Mo(ve)ments of Resistance

In Mo(ve)ments of Resistance, Grinberg summarizes both his own work and that of other political economists, providing a coherent historical narrative covering the time from the beginning of Socialist Zionism (1904) to the Oslo Accords and the neoliberalization of the economy (1994–1996). The theoretical approach of the book combines eventful sociology, path dependency, and institutional political economy. Grinberg argues that historical political events have been shaped not only by political and economic forces but also by resistance struggles of marginal and weaker social groups: organized workers, Palestinians, and Mizrachi Jews. Major turning points in history, like the Separation War in 1948, the military occupation in 1967, and the Oslo peace process in 1993, are explained in the context of previous social and economic resistance struggles that affected the political outcomes.

Lev Louis Grinberg (PhD Tel Aviv University) is a political economist and sociologist and associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Ben-Gurion University. He is the founding Chair of the Sociology and Anthropology Department (2006–2009), and is the former director of the Humphrey Institute for Social Research (1998–2003). He was a Fulbright visiting professor at UCLA in 1998, visiting professor at UC Berkeley, and was also granted Koret and Mellon fellowships. His fields of specialization are the history of the Zionist Labor Movement, Israel's political economy, and the sociology of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. His many publications include: Mizrachi Voices (2005), Imagined Peace, Discourse of War (2007); Politics and Violence in Israel/Palestine: Democracy vs. Military Rule (2010).

Sanford R. Silverburg, Catawba College:
"Grinberg is an Argentinian-born, Israeli academically-trained, sociologist and political economist, who with his training and interest looks at Israel’s political development through the filter of class structure and social dominance by European Jews’ control of the Israel political structure. A wide range of the relevant sociological, economic, and political literature is arrayed to support Grinberg’s theory that there has been a continuous tension between marginalized Jewish and Palestinian groups for a share of the economic forces shaping Israeli society. . . . The audience for this book would be the upper levels of academia with a focus on political economics."

Michael Shalev, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem:
“In this volume, Grinberg links key episodes in which Israeli power-holders were challenged by subordinate groups in different arenas and eras. The result is an original and compelling account of Israel's social and political history and a fine illustration of the dialectics that both generate and defuse popular insurgency. Many of the cases are little-known, even to Israelis, and they are analyzed boldly and accessibly, offering original perspectives and insights on the most important political developments of the last half-century, including the massive social justice protests of 2011 and their extinction. Along the way the reader learns a great deal of new things about Israel’s social, economic, and political life.”