Keith Kahn-Harris

Keith Kahn-Harris is a London-based sociologist and writer. He teaches at Birkbeck College, Leo Baeck College and is a Fellow of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research. His most recent book is ‘Uncivil War: The Israel Conflict in the Jewish Community’. His website is kahn-harris.org and he tweets on @KeithKahnHarris.

After the pandemic: how will the right fight back?

Five ways in which they might rescue the wider political project from the jaws of defeat.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 16 Mar 2020

After the pandemic: how will the right fight back?

The fear of being a "bad Jew": a response to David Graeber

Will left anti-racists defend the "bad Jew"? Fear comes also from the fear that some might not.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 10 Sep 2019

The fear of being a "bad Jew": a response to David Graeber

A crack in history? – a conversation between two recent UK Labour Party recruits

We need to find a way to build political movements that make space for difficult questions, for diversity, for ambivalence. But how?

By Dougald Hine and Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 31 Aug 2017

The antisemitism reports: against a zero-sum reading

It is how texts are read, not texts themselves that determine meaning. Applying this post-modernist lesson to the Chakrabarti and Home Affairs Committee antisemitism reports yields new political possibilities.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 3 Nov 2016

Better-off siding with Russia or China: there's no dictator's dilemma today

Democracy promotion by the west has been a grubby, hypocritical affair. Is there any hope for doing it properly?

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 30 Oct 2016

Internal and external factors in intra-Jewish conflict over Israel and antisemitism

Since 2000, the questions of Israel and antisemitism have become a source of ever greater conflict in British Jewry, as well as in other diaspora Jewish populations.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 29 Sep 2015

Is Corbyn too pally with tyrants and other pariahs?

Why is it so hard for the left, both pro and anti-Corbyn, to resist the logic of "my enemies' enemies are my friends"? Can we learn to cast a plague on the houses of enemies of progress whoever they are?

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 13 Aug 2015

On the strangeness of contemporary antisemitism

Can we agree on one thing? That contemporary antisemitism is profoundly strange.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 13 Apr 2015

"Judaism, All that matters". An openDemocracy podcast

An openDemocracy podcasted conversation around Keith Kahn-Harris' latest book (1 hr)

By Tony Curzon Price and Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 27 Oct 2012

2011, a year between worlds

A profusion of innovative projects guided by an ethic of collaboration holds out the possibility of creative responses to today's multiple crises, says Keith Kahn-Harris.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 24 Dec 2011

Jews, Gypsies and Travellers: a particular empathy

The legal eviction from their land of a large community on the edge of London raises disturbing questions about deep-rooted discrimination that Jewish historical experience can help to address, say Keith Kahn-Harris, Simone Abel & Shauna Leven.

By Keith Kahn-Harris, Simone Abel and Shauna Leven

/ 18 Sep 2011

The dinner-party revolution

The dinner-party is a symbol of complacent presumption, the last occasion to be associated with genuine dialogue or the jolt of rethinking. But it’s possible to renew the ritual in surprising ways - and really caring about the food is just the start, says Keith Kahn-Harris.

By Keith Kahn-Harris

/ 6 Sep 2011