Historical Background

Professor Benjamin Gidron of Ben Gurion University reviews the historical background and growth of Israel’s Third Sector in his important 1997 article ‘The Evolution of Israel’s Third Sector: The Role of Predominant Ideology’.

First he traces cultural and social roots of the Jewish communities living around the world for two millennia with partial autonomy and thus created their own institutions, including organization to help the needy among them. The impoverished communities of Jews in the Land of Israel in the last centuries were supported by Jewish communities in the Diaspora. This culture created certain values still found in Jewish Israeli society today.

During the pre-State era, from 1917 to 1948, Jewish society in Israel maintained itself mostly on its own under the British Mandate through many non-governmental organizations. The Jewish Agency under the World Zionist Federation was one major institution raising funds for purchasing land and assisting immigration. Another major institution was the Histadrut, the labor unions, comprised of the socialist Jewish workers and their culture. Utlra-Orthodox factions operated their various religious and social institutions. There were also political and paramilitary groups, educational institutions, medical centers and other institutions in every sphere of life.

As the State of Israel was formed in 1948 a dilemma arose regarding what to do with the independent institutions - which ones should be nationalized into government institutions, which ones should maintain independent, and which ones can be dissolved entirely. The new state was very patriotic and welfare-oriented, because of dominant ideologies and due to circumstance. However, many social services instead of being nationalized continued to provide their services to society, as if in place of the new state and government. Also, the State itself needed donations from Jews around the world, and so in this aspect as well services were delegated to the newly incorporated non-governmental institutions as systems built for raising money and investing in projects and services. Thus, many non-governmental institutions became as quasi-public bodies in Israel, interacting with the government and society.

In addition to the Zionist non-governmental organizations, the Arab communities and the Ultra-Orthodox communities were organized by their own communal institutions, instead of the Zionist government with whom they strongly disagreed intervening in their affairs.

With the 1970’s, due to various political, technological and economic occurrences, a wave of rebellion or disenchantment towards government control of society ensued, which led to more individualism and a weakening of national solidarity, more ideological factions and more non-institutional behavior. This led to greater awareness of the Third Sector and utilization of independent nonprofit institutions, and following the 1980 Law of Associations (Amutot) over a thousand new nonprofit organizations are registered every year in all fields.

In summary, the author generalizes that “the three eras can also be seen as reflecting the pre-welfare state, the welfare state and the post-welfare state eras”, or, Pre-State, Formative and Pluralistic. The relations of NGO / institutions with the government are broadly in the first stage as independent of sovereign government, in the second stage cooperative complimenting the services of the government, and in the third stage both cooperative and antagonistic, sometimes pressuring or even competing with government services.

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