Birthday profile

Amitai Etzioni

German-Israeli immigrant to the United States, sociologist and political theorist of communitarianism

Born
January 4, 1929
Died
May 31, 2023
Zodiac sign
Capricorn
Birth year
1929

About Amitai Etzioni

Amitai Etzioni (; Hebrew: אמיתי עציוני; né Werner Falk; 4 January 1929 – 31 May 2023) was an Israeli-American sociologist, best known for his work on socioeconomics and communitarianism. He founded the Communitarian Network, a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to supporting the moral, social, and political foundations of society. He established the network to disseminate the movement's ideas. His writings argue for a carefully crafted balance between individual rights and social responsibilities, and between autonomy and order, in social structure. In 2001, he was named among the top 100 American intellectuals, as measured by academic citations, in Richard Posner's book, Public Intellectuals: A Study of Decline. Etzioni was the Director of the Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies at The George Washington University, where he also served as a professor of International Affairs. At this time, he began to go by the first name Amitai instead of Werner, since the principal of Etzioni's new school strongly encouraged Etzioni to introduce himself by a Hebrew name. Etzioni was stuck with his parents in Athens, Greece for a year, unable to enter Palestine since his family was awarded a bachelor permit instead of a family permit.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

The world when Amitai Etzioni was born

Amitai Etzioni was born in 1929. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1929

  • #1 song"Singin' in the Rain"
  • Top movieThe Broadway Melody (first Best Picture winner)
  • Best-selling bookA Farewell to Arms – Ernest Hemingway

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst baseball All-Star Game proposed
  • Top headlineStock market crashes on Black Tuesday
  • Technology milestoneFirst Academy Awards ceremony held
  • Defining fadYo-yos
  • Notable inventionCar radio
  • World population2.10 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderHerbert Hoover
  • Sports championPhiladelphia Athletics (World Series)
  • U.S. population121.8M

1929 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Amitai Etzioni's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19292026
Gas$0.21$3.45/gal
Average home$6,300$435,000
Average income$3,850$67,500
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.02$0.73
Population121.8M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Library of Congress. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.