Mennonite Weekly Review

On my desk is Mennonites, Politics and Peoplehood: Europe, Russia, Canada, 1525 to 1980, by James Urry, published by University of Manitoba Press, Winnipeg, 400 pages, 2006, $27.95.

Lapp

James Urry, a reader in anthropology at New Zealand’s Victoria University, demonstrates how Mennonites have been involved in political processes as subjects, outsiders, petitioners, negotiators, advocates, voters, critics, civil servants and elected officials.

He also recognizes frequent struggles and suffering, including conflicts with authorities.

Urry tells the story dispassionately, including controversies in the church over the necessity and form of political involvement. I think he shortchanges the important Anabaptist tradition that the people of God, rather than political entities, are the bearers of divine interests. While he continually notes conflicts with authoritarian regimes, he could have given more attention to migration as a political statement.

I was intrigued how the Jewish and Mennonite struggles for civil liberties intersected, particularly in the Netherlands and Prussia. Dutch Mennonite participation in the patriot movement during the late-18th-century revolutions was quite extensive. Diplomatic envoy John Adams from the American revolutionary government shared colonial U.S. constitutions with Dutch cities as they organized new governments.

Urry knows the Russian Mennonite story intimately. He explains the privilegium, so important in Prussia and Russia, which guaranteed freedom of religious practices and exemption from military service. I found it fascinating that these agreements were highly valued but also the source of constant anxiety, due to fear that the terms might be changed or discontinued.

The Canadian story is unique because of the openness of political life. Mennonites from Russia had no experience “where people possessed the right to exercise political freedoms,” Urry writes.

Urry is strong on the Manitoba story. There the sense of separatism was so strong that large numbers left in the 1920s and 1930s for Mexico and Paraguay. Urry could have made more of what this meant as a political statement.

Beginning with the immigrants of the 1920s, known as “Russlanders,” there has been a steady extension of political activity. Urry notes that this also included the “Kanadier,” those from the earlier migration who did not move on. This involvement developed in both rural and small towns as well as in the city of Winnipeg.

Early on, Mennonites had a Liberal Party orientation, but quickly there were Progressive Conservatives, Social Credit and New Democrats. Urry unravels the tensions and personalities that go along with political life. Today there are Mennonite political leaders in all the western Canadian provinces and more than a few in Ottawa.