The Rapid Economic Development of Israel and the Emergence of the Ethnic Division of Labour

This paper deals with the formation of the ethnic division of labour within the Jewish population in Israel during the rapid economic growth of the first decade of the existence of the state. It is argued that the division of labour stemmed from the specific patterns of economic development and the expanding capitalist relations of production. This approach is opposed to the functionalist view which argues that the position of the oriental immigrants was determined by their 'traditional', pre-immigration, characteristics. Four major economic spheres argiculture, construction, industry and the civil services are examined in terms of the specific pattern of growth in each sphere, the ethnic division of labour it entailed and the ethnic division of rewards. Finally, the paper discusses the function of the dominant ideology in disguising the concrete ethnic-class relations. The oriental Jews who arrived in Israel en masse after the establishment of the state in 1948, found themselves occupying the lower echelons of Israeli society. This fact has been explained by Israeli social scientists, politicians, and journalists alike as the natural and only possible result of the immigrants' demographic, occupational and educational characteristics. At the same time, the oriental immigrants' entrance into Israeli society has been described as the beginning of a process of modernisation which will end in their dispersal throughout the social structure. The basic assumption underlying this view is that Israeli social structure was well established when the immigrants arrived, and that they entered categories which were already in existence in that structure. The structure is assumed to have been composed of upper, middle, and lower categories. The immigrants are assumed to have crowded the lower categories, due to their background characteristics. British Journal of Sociology Volume 33 Number 1 March 1982 (C) R.K.P. 1982 0007 1315/82/3301-0064 $1.50