The case for optimism about Israel

[oberliner]

When I wrote this week that Israel appears increasingly bound for a future of authoritarianism and international isolation, as Israelis continue to trade away their democracy to maintain their occupation of the Palestinians, I received two broad categories of counterarguments.

The first, most associated with the Israeli right, says that the status quo is basically sustainable or not worth changing in the immediate future. According to this view, Israel will be able to preserve both the occupation of Palestinians and Israeli democracy in something akin to perpetuity. While this position often acknowledges the occupation as bad, it views the costs of ending the occupation as exceeding the benefits to Israelis.

The second, more in line with the Israeli left, acknowledges that the status quo cannot continue forever and that the occupation is actively eroding Israeli democracy. But in this view, Israeli democracy itself will be able to solve the problem, by appealing to the ideals and long-term interests of Israeli voters to convince them to end the occupation, even with all the short-term risk that brings.

To understand this latter view, I spoke with Naomi Paiss, the vice president of public affairs at the New Israel Fund, a left-leaning pro-Israel organization that works with civil society institutions in Israel to promote and preserve Israeli democracy. What follows is a transcript of our conversation, edited and condensed for clarity.

http://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8410089/israel-naomi-paiss

[Scootaloo]

1. It's a feel-good denialist argument

Sort of like we hear from pollyannas on climate change. "Oh don't worry, once it gets bad we'll invent something that will make it bettr! That's how technology works."

Israel defines itself by a single ethnic group. That is counter-productive to the notion of democracy. You can have your ethnic supremacism, or you can have democracy. You can't have both. And history shows that when these two forces butt heads, ethnic supremacism wins out - not htel east becuase its adherents are more than willing ot use violence to guarantee their primacy over more liberal-thinking people.

At least, in the short term, it wins out. But an awful lot of damage can be done in a short time.

[oberliner]

2. What about Croatia?

Croatia defines itself by a single ethnic group and is a liberal democracy.

Similarly, Macedonia, Slovenia and the other countries that emerged from the former Yugoslavia.

[Scootaloo]

3. Does it?

Tell me all about Croatia, Oberliner. You're obviously more intimately familiar with the place than I am.

Maybe it works better when the nation is 90% one ethnicity. of course, it we look back in history to see exactly howthat percentage was achieved... it's not really pretty.

[oberliner]

4. Yes

Maybe you can Google for more info. I only know the very basics.

Macedonia might be a better example since the demographics there are fairly similar to Israel in terms of the Macedonians making up a little over 60 percent of the population, and a sizable Albanian minority making up around 25 percent.

[Scootaloo]

6. I did google, it didn't really help

I mean for defent information, i would need to have a frame of reference, right? "how does Croatia compare to israel" got me nothing useful.

Since you leaped to the comparison, I thought you had something.

I did see that none of the former Yugoslavian states are exactly top-shelf liberal democracies. Most are more along the liens of "well... we're not Belarus, I guess." Which COULD be a point of comparison to Israel - There are people who love to point out that Israel is much better than Syria on several issues.

Were you just naming states that happen to be named after an ethnic group, Oberliner?

[bemildred]

7. I will comment a little.

You can have one ethnicity or many. What gets you in trouble is having a few and focussing on them, allowing them to enter the legal system and the law. When ethnicity offers legal and economic advantages, people will exploit that and before you know it you've got an ethnic conflict.

The USA is a case of "many", and when things work well here (it has happened occasionally) it is because all such issues are ignored, in venues where everybody is treated the same. And when things suck here, it's because some assholes decided that THEIR ethnicity and their religion is best and everybody else OUGHT to conform too or they DESERVE what they get.

One of the things you do when you "celebrate diversity" is you don't celebrate any one in particular. You enjoy your own and pick the best from the others.

[shira]

9. Same old, tired refuted assertions from you. Tell me this Scootaloo....

Would Greeks ever agree to a situation in which Turks are allowed to become the majority, rename Greece into "Western Turkey", and run Greece according to Turkish customs and traditions? Greeks lose their self-determination, are the minority, possibly a persecuted minority?

I could ask you that WRT any country. Italy could allow so many Tunisians in that it becomes Northern Tunisia, etc...

============

If you're consistent, you'd accuse both Greece and Italy of being ethnic supremacist nations for never allowing such a thing to happen.

Well....?

[Little Tich]

5. The Israel envisioned in the OP is one I would accept relatively easily.

Apart from all the other elephants in the room, I have unfortunately no doubt in Netanyahu’s ability to kill this vision permanently if he gets to become PM again.

I like Israel as a country, but Israel as a state is very far from what it could be.

[geek tragedy]

8. it's not a very convincing argument, unfortunately

The only thing the Israeli left has done over the past decade is lose, lose, lose.

Voters do not think about long-term issues.

[shaayecanaan]

10. The US was founded on WASP culture

which to a large extent has transcended ethnicity and become a catholicised, universal culture. People the world over wear suits, play golf, drink scotch and eat cheese sandwiches without even the slightest degree of self-consciousness. On the other hand if I wear a kimono while on holiday I instantly feel like a dill. It is a dress for Japanese people, after all.

That very lack of perceived ethnicity has ensured that WASPs have been able to lord over their subjects without a great deal of consternation. Fully 40% of American presidents were blue-blooded Anglicans or Presbyterians (who only make up about 5% of the population). No one seems to mind.

Jewish culture is not a republican culture. It is an endogamous culture and it is much more prickly about the extent to which outsiders can participate. As you said, WASP racism is essentially "you must become one of us", whereas Jewish racism is "you will never be one of us".

The WASPs have been in the colonialism business a long time. The Jews have only been at it for forty years, and you could fit their colonial possessions in a picnic basket. When you consider how modest the whole enterprise is it is shocking just how much effort has gone into it. More effort has been expended hanging onto a sandpit than was expended by the WASPs in controlling one-quarter of the world's surface.

[oberliner]

11. No idea what this response means

Or how it relates to anything in the OP.

When did I make any comment about WASP racism?

"The Jews" have colonial possessions?

I seriously have not a clue what you are going on about here.

[shaayecanaan]

12. its more a riff on the whole thread

there were a couple of responses that compared america and Israel. I wasn't really responding to anyone in particular so I tacked it on at the end.

[oberliner]

13. OK fair enough

I'm still not sure I get the thrust of what you are trying to say, though.

[aranthus]

14. So what?

Every country has a founding culture. That's why there are countries. Some cultural group stakes out a piece of land and calls it home. And without that founding unifying and cohesive culture, countries don't survive. See Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Soviet Union, Iraq, Syria, etc. And to the extent that "American" has become a universal culture (which I believe is less than you allude to), isn't that at least a function of the power of the ideas of the culture?

[shaayecanaan]

15. Put it this way

there are republican cultures and non-republican cultures (there are better words for this, Max Weber probably is a good start, but lets proceed).

Non-republican cultures get along swimmingly as long as non-members of that culture are relatively insignificant - eg Japan, Armenia, etc etc.

Non-republican cultures can also govern a country with minorities essentially by using a strong hand, eg Titoist Yugoslavia, China and Israel to some extent. The problem is that this can come unstuck, and generally tends to do so given enough time.

The WASPs and the French have succeeded in building pluralist states. Even other European states have struggled to do so (ie Germany, Belgium with its tension between the Flemish and Walloons, etc). Both the English and the French created postcolonial states that survive to this day. None of the political structures created by the other Europeans in their colonies survived.

Part of this, is, as you say, those cultures are inherently strong. Even if every WASP on the Earth were to die tomorrow their culture would still live on. The security that this gives WASPs means that they are also uniquely placed to indulge criticism and to even attempt reforms of their culture (a phenomenon called culturalism, rather than nationalism, which is usually motivated by insecurity).

Neither Israeli culture nor Jewish culture is that sort of culture. Non-republican cultures have tended to fare extremely poorly when attempting to obtain colonies. Japan made a terrible mess of colonising Asia during World War 2, even if they had not been defeated militarily, their subjects would probably have booted them out eventually. These were countries that had been colonised fairly uneventfully by the Europeans for several centuries.

[aranthus]

16. Interesting ideas.

I propose the word 'ideaic" to describe what you call "republican-culture." It is a culture that is entirely or mostly defined by its ideas instead of its ethnicity or bloodline, as opposed to ethnic cultures. Those cultures have a universal message, which makes them attractive, especially to the have nots of the world, and also makes it easier to assimilate newcomers or colonies. Part of that, at least in American culture, is that it is based on Christianity and Judeo-Christianity, so that there is a desire to obtain converts. Our society isn't merely open to immigrants. At some level, we want immigrants (despite how we've treated and are treating some). Jewish is in many ways an ideaic culture, although it's nowhere as open as American or even English or French. It's somewhere between a very ethnic society like Japan and the totally ideaic United States. And I think someone like Israeli would tell you that Israel is or at least should be moving in the direction of a society that is open to all. The real issue in I/P is that you have two very distinct nations living very close to each other, and they each want to live their way. We can have Hispanics in the US, and we're fine as long as they generally want to live as Americans. But if close to half the country was Hispanic and wanted to live as Mexicans or Guatemalans, there would be a problem. Also, I think the Israelis would say that the West Bank isn't a colony of Jewish culture . Rather, it is the heartland of Jewish civilization. Some are quite honest about merely wanting as much of the land as possible with any Arabs. To be clear, that is not something that I support. My point is that it isn't quite as cut and dried that Israel is a colonizing non-republican/non-ideaic/ethnic society.