CIJA rejig: Shonda 2.0

Editorial

The complete shakeup of Canada’s Jewish and Zionist communal institutions is not so astonishing – such tempests take place every few years it seems, although this latest one is clearly the most thorough. What is astonishing is the almost completely secretive and entirely antidemocratic processes around this most recent revamp.

As reported in last week’s paper, the familiar (or not) alphabet soup – Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC), Canada-Israel Committee (CIC), Quebec-Israel Committee (QIC), University Outreach Committee (UOC) and National Jewish Campus Life (NJCL) – have all been rolled into one. The new agency, still officially unnamed, is currently going by the quaintly retro-futuristic moniker CIJA 2.0. The Canadian Council for Israel and Jewish Advocacy – CIJA – was previously an umbrella for the aforementioned groups. Now, it appears, the umbrella has closed around them – and the metaphor is apt, since there are only a handful of people in the country who seem to know exactly what is happening beneath the darkened enclosure that has collapsed into a (metaphorically and literally) top-down entity.

It is safe to say that almost every other organization in the world is going in precisely the opposite direction. Businesses, nonprofits – even the worst governments on the planet – are all opening up to seek the best ideas by including as many voices, people and perspectives as possible. Not our communal agencies. A top-down approach will make advocacy easier and more effective, according to Shimon Fogel, CEO of CIJA 2.0. True enough: it is accepted by all that dictatorship is a far more efficient form of governance – just as monopolies are more receptive to consumer demand (not) – than the alternatives.

Meanwhile, staff have been terminated, a new national board is to be “appointed” and a name is to be announced soon. In the meantime, the document laying out these changes is apparently top secret. Responding to a request from the Independent, a spokesperson for CIJA suggested something might be ready for public consumption some day soon.

“The document Roadmap for the Reorganization … is not a public document,” the Independent was told in an e-mail after submitting a request for a copy of the report, “and, therefore, cannot be circulated. In the near future, CIJA will be releasing more public details and comments. Thank you for your understanding.”

What understanding? What’s to understand? The entire Jewish and Zionist apparatus in Canada is apparently being torn down and rebuilt from the top, the piddling pretence of democratic input that remained now thoroughly suffocated, and the people whose campaign contributions fund this entire engine of organization are being kept in the dark.

Fogel wouldn’t even tell reporters who will be on the senior management team of the new uber-agency.

For whatever great things might come for those who wait for CIJA to get its act together, this much is certain: the secretive rollout has put CIJA’s ostensible constituents – Jewish and Zionist Canadians – at the bottom of the priority list. We fervently hope this is not indicative of what we can expect from CIJA 2.0 when it finally reveals its shape. This community – indeed, this country – needs better.

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