Diaspora Members Driving Ideational Change: The Rise of Israel's Conservatism

• In Event: Outsider Ideas and Elite Policymaking

Abstract

The Israeli government formed in late 2022 has been registered as the most right-wing in Israeli history. Before the October 2023 War, the ruling Likud party, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, formed a coalition with far-right parties, including the self-proclaimed predecessor of Rabbi Kahana’s Kach party and the Ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties. Its policies and attempts at dramatic regime and institutional changes have sent shockwaves within the Israeli public sphere and were heavily criticized by international political leadership and media. As acknowledged by protests against the government’s moves and in the media, these attempted changes relate to the recent entry of American conservative ideology. The reforms were designed by newly founded civil society organizations committed to the distribution of ideas that until recently were absent from Israeli public and political discourse. Conservatism, unlike other ideologies, has never been present as a coherent political ideology in Israeli politics. This raises the question: how did such an ideational shift occur?

The existing literature does not provide an adequate explanation for this ideational shift. Indeed, the literature suggests that since established belief systems are relatively stable, ideational changes commonly derive from ideational import. According to prevailing studies, the main sources for such ideational import are national efforts by another country, like US ideational influence during the Cold War, efforts of individual entrepreneurs, like economists and other types of experts, and international knowledge networks of think tanks and transnational advocacy groups. Yet, none of these sources of ideational change apply to the ideational import of American conservatism to Israel. In fact, foreign countries like the US and the EU have had concerns about the changes in Israel, and experts and think tanks have directly opposed it.

In light of the limited ability of prevailing explanations to account for the ideational change that took place in Israel, we develop a theoretical framework that identifies an additional channel of ideational import: the cooperation of agents from a diaspora with local agents. We argue that the unique location of these agents, at the intersection between the homeland and the hostland, allows them to effectively convey influential ideas from the hostland to the homeland. Such conveyance takes place in practice through “organizational localization” - the establishment of organizational infrastructure, and then through “ideational localization” - adaptation of external ideas to the local context.

We utilize this novel analytical framework to explain the rise of the conservative Right in Israel as deriving from ideational import of members of the Jewish diaspora in the US who cooperated with local agents in the Israeli Right. We use process tracing to analyze how these agents have established a network of organizations, inspired by US conservative organizations, which translated, adapted, and disseminated American conservative ideas to the local Israeli context. Our analysis demonstrates how this ideational import has already had a meaningful influence on the Israeli Right and the Israeli political system and public discourse.

This paper not only advances our understanding of ideational changes by uncovering a previously overlooked mechanism of ideational import but also contributes to the literature on diasporas. It refines our perception of the role diasporas play in their homelands. Beyond conventional roles such as promoting their homeland interests and providing financial aid, the case of Jewish-American conservatives exemplifies how diaspora actors strive to actively influence domestic politics, by strategically investing resources in the establishment of an ideational movement focused on importing, adapting, and disseminating foreign ideas within the local context.

Authors

• ‪Or Asher‬‏, Tel Aviv University

• Ronen Mandelkern, Tel Aviv University