the IHRA definition across local governments
Adoption over time
Local governments adopted the IHRA definition in waves. British councils adopted it mostly between 2017 and 2020, Canadian municipalities mostly in 2020, and Australian councils from October 2021 to 2025; American cities began in 2020, and their adoptions peaked in 2023.
Most of the adoptions counted come from lists kept by advocacy organisations, not from council records. For Britain, Canada and Australia we listed every local government, adopters and non-adopters alike, so the share adopting can be computed. For the United States and other countries the local governments that did not adopt are not listed, so the tables show how the recorded adoptions are distributed and give no rate of adoption. The decisions themselves, with what each council's record shows, are on the IHRA adoptions page.
Britain: adoption by the age of the Jewish population
more than a fifth of Jewish residents under 15 other councils with 1,000 or more Jewish residents dot size: number of Jewish residents
Britain: which councils adopted
Expected share of councils adopting by the end of 2020
Local governments adopting by end of year: Britain, Canada and Australia
Each line gives the share of all local governments in a country that had adopted the definition by the end of each year: the principal councils that existed in Britain in that year, 737 Canadian census subdivisions with 5,000 people or more, and 541 Australian councils. Hover over the chart for the counts behind each share.
Adoption by Jewish share of the population: Britain, Canada and Australia
Each dot gives the share of local governments in a band that had adopted the definition by November 2026, with the Jewish share of each council's population taken from the 2021 census (2022 in Scotland). Some bands hold only a few councils, as the counts in the tables below show, and a band with no council in a country has no dot.
Adoptions by year and country
Britain: councils adopting by end of year
Each council counts once, at its first adoption with a known year. The count for each year covers the principal councils that existed during that year, so a council abolished in a reorganisation leaves the count from the following year, whether or not it had adopted; this is why the number adopted falls in 2024, after the 2023 reorganisations in Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset. Combined authorities are left out.
Britain: adoption by Jewish share of the population
The Jewish share comes from the 2021 census (2022 in Scotland), for the council's own area. The census gives no figure for councils abolished before 2021 or for councils in Northern Ireland, and these are counted under "share not available". Every council listed for 2016 to 2026 is counted once, whatever year it existed.
Britain: adoption near an earlier adopter
Canada: municipalities adopting by end of year
Canada: adoptions, plans and motions by Jewish share of the population
The Jewish share is by religion in the 2021 census, which asks the question of a 25 per cent sample of people in private households, so the share is not the Jewish count divided by the total population. The plan is Toronto's (2024), and the motions with measures are those of Toronto, Montréal and Côte-Saint-Luc.
Australia: councils adopting by end of year
Australia: adoptions, plans and motions by Jewish share of the population
The Jewish share counts residents reporting Judaism in the 2021 census, by place of usual residence. The plans are those of Waverley, Glen Eira, Port Phillip, Randwick and Hunters Hill (a draft strategy of March 2026), and the motions with measures those of Waverley, Port Phillip, Randwick and Bayside (Vic.). A wider plan that names antisemitism counts as a plan.
United States: adoptions by Jewish share of the county
a project of
Lab for the Global Study of Antisemitism
This site is a team project of the Lab for the Global Study of Antisemitism, housed in the Anne Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto.
Ron Levi and Sol Goldberg
ron.levi@utoronto.ca
Research Team: Cypress Chernik, Lir Josefsohn, and Arianna Seijts, all of whom are undergraduate interns at the Lab for the Global Study of Antisemitism.
This is a work in progress. Corrections are welcome.