It was in this way that Józef Kwiatek, a prominent activist of the Polska Partia Socjalistyczna (PPS: Polish Socialist Party), defined the concept of the Jewish problem in a brochure entitled Kwestia żydowska [The Jewish problem]; it was issued in October 1904 as the 28th edition of the monthly, Latarnia [Lantern], published by the Polska Partia Socjalno-Demokratyczna Galicji i Śląska (PPSD: Polish Social Democratic Party of Galicia and Silesia). This definition was commonly accepted by Polish Socialists and Social Democrats. They were in general agreement concerning the genesis and existence of the Jewish problem within Polish territory and how it differed from the question of the socio-economic and cultural status of Jews in other countries, although some of the publicists and ideologists of the Polish workers’ movement, not always sharing the social democratic orientation-such as Socjaldemokracja Królestwa Polskiego i Litwy (SDKPiL: the Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania)emphasized above all the economic circumstances of the Jewish problem. What divided Socialist thinkers, however, was the variety of approaches to the solution of the problem, although all foresaw its disappearance along with the liquidation of unjust social relations. Some postulated assimilation as the one means of resolving it, others spoke out for full equality of Jewish people in every area of social life, and others again saw the solution in the realization of the idea of national-cultural autonomy, or within the framework of some similar form of national self-government.

The climax of disagreement among Polish Socialists over the Jewish matter took place in the first and fourth decades of the twentieth century. In the first period various concepts and viewpoints were worked out in an attempt to address the many new issues which arose at the turn of the last century as a result of the sociopolitical processes taking place in Jewish society in Poland.