On 27 April the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR), founded in New York as the Institute of Jewish Affairs in 1941 but located in London since 1965, announced the launch of its Community Research Initiative. The estimated annual cost will be £200,000 per annum for a period of six years, and donations are being actively sought.
The initiative aims to strengthen the JPR’s long-standing commitment to provide reliable data in support of the Jewish community and its organizations in the UK, in particular by running a major national Jewish identity survey in March 2011 in parallel with the civilian population census (which will again include a question on religion). The JPR survey will cover Jewish beliefs, attitudes, behaviours and concerns.
‘Used in tandem’, it is claimed, ‘data from the 2011 census and the parallel JPR survey will allow us to create the richest and most in-depth analysis of Jews in Britain that has ever existed’.
For more information about the Community Research Initiative, see:
http://www.jpr.org.uk/news/detail.php?id=155
For a brief history of Jewish statistics in Britain, see:
http://www.brin.ac.uk/commentary/drs/2-collected-by-communities/index.shtml#Judaism
