AGENCY, STRUCTURE, AND JEWISH SURVIVAL OF THE HOLOCAUST:

In this article I use a life history of two brothers who survived the Holocaust to bring survivor research into the mainstream of sociological inquiry and to explore one of the central problems of general social theory: the relationship between human agency and social structure. A theory of agency and structure offers a distinctly sociological alternative in a literature that has been dominated by psychological theorizing and that has often characterized Jews in overly negative or overly heroic terms. Survivors' accounts are permeated with "epiphanies," including "crucial moments" involving the ability to make difficult choices and quick decisions that were the difference between life and death. These situations illuminate the relationship between agency and structure in instances where the tension between them is heightened. Survivors' life histories suggest ways in which Jews' ability to exercise agency to survive structural conditions of extremity was influenced by their pre-war exposure to cultural schemas and resources that they were able to transpose to the war-occupation context. Successful agency, however, was in large part a collective accomplishment and dependent on factors beyond individuals' control.