LIEBMAN, CHARLES (YESHAYAHU)

LIEBMAN, CHARLES (YESHAYAHU) (1934–2003), political scientist specializing in the political culture and behavior of world Jewry and considered one of the leading researchers in the field. Liebman was born in the U.S. and immigrated to Israel in 1969. Between 1949 and 1952 he studied at the Herzlia Hebrew Gymnasium in Tel Aviv. He received his B.A. from the University of Miami in 1956, and received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois in 1960. In the 1960s he lectured at several universities in the U.S.: University of Pennsylvania (1961–63), Yeshiva University (1962–69), and Columbia University (1964–65). In 1969, after immigrating to Israel, he joined the Department of Political Science at Bar-Ilan University and became professor in 1978. From 1980 to 1984 Liebman was the head of the department. During those years he was a visiting professor at many American universities. He held other positions as well, on academic councils and editorial boards, published around 100 articles and 14 books, among them: Ambivalent American Jew: Politics, Religion, and Family in American Jewish Life (1973), Pressure Without Sanctions: The Influence of World Jewry in Shaping Israel's Public Policy (1977), The Civil Religion of Israel: Traditional Judaism and Political Culture in the Jewish State (with Don-Yehiya, 1983), Two Worlds of Judaism: The Jewish Experience in Israel and the United State (with Cohen, 1990), and The Jewishness of Israelis: Responses to the Guttman Report (with Katz, 1997). He won the Marshall Sklar Prize for his studies on U.S. Jews in 2000 and the Israel Prize for political science in 2003.

[Shaked Gilboa (2^nd ed.)]