This book offers a nuanced and sophisticated analysis of the secularization of certain public spaces in Israel since the late 1980s. Two forces have propelled this development: mass immigration from the Former Soviet Union (FSU) and economic growth that has involved globalization, a neoliberal order, and a consumer society. Ben-Porat defines secularization as the “decline of religious authority,” and based on this definition he identifies four major spheres in which secularization has taken place in Israel: the de facto increase in non-Orthodox marriage, the growing availability of secular burial, the prosperity of the non-Kosher food market, and the expansion of commercial and cultural activities on the Sabbath. The “entrepreneurs” who create these changes (such as owners of companies that produce or sell non-Kosher food, nonorthodox rabbis who conduct marriage ceremonies, or managers of secular cemeteries) might be ideologically motivated, but very frequently they have other agendas, including finding a pragmatic solution to a personal problem or economic interests. Therefore, this secularization does not necessarily reflect or herald an ideological change in Israeli society, and it has not been accompanied by parallel changes at the level of formal politics. It remains limited to a set of strategies that Ben-Porat classifies as “sub-politics.”
These insights are developed through rigorous investigation using diverse methods, including mapping exercise based on secondary materials, in-depth interviews with “secular entrepreneurs,” and cross-tabulations based on a survey conducted by the author in 2009 (the size of which is not mentioned). The methodological diversity as well as the decision to investigate multiple spheres add validity to the arguments presented in the book but are also a derivative of the author's conceptual framework which views secularization as “a bricolage of changing beliefs, practices, and affiliations that do not always move in lockstep with one another” (p. 24). This bricolage is illustrated very clearly.
As the book demonstrates, three out of the four above-mentioned paths of secularization (civil marriage, secular burial, and non-Kosher food) are limited to a large extent to two distinct categories of Israelis: upper middle-class Ashkenazi Jews who self-identify as “secular” in popular discourse and surveys; and immigrants from the FSU who arrived within the post-1980s wave of immigration. In the case of secular burial, the practice is shared among an especially tiny minority (2% of burials). The vast majority of Jewish Israelis who define themselves as Ultra-Orthodox, religious, or masortiim (an intermediate category between secular and religious) do not share the practices or attitudes associated with these three paths. In terms of ethnicity, Mizrahim in Israel only marginally take part in these processes. The fourth path, commerce on the Sabbath, is shared among not only secular Jewish Israelis but also many masortiim.
In addition to its limited demographic boundaries, secularization has “met a counter-process of religionization” (p. 28) in every one of these four spheres. Furthermore, in other contexts religious authority in Israel has only increased. This aspect is less developed in the book but the concluding chapter does mention some examples: Orthodox demand has led to strict separation between men and women in some private and public transportation services, and rabbinical authority has gained a stronger hold in the military. To these cases one should add other spaces that have become more religious, but were not included in the book. For example, many Jerusalem neighborhoods that were considered secular or mixed in the past have gained a clear Ultra-Orthodox character. A similar process has taken place in other cities, such as Rehovoth and Beit-Shemesh. Some soccer teams, the most prominent among them Betar Jerusalem, have decided that their home games can no longer take place on the Sabbath, a decision embraced by the rabbinical establishment. In recent decades, the religious Zionist youth movement, Bnei Akiva, has implemented separate activities for girls and boys in many of its local branches, defying decades of tolerance to mixed activities. In Muslim towns and cities in Israel, drinking alcohol in public was tolerated during the 1970s, but is today unacceptable.
What I suggest here is that, with the exception of commerce on the Sabbath, which has gained massive support by the Israeli public, what we are witnessing might not be the “secularization of Israel” but rather “secularization in Israel.” The Israeli public sphere has become more fragmented and decentralized, which allows different groups to promote their worldviews and interests based on the local or contextual balance of power, rather than as a derivative of the balance of power at the national level. The result is that certain spheres and spaces have developed a more explicit and extreme articulation of their secular or religious character.
My hesitation to adopt the book's subtitle does not subtract from my general appreciation of this important project. It is an excellent and refreshing contribution to the study of Israeli society, and I would certainly assign it to my students.
