Implications of the Scenarios

After designing the scenarios, we asked what their implications are for the Jewish community. How are different sectors of the community affected in each of these alternative futures? What are the challenges and opportunities presented in each alternative future? Which of our basic assumptions become obsolete? How do we need to re-imagine the organizational architecture of the Jewish community to better respond to the new context in each scenario?

  • How will human service agencies cope with the double whammy of increased needs and decreased funding in the scenarios in which the economy doesn’t recover?
  • How can we do Israel engagement in a world in which travel remains impossible or infrequent?
  • How can we benefit from a possible renaissance in arts and culture?
  • How can we keep the community safe in the scenarios in which antisemitism increase?
  • How can we work with college students when, in most scenarios, there’s a decrease of young people going to campus?
  • Will we see more assimilation?
  • In what scenarios do young Jews become politically radicalized? How do we change our strategy if that happens?
  • In a scenario in which more Jews move to suburbs, what happens to communal real estate assets in cities?
  • What happens to our advocacy work? Will we still be focused on Israel, or will we devote more energy to domestic issues that affect our impoverished constituencies?
  • What happens to day schools when tuition becomes widely unaffordable? Conversely, if the public school system collapses, can day schools benefit?
  • Will the hostility of the general society in some scenarios result in a greater sense of community among Jews?
  • Will organized religion – and synagogues – grow or diminish in importance in each of the scenarios?
  • What critical skills that we lack today are needed in each of the scenarios?

Implications of Each Scenario

A New Renaissance

Haves and Have-Nots

Back to the 1930s

A Smaller but Tastier Pie

What Can We Do Today