Economic factors and political strategies: the defeat of the revisionists in mandatory Palestine
| Autor: | Lilly Weissbrod |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 1983 |
| Předmět: |
Cultural Studies
History Sociology and Political Science media_common.quotation_subject Mandatory Palestine Geography Planning and Development Political structure Independence Power (social and political) Politics Political science Protest vote Political economy Development economics Opinion poll Ideology media_common |
| Zdroj: | Middle Eastern Studies. 19:326-344 |
| ISSN: | 1743-7881 0026-3206 |
| DOI: | 10.1080/00263208308700554 |
| Popis: | Israel was governed by the Labour party continuously for the first 29 years of its existence. When the Likud party came into power in 1977, this was not due to any massive increase in its support, which rose from 30.2 per cent in 1974 to 33.4 per cent in 1977, but rather to a considerable decline in the support of Labour. Therefore, observers at first put down the 1977 election results to a protest vote, and predicted a temporary setback for Labour. It was argued that many people had voted for other parties, and principally for Dash, a new slightly left-of-centre formation, to punish Labour for the debacle of the October 1973 War, and for a considerable number of unsavoury scandals involving prominent Labour figures. Indeed, the inadequate functioning of the Likud government during its first term in office, and the deteriorating economic situation in Israel seemed to support the above prediction, as did various public opinion polls indicating a decline in Likud popularity.' Yet, despite these objective reasons for disillusionment with Likud, it actually gained considerably in the 1981 elections, its vote rising from 33.4 per cent in 1977 to 40 per cent in 1981. Moreover, its popularity has been increasing to 45 per cent, according to a poll conducted in April 1982.2 The present success of Likud begs the question of its past continuous failure to gain power. The period deciding the political structure and power distribution of a society is said to be that in which its various political parties coalesce. The power distribution is set in these formative years and remains relatively unchanged.3 One may question the general character of this contention, but it does seem applicable to a new society, such as Israel. Since the political structure of Israel was formed prior to its independence, it is in that period that the factors which perpetuated the electoral failure of Likud, or rather of its precursor, the Revisionist party, should be sought. No social process can be explained by a single factor, and the formation of a political structure is no exception to this rule. Yet it would be impossible to analyze in one article all the causes accounting for the electoral failure of the Revisionists. I shall therefore confine myself to a discussion of the economic factors involved, and touch upon others only in passing. Organizational factors have already been pointed out by other researchers4 and I have analyzed ideological ones elsewhere.5 Economic factors have the advantage of showing not only why things occurred, but also why they occurred at certain points in time rather than others. But, though economic variables will be emphasized throughout this article, the reader must bear in mind that they provide only a partial explanation of the events discussed. This will become evident as other factors will be pointed out to complement the economic explanation. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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