***** The Global Political Economy of Israel
Jonathan Nitzan & Shimshon Bichler
$35.95 Paperback
Release Date: 8/1/02
ISBN: 0745316751
Distributed for Pluto Press
About the Book
Over the past century, Israel has been transformed from an
agricultural colony, to a welfare-warfare state, to a globally
integrated "market economy" characterized by great income
disparities. What lies behind this transformation? Why the shift in
emphasis from "war profits" to "peace dividends" -- and back to
conflict? How did egalitarianism give rise to inequality? Who are the
big winners here, and how have they shaped their world?
Never before have these questions been answered as they are in this
highly original book. In order to understand capitalist development,
argue Bichler and Nitzan, we need to break the artificial separation
between "economics" and "politics," and think of accumulation itself
as "capitalization of power". Applying this concept to Israel, and
drawing on seemingly unrelated phenomena, the authors reveal the big
picture that never makes it to the news. Diverse processes -- such as
global accumulation cycles, regional conflicts and energy crises,
ruling class formation and dominant ideology, militarism and
dependency, inflation and recession, the politics of high-technology
and the transnationalisation of ownership -- are all woven into a
single story. The result is a fascinating account of one of the
world's most volatile regions, and a new way of understanding the
global political economy.
About the Author(s)
Shimshon Bichler teaches political economy at colleges and
universities in Israel.
Jonathan Nitzan teaches political economy at York University in Toronto.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Capital and Power: Breaking the Dualism of 'Economics' and 'Politics'
3. The History of Israel's Power Structure
4. The Making of Stagflation
5. The Weapondollar-Petrodollar Coalition
6. From Foreign Investors to Transnational Ownership
References
Index
Reviews
"The Global Political Economy of Israel is hard to review without
superlatives. . . . I read it as a desert traveller who has finally
reached an oasis. It is full of details, flatters the reader, but
demands an intellectual effort. In return, it explains not only the
'how' but also the 'why'. Bichler and Nitzan have put aside the
justifications, the misleading terminology, the dis-information, the
speculation in blood. They came to the party with their cameras, only
that instead of conventional film, they used x-rays."
-- Haim Baram, Kol Ha'eer
"The reader will find in this book a whole world, Kafkaesque in
nature and scope. . . . Naturally, it deserves attention from
economists . . . but it could also be read as a first-class cultural
document. Above all, it is a grand, perpetual deconstruction of
Israel's material reality, a penetrating, sarcastic and well-written
study of 'where we live'. Rarely does a single book transform the
entire worldview of a reader. This book does it. Eye opening.
Depressing."
-- Dror Burstein, Kol Ha'eer
"You could agree or disagree with The Global Political Economy of
Israel, but it is undoubtedly the most riveting and outstanding
economics book you would have read this year."
-- Globes
"An arresting and creative book. Moving beyond standard explanations,
the authors reveal the underpinnings of Israeli's history and
politics, and in doing so provide a new framework to examine other
such societies in global politics."
-- Jeffrey Harrod, Professor of International Political Economy,
University of Amsterdam
"I devoured it in few days. It is a great, impressive and
illuminating book, as well as a fascinating read. The enemies of
Bichler and Nitzan, but also their admirers, will now be a
thousand-fold."
-- Aryeh Kofsky, Professor of Comparative Religion, Haifa University
"I read the hundreds of pages of this book like a thriller. . . .
There is a great deal of anger in this book and a great deal of
humor. Reading economic literature is usually very boring. This book
is fascinating. Marxists and socialists of all kinds, if they don't
want to give answers from the day before yesterday to yesterday's
questions, should definitely read it."
-- Itzhak Laor, Professor of Literature, Tel Aviv University
"Bichler and Nitzan are without doubt two of the more innovative
political economists in the world right now. Relying primarily on
data gathered by themselves, with brutal precision and unwavering
logic they dispense with the thick layer of ideologies and
mystification to lay bare the innermost structures of power of
Israeli society. This accessible but deeply disturbing book is not
only the most authoritative study of the Israeli State to date, but
also a significant contribution to state theory and globalisation. I
would place it on par with Poulantzas' work in the seventies. It is a
masterpiece."
-- Ronen Palan, Professor of International Political Economy,
University of Sussex
"This innovative and thoroughly researched examination of Israel in
the global political economy is a brilliant addition to the growing
'new political economy' literature. The volume is distinguished by
its engaging style. Theories are laid out clearly and evaluated
empirically with reference to a rich descriptive and quantitative
data base that includes economic and political variables. Indeed,
among the greatest strengths of this work is the way that economics
and politics are fully integrated throughout; another is how well the
authors site Israel's domestic political economy in a larger web of
external strategic and economic relationships. I recommend it highly
and look forward to sharing it with my students."
-- Mary Ann Tétreault, Professor of International Political Economy,
Trinity University
"Professional academics will, of course, hate it. They will say it is
not 'science' and they will say it is not scholarship, it will be
called 'journalism' and all that. But you guys knew of course what
you were doing. And I am glad you did it this way, because I would
have never even opened the book if it were classical scholarship.
Life is too short. I found it a good read, a very good read,
illuminating, very funny at times, and even when I did not agree
(because my views on life, social justice, political organization,
are very different than yours), I found it challenging and engaging.
I also loved, just loved, all the gossipy snippets. A 'Must' read for
anyone interested in the debate about globalization and its
discontents, this book pricks and deflates all hot air balloons in
sight.
-- Joseph H.H. Weiler, Jean Monnet Professor of Law, NYU School of Law
A sample chapter of this title is not available at this time. For
further information, please email <info at ubcpress.ubc.ca>.
How To Order
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<http://www.ubcpress.ca/search/title_book.asp?BookID=2997> *****
Jonathan Nitzan: <http://www.yorku.ca/polisci/faculty/nitzan.html>
Adam Hanieh, "An Interview with Dr. Shimshon Bichler," _Between the
Lines_ (March 2002):
<http://www.between-lines.org/archives/2002/mar/Shimshon_Bichler.htm>
***** Science & Society (Fall 2000)
...The current issue begins with a study by two Israeli economists,
Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler, "Inflation and Accumulation:
The Case of Israel." This is both a careful sketch of recent economic
history, with implications for political and social trends in the
Middle East, and an application of a novel theoretical perspective,
developed by the authors in a series of recent works. Marxist models
of capitalist accumulation have implicitly treated "capital" as a
unified entity, which can be studied at the macro level ("capital in
general"), or at the level of a representative firm. Nitzan and
Bichler suggest, to the contrary, that some of the crucial dynamics
of accumulation and inflation result from the division between the
largest core firms of an economy, and the remaining firms. The core
firms may accumulate "differentially," i.e., at the expense of the
peripheric firms, and they may do this via two different regimes:
breadth, and depth. While breadth and depth regimes do not alternate
in a determinate cycle, they do have internal limits, which may
explain how a particular regime comes to an end. Explanations of this
type, in turn, can be used to understand the inflation cycle
experienced by Israel in the postwar decades. Nitzan and Bichler's
study imaginatively combines theory with data, and demonstrates how
meaning can be teased out of empirical information even when the data
sources are limited....
<http://www.scienceandsociety.com/editorial2_fall00.html> *****
***** Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan, "Military Spending and
Differential Accumulation: A New Approach to the Political Economy of
Armament--The Case of Israel", RRPE 28(1) March 1996, pp. 51-95
ABSTRACT: This paper offers a new approach to the political economy
of armament, focusing on the relationship between military spending
and differential accumulation in mature capitalist economies. Applied
to the "model" case of Israel, our analysis suggests that the
militarization of Israel's economy since the late 1960s occurred
within a growing dichotomy between large and small firms. The
econometric model shows that the "military-bias" of Israeli industry
raised the profits of the large corporate conglomerates but
constrained and even lowered those of smaller companies.
<http://www.urpe.org/28-1-3.html> *****
--
Yoshie
* Calendar of Events in Columbus:
<http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>
* Anti-War Activist Resources: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/activist.html>
* Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/>
* Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osu.edu/students/CJP/>