Law and the Culture of Israel

Menachem Mautner

Tells a compelling narrative of the war of cultures between secular and religious Jews, offering insights to anyone seeking to understand Israeli history
Offers a critical analysis of the sweeping judicial activism in the Israeli Supreme Court, of value to those studying comparative constitutional law
Presents a powerful argument for a new approach to multiculturalism in Israel, with broader applications to religiously divided societies

Law and the Culture of Israel

Menachem Mautner

Description

Menachem Mautner offers a compelling account of Israeli law as a site for the struggle over the shaping of Israeli culture. On the one hand, a secular, liberal group wishes to associate Israel with Western culture and to link Israeli law to Anglo-American liberalism. On the other hand, a religious group wishes to associate Israeli culture with traditional Jewish culture, and to found Israeli law on traditional Jewish law. The struggle between secular and religious Jews has been part of the life of the Jewish people in the past 300 years. It resurged in the 1970s with the rise of religious fundamentalism and the decline of the political and cultural hegemony of the Labor movement. The secular group reacted by shifting much of its political action to the Supreme Court which since the establishment of the state has been the state organ most identified with entrenching liberal values in the country's political culture. In a short span of time in the early 1980s the Court effected extensive changes in its jurisprudence, most strikingly adoption of sweeping judicial activism which is widely regarded as the most far-reaching in the world. The Court's activism provided the secular group with the means for intervening in decisions of the state branches over which the group had lost control. With Arabs being a fifth of the country's population, an additional divide in Israel is that between Jews and Arabs. Drawing on notions of multiculturalism, political liberalism and republicanism, Law and the Culture of Israel offers fresh insights as to how to manage Israel's divisive situation.

Law and the Culture of Israel

Menachem Mautner

Introduction
1. Zionism and the Evolving New Culture in Eretz Israel (Palestine)
2. The Cultural Struggle Over the Shaping of the Law of the Jewish Society in Eretz Israel (Palestine) and in the State of Israel
3. From Judicial Restraint to Judicial Activism
4. The Decline of Formalism and the Rise of Values
5. From Hegemony to Multiculturalism: Law and Culture in a Polarized Society
6. The Supreme Court and the Future of Liberalism in Israel
7. Law and Culture in Israel in the Coming Decades
Conclusion
Bibliography

Law and the Culture of Israel

Menachem Mautner

Author Information

Menachem Mautner is the Danielle Rubinstein Professor of Comparative Civil Law and Jurisprudence at the Tel Aviv University, Faculty of Law. He was Dean of the Faculty. Mautner teaches courses in the areas of law and culture, multiculturalism and contract law, and was awarded the 'Zeltner Prize for Excellence in the Law' and the Tel Aviv University Rector's Prize for Distinction in Teaching. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the book series Law, Society and Culture published by the Faculty of Law, Tel Aviv University. Mautner is the author of four books, and his book The Decline of Formalism and the Rise of Values in Israeli Law is the most cited book in Israeli law in the past two decades. Mautner is also the editor of five books, including Multiculturalism in a Democratic and Jewish State, and the author of over 70 articles and chapters in the areas of law and culture, multiculturalism, jurisprudence and contract law.

Law and the Culture of Israel

Menachem Mautner

Reviews and Awards

"A penetrating study of the role of the activist Israeli Supreme court in the changing political and economic context of the past thirty years. Mautner argues, with calm conviction, that difficult political choices embracing greater multiculturalism need to be made so as to reconcile the centrifugal tendencies of the divided components of Israeli society. But he also offers valuable lessons for those interested in the increasing importance of Supreme and constitutional courts worldwide. An indispensable work of legal scholarship and political analysis." --David Nelken, Distinguished Research Professor of law, Cardiff University and Visiting Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Oxford

"This book by Menachem Mautner is one of the most important academic acheivements ever published on the relationship between law and culture in Israel...(it) respects the importance of (the law's) Jewish characteristics and yet allows greater freedom and human righrs to it's non-Jewish minorities... This book is unquestionably required reading for all students, scholars, and serious observers of law and society in Israel.'" --Gad Barzilaj

"Mautner's current book, iLaw and the Culture of Israelr, condenses twenty years' worth of publications into 226 pages. Subjects Mautner has discussed at great length in Hebrew are here discussed in brief." --Adam Hofri-Winogradow, Edinburgh Law Review

"An excellent guide for anyone seeking to understand the special place of law in Israeli society today." --Yedidia Z. Stern, The American Journal of Comparative Law