What is a bund is derived from the German word for border, as in the boundary that separates two land masses. Farmers build bunds along their fields to retain water and prevent erosion. Bunds are also used as a type of dam, e.g., the Rhine-bund.

The Bund grew rapidly in 1903 and 1904, organizing political meetings and demonstrations, and publishing pamphlets dealing with Jewish national-cultural autonomy and self-defense. It became one of the principal promoters—and in some places the main organizer—of the movement to combat anti-Jewish pogroms and the perpetrators thereof. In addition, it worked actively on cultural institutions of a Jewish nature, and supported the fourth *Duma in Warsaw.

At the fourth convention in 1901, the Bund moved beyond its demand for equality to a call for a “national political state.” This change reflected a number of internal and external pressures, including those exerted by the solution advocated by S. *Dubnow and the views of H. Zhitovsky, as well as the increasing influence of Zionism.

Demystifying Bunds: What Is a Bund and How Does It Work

A splinter group of older Bundists (V. *Medem and A. Litwak ) favored affiliation with the Comintern, but a majority of the fifth convention decided against it, arguing that it would compromise the Bundist program. Nevertheless, the question remained a source of tension and dissension, and several of its prominent members (especially K. Kuhn ) eventually emigrated, where they joined the short-lived Social Democratic Bund.

In the United States, the Bund was represented in a “Committee Abroad,” which organized fund-raising, printed material, and helped Bundists who left Russia. It also maintained a close working relationship with the Jewish Labor Committee and published its monthly journal, Unzer Welt, until 1941. The American Bundists were arrested or interned as aliens during World War II, and the organization died out in the United States.