment of the Polish massacre of Jewish neighbors in Jedwabne under the framework

of collaboration is problematic due to the possibility that the primary causal factors of the

1 Polonsky and Michlic, eds., The Neighbors Respond, 216.

2 Ibid.

McBride, 2

massacre may have been internal Polish anti-Semitism. Jan Gross suggests this possibility with

the comment that “one should not deny the reality of autonomous dynamic in the relationship

between Poles and Jews within the constraints imposed by the occupiers.” By considering anti-

Semitism an “autonomous dynamic,” Gross offers the possibility of the Jedwabne massacre

standing as something the Poles “did not have to do but nevertheless did.”3 Judging by certain

perceptions of Polish anti-Semitic nature, such an explanation seems plausible. Antony

Polonsky and Joanna Michlic note that many Jewish scholars consider Poland “perhaps even

uniquely anti-Semitic,” largely due to the Polish regime’s “bitter and increasingly successful war

against the Jewish population" in the interwar period.4 Even Rabbi Baker, who otherwise takes

an idyllic view of Jewish life in Jedwabne, notes the negative role that religious anti-Semitism

from the Catholic Church had on Polish-Jewish relations.5

Given this organic Polish anti-Semitism, many Polish scholars view Jewish collaboration

with the Soviets as an explanatory factor in the Jedwabne massacre. For example, Professor

Strzembosz charged that “the Jewish population… participated en masse in… armed

collaboration” with the Soviets in “revolt against the Polish state.”6 Regardless of the success of

Jan Gross, Pinchuk, and others in demonstrating that collaboration was far from a purely Jewish

affair, it is logical that Poles would perceive the Jews as close collaborators of the Soviets.

Given the Polish stereotype of communism being a Jewish ideology, the Soviet regime’s

unprecedented decision to put Jews into positions of authority in Poland likely shaped the Pole’s

memory of Soviet occupation in a powerful way. Accepting that a large segment of Poles in

Jedwabne perceived their Jewish neighbors as traitors to the Polish state along the lines of

3 Jan Gross, Neighbors, xix.

4 Polonsky and Michlic, eds., The Neighbors Respond, 211.

5 Ibid, 164.

6 Ibid, 99.

McBride, 3

Professor Stzembosz, the possibility that the massacre was considered revenge for Jewish

“treason” problematizes the characterization of the Jedwabne Poles as German collaborators.

This distinction hinges on the level of German incitement of anti-Jewish violence. If the German

contribution to the massacre was solely indirect through the destruction of Soviet authority

Eastern Poland, then the Jedwabne massacre fits Gross’s characterization as an “autonomous

dynamic,” something that “they did not have to do but nevertheless did.”7 If the Germans did

not prominently figure into the internal calculus of Polish decisions to murder Jews, then how

could the massacre be collaboration? If the Germans did not play a key role in inciting or

leading the massacre, how could this be a collaborative effort between Germans and Poles?

Unfortunately, the level of German involvement in the massacre remains unknown.

Numerous eyewitnesses indeed claimed to have seen uniformed Germans in Jedwabne on the

day of the massacre, but their incoherence suggests that eyewitnesses inflated the German

presence in order to cast off blame. Indeed, much of the scholarship that has emphasized the

German role in Jedwabne seems to have done so as a means of exculpating the Poles from

responsibility for the massacre. Based off this logic, the Polish prosecutor responsible for the

case assigned the German responsibility sensu largo and the Jedwabne Poles sensu stricto.8

Similarly, Archbishop Henryk Muszynski provocatively assigned Germany the role of Jewish

king David from the Books of Samuel, stating that “David’s intention was the kill Uriah, but he

used someone else to do it.”9 Ultimately, definitive proof of the German role at Jedwabne does

not exist, but Polish anti-Semitism, the perception of Jewish “collaboration” with the Soviets,

and the extremely violent actions of Poles at Jedwabne suggests that accusations of German

incitement may be a “red herring” against Polish anti-Semitism’s role in the massacre.

7 Jan Gross, Neighbors, xix.

8 Polonsky and Michlic, eds., The Neighbors Respond, 134.

9 Ibid, 156.

McBride, 4

In contrast to Jedwabne, the concept of “collaboration” in the Łódź ghetto is problematic

for fully separate reasons. Specifically, this classification revolves around whether Mordechai

Rumkowski, Jewish Elder of the Łódź ghetto, can accurately be considered a “collaborator.”

Reasoning that total submission to German wishes offered the best hope for survival of at least a

portion of the Jewish community, Rumkowski attempted to make the Łódź ghetto economically

indispensable to the German war economy, even willfully selecting Jews for deportation to

extermination facilities.10

In contrast to the Poles of Jedwabne, Rumkowski’s actions can only

be understood as a conscious decision to support German demands, eliminating any suspicion

that he acted out of a parallel set of personal motives. Unlike the Poles, Rumkowski had no

convergence of interest with the Germans. He did not share in the National Socialist ideology,

and, outside of German coercion, he never would have knowingly assisted in the murder of

Polish Jewry. He undoubtedly felt remorse for participation in the killing of his fellow Jews, but

he considered the willful sacrifice of the weak and less productive a means of ensuring the

survival of at least some of the Jewish community.

Gordon Horwitz argues against the classification of Rumkowski as a collaborator, writing

that “compliance under circumstances of extreme coercion is not the same as collaboration.”11

Under this logic, Rumkowski can only be considered a collaborator if he would have been

willing to serve German interests outside German coercion, thereby assuming that collaboration

requires ideological convergence between two parties towards a specified end state. Because the

Nazi leadership desired the destruction of the Jews and Rumkowski did not, this ideological

convergence did not exist in Łódź. Rumkowski complied with German wishes, but he was not a

collaborator because he would have acted differently absent German coercion. When this

10

Gordon Horwitz, Ghettostadt, 314. 11

Ibid, 317.

McBride, 5

counterfactual is applied to the Jedwabne massacre, it remains a distinct possibility that the Poles

would kill their Jewish neighbors absent German coercion. Indeed, German coercion seems not

to have been present. This would logically suggest that Horwitz would classify Jedwabne as

collaboration. However, by emphasizing ideological congruence as the primary indicator of

collaboration, Horwitz’s definition directly conflicts with Gross’s suggestion that the massacre

represented “autonomous dynamics in the relationships between Poles and Jews.” In contrast,

when Gross’s statements are applied to Rumkowski, it is clear that Rumkowski enjoyed few

“autonomous dynamics,” highlighting that his actions were irrefutably based on the decision to

support German wishes.

These conflicting frameworks clearly support Ben Cion Pinchuk’s assertion that “the use

of the term ‘collaboration’ in research is problematic at best and misleading at worst.” It is

mistaken to attempt to extrapolate a complete definition of “collaboration” from either Jan Gross

or Gordon Horwitz because neither author attempted such a difficult feat. Ultimately, Gross’s

purpose was to shift blame for the massacre to the Poles, while Horwitz’s purpose was to

exculpate Rumkowski. Due to the conceptual flexibility of “collaboration,” both authors

accomplished their purpose, albeit in conflicting ways. The effect is to make the concept of

collaboration both problematic and misleading. Is collaboration predicated on ideological

convergence towards a shared end or a conscious decision to foster the interests of another party,

even as personal cost? Or is it both? Jedwabne and Łódź demonstrate that these definitional

issues are unsettled, largely because scholars are hesitant to strip “collaboration” of its

judgmental overtones. Doing so would result in collaboration as originally conceived by Pétain,

meaning simply cooperation or zusammenarbeiten. Such conceptual banalization remains

unacceptable for the study of the Holocaust, an event that cannot be studied absent moralization.