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Kosher: Private Regulation in the Age of Industrial Food
Generating over $12 billion in annual sales, kosher food is big business. It is also an unheralded story of successful private-sector regulation in an era of growing public concern over the government’s ability to ensure food safety. Kosher uncovers how independent certification agencies rescued American kosher supervision from fraud and corruption and turned it into a model of nongovernmental administration.
Currently, a network of over three hundred private certifiers ensures the kosher status of food for over twelve million Americans, of whom only eight percent are religious Jews. But the system was not always so reliable. At the turn of the twentieth century, kosher meat production in the United States was notorious for scandals involving price-fixing, racketeering, and even murder. Reform finally came with the rise of independent kosher certification agencies which established uniform industry standards, rigorous professional training, and institutional checks and balances to prevent mistakes and misconduct.
In overcoming many of the problems of insufficient resources and weak enforcement that hamper the government, private kosher certification holds important lessons for improving food regulation, Timothy Lytton argues. He views the popularity of kosher food as a response to a more general cultural anxiety about industrialization of the food supply. Like organic and locavore enthusiasts, a growing number of consumers see in rabbinic supervision a way to personalize today’s vastly complex, globalized system of food production.
Currently, a network of over three hundred private certifiers ensures the kosher status of food for over twelve million Americans, of whom only eight percent are religious Jews. But the system was not always so reliable. At the turn of the twentieth century, kosher meat production in the United States was notorious for scandals involving price-fixing, racketeering, and even murder. Reform finally came with the rise of independent kosher certification agencies which established uniform industry standards, rigorous professional training, and institutional checks and balances to prevent mistakes and misconduct.
In overcoming many of the problems of insufficient resources and weak enforcement that hamper the government, private kosher certification holds important lessons for improving food regulation, Timothy Lytton argues. He views the popularity of kosher food as a response to a more general cultural anxiety about industrialization of the food supply. Like organic and locavore enthusiasts, a growing number of consumers see in rabbinic supervision a way to personalize today’s vastly complex, globalized system of food production.
- GenresFoodJewishNonfiction
240 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 10, 2021
5/5 stars
A practical study of decision making units
*******
The two things that stand out in this book more than any other are:
1. The formidable Ashkenazi Jewish ability to self organize at high levels of complexity / the ability to co-opt some system for their own use. (In this case, you have them convincing companies to pay them for their expertise in certifying products that they want for Jews' own use.)
2. Halacha as the Phlogiston of Rabbinic-Will-To-Power. (The best quote of the entire book (p86) is that "Modern kashrut is 2% Halacha and 98% ego and money and politics.")
*******
Of the book......
153 pages / 4 chapters≈ 38 pps per chapter.
Chapter Content:
1. A century of failures (1855-1940)
2. The current solution
3. Self regulation of the industry
4. Assessment of the effectiveness of the current paradigm.
5. Conclusion/appendices and pre-butting of stupid questions by critics ("Democratic legitimacy of private Kashrut regulation, etc")
Of the big picture:
First is that this great book about Jewish history has the rare advantage of making its argument over no more pages than absolutely necessary (153), and yet still covers a topic that every single observant Jew sees as an issue of concern. ("Kesser Dovid: The Halachic Guide to Dentistry" comes in at 498 pages and has not a single review.)
The second thing is that it takes a specific, discrete topic and pushes it through time and thereby gives us a snapshot of Jewish communities around the same topic at different instances in time.
What do we learn from this? (pps. 32-34).
1. (Stage 1, Europe: Kehilla regulated) From the Middle ages up until 1800, Jewish communities were corporate entities within many various spots in Europe and rabbis there did have the power of enforcement. The number of people who could certify meat was very small and that system worked well for many centuries
2. (Stage 2, US-New York: Synagogue regulated).The first Jewish community in the United States was Sephardic (Spanish and Portuguese), and the board hired a shochet slaughter meat and that person was a synagogue employee. Congregational coalitions worked for a century and a half.
3. (Stage 3 and on US-New York: Trade associations-->independent communal organizations-->government agencies->Public private partnerships ). These stages are all the same thing: fragile coalitions leading to bickering and collapse.
4. (Stage 4, WWII-->Present: professional certification agencies.)
Second order thoughts:
1. It's just amazing how much time it took to get this right. (And you wouldn't think so, because food is something that we have to eat every single day.) Just a smidge under three centuries from start to finish.
2. Pareto Principle in action: OU is primarily Modern Orthodox. Very strange, because Modern Orthodox are only 20% and not highly visible. But they get 80% of the work done. Haredim appear to be just the opposite. Highly visible, 80% of the mass, but for only 20% of the work (if even that).
Conversion standards in North America these days are also predominantly Modern Orthodox.
3. With a nod to the Masorti movement: Halacha really is an evolving thing. Initially "everything is kosher except these things that we tell you are not." Finally...."nothing is kosher *except* these things that we tell you."
4. Then, as now: The (loosely structured) Haredi elements of the Rabbinate have the characteristics of a very ugly, factional, power-hungry entity. There is absolutely *nothing* that cannot be repurposed as a tool to bicker / assert power: Kashrut in one century, geirut in the next.
Side note: Recently, one hechsher in Israel (Barkan) said that they would not certify the wine of a particular company because it had black people working for it. (Ethiopian Jews, many of whom had a secondary conversion by the Israeli rabbinate to remove all doubt of their Jewishness.)
Even though ostensibly the issue was about most Haredim not liking black people (whom they, as a matter of fact, don't) the real issue was what tool a local Court could use to stick a finger in the eye of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate--such as refusing to accept the validity of their conversions. It *incidentally* was about kashrut/black people in this case.
5.
a. Even though Modern Orthodoxy is only 20% of the Orthodox world (Orthodoxy itself is about 12% of All American Jewry)--that scant ≈2.5% of all Jews does the heavy lifting for a number that is many times larger--as well as the great majority of people who would go out of their way to have certified kosher food.
b. Something like 90% of Haredim would never set foot inside of a Modern Orthodox synagogue, but they rely on the same people to certify their food?
c. The hechsher that comes under the most scrutiny and is accepted by only a minor fraction of Haredim (=Triangle K) is actually run by an Agudath Rabbi. (Aryeh Ralbag.)
6. It is in the nature of normative Orthodox Judaism to move to the right, but kashrut certification is constrained in this way because excessive stringency can make it such that one excludes too many perfectly reasonable manufacturers. (It's the obverse of the fact that excessive leniency can alienate the most religious people.)
7. Nicholas Taleb has written before that people who are an extreme minority can influence the mainstream by simple intransigence.
The 12% of Jewry that has any concern about dietary issues becomes the standard bearer for the other 88% simply by refusing to compromise.
Eric Hoffer has written that the desire to keep a job is enough of a reason to explain why clergy persist thousands of years past their originating point. (The Diaspora Rabbinate has been with us for 20 centuries, and the Catholic Church is all that is left of the long perished Roman Empire.)
*******
Much that the author observes is somewhere between predictable and trivial.
1. Government is not the appropriate decision making unit for the overwhelming majority of decisions. Kashrut standards are just one more among a trillion others.
2. The Rabbinate, though emphatically NOT composed of practical Men of Action, is the least bad decision making unit for the task at hand.
3. Of course professional societies / trade unions would not be the appropriate decision making unit, because that's an example of the fox guarding the hen house.
4. This book is an extended practical example of studies of decision making units. I would recommend that this be read in conjunction with Thomas Sowell's "Knowledge and Decisions."
*******
Parting thought: Halacha geirut will not be standardized before the 3rd Temple. After all, kashrut is something that is used every day by every single Jew.
And it took every bit of three centuries to get it right.
There's unlikely to be enough lifetime left in the sun for this process to see itself through.
Verdict: Recommended at the new price.
A practical study of decision making units
*******
The two things that stand out in this book more than any other are:
1. The formidable Ashkenazi Jewish ability to self organize at high levels of complexity / the ability to co-opt some system for their own use. (In this case, you have them convincing companies to pay them for their expertise in certifying products that they want for Jews' own use.)
2. Halacha as the Phlogiston of Rabbinic-Will-To-Power. (The best quote of the entire book (p86) is that "Modern kashrut is 2% Halacha and 98% ego and money and politics.")
*******
Of the book......
153 pages / 4 chapters≈ 38 pps per chapter.
Chapter Content:
1. A century of failures (1855-1940)
2. The current solution
3. Self regulation of the industry
4. Assessment of the effectiveness of the current paradigm.
5. Conclusion/appendices and pre-butting of stupid questions by critics ("Democratic legitimacy of private Kashrut regulation, etc")
Of the big picture:
First is that this great book about Jewish history has the rare advantage of making its argument over no more pages than absolutely necessary (153), and yet still covers a topic that every single observant Jew sees as an issue of concern. ("Kesser Dovid: The Halachic Guide to Dentistry" comes in at 498 pages and has not a single review.)
The second thing is that it takes a specific, discrete topic and pushes it through time and thereby gives us a snapshot of Jewish communities around the same topic at different instances in time.
What do we learn from this? (pps. 32-34).
1. (Stage 1, Europe: Kehilla regulated) From the Middle ages up until 1800, Jewish communities were corporate entities within many various spots in Europe and rabbis there did have the power of enforcement. The number of people who could certify meat was very small and that system worked well for many centuries
2. (Stage 2, US-New York: Synagogue regulated).The first Jewish community in the United States was Sephardic (Spanish and Portuguese), and the board hired a shochet slaughter meat and that person was a synagogue employee. Congregational coalitions worked for a century and a half.
3. (Stage 3 and on US-New York: Trade associations-->independent communal organizations-->government agencies->Public private partnerships ). These stages are all the same thing: fragile coalitions leading to bickering and collapse.
4. (Stage 4, WWII-->Present: professional certification agencies.)
Second order thoughts:
1. It's just amazing how much time it took to get this right. (And you wouldn't think so, because food is something that we have to eat every single day.) Just a smidge under three centuries from start to finish.
2. Pareto Principle in action: OU is primarily Modern Orthodox. Very strange, because Modern Orthodox are only 20% and not highly visible. But they get 80% of the work done. Haredim appear to be just the opposite. Highly visible, 80% of the mass, but for only 20% of the work (if even that).
Conversion standards in North America these days are also predominantly Modern Orthodox.
3. With a nod to the Masorti movement: Halacha really is an evolving thing. Initially "everything is kosher except these things that we tell you are not." Finally...."nothing is kosher *except* these things that we tell you."
4. Then, as now: The (loosely structured) Haredi elements of the Rabbinate have the characteristics of a very ugly, factional, power-hungry entity. There is absolutely *nothing* that cannot be repurposed as a tool to bicker / assert power: Kashrut in one century, geirut in the next.
Side note: Recently, one hechsher in Israel (Barkan) said that they would not certify the wine of a particular company because it had black people working for it. (Ethiopian Jews, many of whom had a secondary conversion by the Israeli rabbinate to remove all doubt of their Jewishness.)
Even though ostensibly the issue was about most Haredim not liking black people (whom they, as a matter of fact, don't) the real issue was what tool a local Court could use to stick a finger in the eye of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate--such as refusing to accept the validity of their conversions. It *incidentally* was about kashrut/black people in this case.
5.
a. Even though Modern Orthodoxy is only 20% of the Orthodox world (Orthodoxy itself is about 12% of All American Jewry)--that scant ≈2.5% of all Jews does the heavy lifting for a number that is many times larger--as well as the great majority of people who would go out of their way to have certified kosher food.
b. Something like 90% of Haredim would never set foot inside of a Modern Orthodox synagogue, but they rely on the same people to certify their food?
c. The hechsher that comes under the most scrutiny and is accepted by only a minor fraction of Haredim (=Triangle K) is actually run by an Agudath Rabbi. (Aryeh Ralbag.)
6. It is in the nature of normative Orthodox Judaism to move to the right, but kashrut certification is constrained in this way because excessive stringency can make it such that one excludes too many perfectly reasonable manufacturers. (It's the obverse of the fact that excessive leniency can alienate the most religious people.)
7. Nicholas Taleb has written before that people who are an extreme minority can influence the mainstream by simple intransigence.
The 12% of Jewry that has any concern about dietary issues becomes the standard bearer for the other 88% simply by refusing to compromise.
Eric Hoffer has written that the desire to keep a job is enough of a reason to explain why clergy persist thousands of years past their originating point. (The Diaspora Rabbinate has been with us for 20 centuries, and the Catholic Church is all that is left of the long perished Roman Empire.)
*******
Much that the author observes is somewhere between predictable and trivial.
1. Government is not the appropriate decision making unit for the overwhelming majority of decisions. Kashrut standards are just one more among a trillion others.
2. The Rabbinate, though emphatically NOT composed of practical Men of Action, is the least bad decision making unit for the task at hand.
3. Of course professional societies / trade unions would not be the appropriate decision making unit, because that's an example of the fox guarding the hen house.
4. This book is an extended practical example of studies of decision making units. I would recommend that this be read in conjunction with Thomas Sowell's "Knowledge and Decisions."
*******
Parting thought: Halacha geirut will not be standardized before the 3rd Temple. After all, kashrut is something that is used every day by every single Jew.
And it took every bit of three centuries to get it right.
There's unlikely to be enough lifetime left in the sun for this process to see itself through.
Verdict: Recommended at the new price.
October 22, 2014
In the first half of the 20th century, kosher supervision was corrupt and unreliable; kosher meat was supervised by local rabbis who, even if they were honest, were often too overloaded to adequately supervise producers. Today, thousands of products are under kosher supervision, and kosher-keeping Jews generally trust the major certifying agencies.
This book seeks to answer the question: what went right? How come kosher supervision is as successful as it is? Prof. Lytton points out that kosher certifiers are much more interdependent than they were 70 years ago because of the increased complexity of food production. Today, agencies must certify foods with a long supply chain of ingredients; in such a situation, a certifying agency must know that every agency certifying any product in that supply chain has to be equally reliable. Thus, each agency can certify more products and get more business when its competitors follow the same standards. It follows that each agency benefits from its competitors' success to some extent. In addition, kosher consumers are vigilant and informed, and both certifying agencies and consumers have a strong sense of religious mission.
This book seeks to answer the question: what went right? How come kosher supervision is as successful as it is? Prof. Lytton points out that kosher certifiers are much more interdependent than they were 70 years ago because of the increased complexity of food production. Today, agencies must certify foods with a long supply chain of ingredients; in such a situation, a certifying agency must know that every agency certifying any product in that supply chain has to be equally reliable. Thus, each agency can certify more products and get more business when its competitors follow the same standards. It follows that each agency benefits from its competitors' success to some extent. In addition, kosher consumers are vigilant and informed, and both certifying agencies and consumers have a strong sense of religious mission.
June 13, 2013
This book is well-researched, stays on message, gives marvelous insight, but is deficient. It is droll (it reads like a long research paper and is devoid of any form of humor), repetitive (it introduces characters fully repeatedly, a pet peeve of mine), and has absolutely no insight whatsoever to the daily lives of mashgichim. I find their day-to-day key to any kashrus discussion. It skirts around, but does not fully discuss, Big Five bullying tactics. A far superior, and vastly more entertaining book, is Sue Fishkoff's Kosher Nation, which this book actually reference and footnotes ad nauseum. In the final analysis, reading both books would give one a quite complete picture of the industry. So do that if you want to be in the know.
June 23, 2013
This book was well written, with clear and helpful discussion of the backstory and implementation of Kosher label systems in the US. That might seem a bit obscure, but with all the current furor over food labels and ingredients, I thought it was very interesting. It seems to me this could be a very effective strategy for many groups who want to label products with various ingredients or other personal philosophies such as "green".
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews