The Jewish Question in Galicia: The Reforms of Maria Theresa and Joseph II, 1772‒1790
This chapter focuses on the reforms imposed by the Austrian authorities, who did not recognize the institutions and legal norms that had been inherited from Polish times in the annexed territory of Galicia. Specifically, it examines those reforms that pertained to the legal status of the Jewish population and can be separated quite easily from the wider Theresian–Josephine reforms. Here, the status of the Jews was by no means a secondary issue. The consequences of these reforms may be appraised on several levels. The chapter takes into consideration, first, the economic, social, and legal situation of the Jewish population in Galicia; second, that population's degree of loyalty to the new authorities; third, Jewish coexistence with the Polish population (and, to the degree that the Ukrainian nationalist movement developed, also with the Ukrainian population); and fourth, the situation of Galician Jewry in comparison with the position of Jews under the Polish republic before partition and with the situation of those Jews who found themselves under Russian rule after 1795.