Emily Greene Balch

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Emily Greene Balch,
Harris & Ewing photo studio

Emily Greene Balch (born January 8, 1867 in Jamaica Plain , Boston , Massachusetts , † January 9, 1961 in Cambridge ) was an American economist , pacifist and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate .

life and work

Early years and education

Emily was the second of eight children to a respected attorney and teacher. She studied Greek and Roman literature at Bryn Mawr College from 1886 and received a scholarship for her excellent graduation in order to be able to continue studying in Europe. There she went to Paris to the Sorbonne from 1890 to 1891 and studied economics , during which time she put on a study on the subject of “Public Aid for the Poor in France” . She then returned to the USA and studied ethics for a semester at Harvard University in 1893 and sociology and folk studies at the University of Chicago in 1895 , then in Berlin until 1896 , there among others with Georg Simmel . In Berlin she also took part in a meeting of the Socialist International .

Scientific career and social commitment

On her return to the United States in 1896, she became an economics officer at Wellesley College . From 1913 she became a professor for political economy , political and social sciences . As a researcher in these subjects, she specialized in the problems of high immigration in the United States. Her main work "Our Slavic Citizens" (1910) dealt with the situation of immigrants from southern and eastern Europe.

In addition to her work, she was very involved in the settlement movement , which promoted the formation of charitable and social institutions. In 1892 she founded Denison House with Helen Cheever, Vida Scudder, and Helena Dudley , where they offered education and support to neighbors and the needy in the spirit of the settlement movement. From 1897 to 1898 she was in the magistrate of the city of Boston , where she was particularly involved in looking after children and the social problems of women and immigrants. As part of her research, she lived for some time until 1910 in the slums of Slavic immigrants in several major American cities and also traveled to Eastern Europe to get to know the way of life there. From 1913 to 1914 she served on a state immigration commission and from 1914 to 1917 on the Boston Urban Planning Committee .

From 1915 Emily Balch was increasingly active in the peace movement. She spoke out vehemently against the USA entering the First World War and lost her chair at the university because of this commitment. After the First World War she was secretary and treasurer of the International Women's League for Peace and Freedom in Geneva from 1918 to 1922 . She was already present at the 1915 International Women's Peace Congress in The Hague when it was founded, and before the war ended, she called on the governments of Russia and Scandinavia to end the war. In 1922 she resigned her post for health reasons and only worked voluntarily for the organization, in 1937 she was elected International Honorary President as successor to Jane Addams .

In 1926 she investigated the social conditions in Haiti and in the following year recommended that the American government withdraw its troops there and give the country to the local population. In 1931 Emily Greene Balch became chairwoman of the American section of the Women's League and in 1934 she returned to her post in Geneva due to financial problems.

During the time of National Socialism in Germany and the Second World War , she went back to the USA and became involved in the fight against National Socialism. She was also particularly committed to European refugees and asylum seekers . With the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, she changed her mind about war and the neutrality of the United States and demanded the state's entry into World War II. After the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki , she spoke out against nuclear armament and wanted to found a women's peace party. In 1946 she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “ for her courage, her clarity and her commitment to people, regardless of race, religion, class, gender and nationality” .

literature

Web links

Commons : Emily Greene Balch  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. Solomon, Barbara Miller: Balch, Emily Greene. In: Barbara Sicherman / Carol Hurd Green (eds.): Notable American Women. The Modern Period , Vol. 4. Cambridge / Mass. 1980, pp. 41–45, here p. 42.
  2. ^ Settlement Houses and the Rise of New American Women. In: wanderwomenproject.com. Retrieved January 9, 2021 .
  3. Suzanne Hildenbrand (ed.), Women's Collections. Libraries, Archives, and Consciousness , Routledge Library Editions, 1986, ISBN 978-0-36782-177-7 . Section “Social Welfare and Reform”.
  4. Solomon, ibid, p. 43.
  5. Balch, Emily Greene (ed.): Occupied Haiti . New York et al .: Garland, 1972 (faks. Reprint).