Scholars

Research Associate Sergio DellaPergola is a professor of population studies at The Hebrew University’s Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry, which he chaired for seven years and where he currently holds the Shlomo Argov Chair in Israel-Diaspora Relations. He is also a senior fellow at the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, an independent think tank based in Jerusalem.

An internationally known specialist on the demography of world Jewry, he has published numerous books and over one hundred papers on historical demography, the family, international migration, Jewish education and identification, and population projections in the Diaspora, Israel, and Palestine. His recent publications include:

• “Autonomy and Dependency: Latin American Jewry in Global Perspective,” in J. Bokser Liwerant et al., eds., Identities in an Era of Globalization and Multiculturalism: Latin America in the Jewish World, 2008;
• “La Démographie en Israël: Diversité et convergence,” in A. Diekhoff, ed., L’État d’Israël, 2008;
• Israele e Palestina: La Forza dei numeri—Il conflitto mediorientale fra demografia e politica, 2007; and
• “’Sephardi and Oriental’ Migrations to Israel: Migration, Social Change, and Identification,” in P. Medding, ed., Studies in Contemporary Jewry, 2007.

DellaPergola has lectured at over 50 universities and research centers worldwide and served as senior policy consultant to the President of Israel, the Israeli Government, the Jerusalem Municipality, and numerous national and international organizations. In 1999, he received the Marshall Sklare Award for distinguished achievement from the Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry.

He holds an MA from the Università degli Studi, Pavia, and a Ph.D. from The Hebrew University.