Security Concerns: Insights from the Israeli Experience(v. 17 Contemporary Studies in Sociology)

This work offers a holistic presentation of security, its broader sources and ramifications in Israel - and by extension, any other country in the world. We extend the usual focus of analysis to include elements of societal life rather than the usual formats restricted to the military sphere or, alternatively, to a single sector of society. Working from a psychological/sociological/geopolitical approach, this work provides a truly multidisciplinary perspective. We assembled contributions from political scientists, sociologists, historians, psychologists, a geographer, a criminologist, and educator, a media expert, and an economist. These authors bring together an array of conceptual tools and methodologies, highlighting for readers, again the set of formative security variables, antecedent factors, and social mechanisms that are instrumental in shaping security concerns and responses, as well as insecurity-security's wider impact on any given society.

Table of Contents:
Foreword (E.A. Cohen, P.H. Nitze). Preface (D. Bar-Tal et al.). Introduction (D. Jacobson, D. Bar-Tal). The Dilemmas of Security. The elusive concept, and pursuit, of security (D. Bar-Tal, D. Jacobson). Outside history? Israel's security dilemmna in a comparative perspective (G. Merom). Shaping Factors. Through the Jewish historical prism: overcoming a tradition of insecurity (E. Luz). The geographical and territorial imprint on the security discourse (D. Newman). The Zionist security concept (Y. Elam). Responding to threat--the dynamics of the Arab-Israel conflict (G. Ben-Dor). Ben-Gurion's enduring legacy (R. Pedatzur). Socializing Agents. The Israel defense forces as a specializing agent (M. Popper). Israel's security intellectuals (M. Keren). The security narrative in Israeli literature and cinema (N. Gertz). The changed security discourse in the Israeli media (Y. Peri). Israeli Society as the Product of Insecurity. The argument of "national security" in politics and jurisprudence (G. Barzilai). Public opinion: long-term patterns (A. Arian). Security-related stress and the quality of life (S.F. Landau). Security and the national economy (Y. Lifshitz). Women's status in the shadow of security (H. Herzog). Security and Israel's Arab minority (S. Ozacky-Lazar). Between the transcendental and the temporal: security and the religious Jewish community (S.A. Cohen). Security Futures. Political subcultures and civilian militarism in a settler-immigrant society (B. Kimmerling). A militaristic society or a democracy in uniform (M. Lissak). Israel's quest for ultimate security: strategies and prescriptions (Y. Dror). Epilogue: learning from the Israeli experience (A. Klieman). Index.