The Kibbutz and the State

Abstract

Of all the innovations of Zionism and the Eretz-Israel Labor Movement the most original and unique, in universal terms, was the kibbutz. The kibbutz was based on the belief in man’s ability to change human nature and create an ideal human type. 

The establishment of the State of Israel ended the period of volunteerism that characterized the kibbutz way of life. The kibbutz’s traditional pioneering tasks were appropriated by the state. The kibbutz now emphasized the socialist factor, but, as a motivational element, it failed to arouse enthusiasm. 

The kibbutz thrived in the years when private and general interests coincided. By end of the 1960s, however, the intensity of life and the spirit of the times changed. The kibbutz could not go against Israeli society which was now entrenched in materialism and bent on financial success. In the 1977 political upheaval Menachem Begin’s delegitimization of the Kibbutz Movement undermined the kibbutz members’ self-confidence in their way of life. The slackening of tension in national-pioneering tasks, the inexorable decline in the size of the Kibbutz Movement, its inability to bring in new members, and finally, the changes in the public and social climate – all stemmed from processes that lay beyond its control.