Symposium on Continuity and Change in Political Culture, Israel and Beyond Register here
Co-edited by Yael S. Aronoff, Ilan Peleg, and Saliba Sarsar
Ten leading scholars and practitioners of politics, political science, anthropology, Israel studies, and Middle East affairs address the theme of continuity and change in political culture as a tribute to Professor Myron (Mike) J. Aronoff whose work on political culture has built conceptual and methodological bridges between political science and anthropology. There will be three consecutive panels on the three themes of the book by its contributors.
Conflict and Peace 11:00-11:55 am EST (6-6:55 pm IST) followed by 10 minute break
Yael S. Aronoff- Pathways to Peace: Legitimation of a Two-State Solution
Aronoff is the director of the Serling Institute for Jewish Studies and Modern Israel and is the Serling Chair in Israel Studies at Michigan State University. Dr. Aronoff teaches in James Madison College, where she is associate professor of political science. Her book, The Political Psychology of Israeli Prime Ministers: When Hard Liners Opt for Peace, was published by Cambridge University Press (2014), and she is the current president of the Association of Israel Studies
Saliba Sarsar- Memory, Identity, and Peace in Palestinian-Israeli Relations
Sarsar, born and raised in Jerusalem, is the author of Peacebuilding in Israeli-Palestinian Relations (2020), Jerusalem: The Home in Our Hearts (2018) and What Jerusalem Means to Us: Christian Perspectives and Reflections (2018).
Nadav G. Shelef- Denationalization in the Israel-Palestinian Context
Shelef is the Harvey M. Meyerhoff Professor of Israel Studies and professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. His most recent books include Homelands: Shifting Borders and Territorial Disputes (Cornell University Press, 2020) and Evolving Nationalism: Homeland, Identity and Religion in Israel, 1925–2005 (Cornell University Press, 2010).
Yossi Beilin- The Ecological Fallacy: “Trust” in International Relations— The Case of the Settlement Freeze in the Oslo Process
Beilin initiated the Oslo Process in 1992, the “Beilin-Abu Mazen agreement” in 1993–1995, and the Geneva Initiative in 2001–2003. He also headed the Labour Party and the Meretz Party. Beilin was Israeli Justice Minister and served as deputy minister and as minister in four governments in Israel from 1988-2001.
Challenges to Democracy 12:05- 12:50 pm EST (7:05-7:50 pm IST) followed by 10 minute break
Naomi Chazan- Israel’s Democracy at a Turning Point
Naomi Chazan is professor emerita of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and currently serves as a senior research fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and at the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace. She has written and edited nine books and over seventy scholarly articles, headed the Meretz Party, and was President of the New Israel Fund.
Ilan Peleg– Majority-Minority Relations in Deeply Divided Democratic Societies: The Israeli Case in a Globalized Context
Peleg is the author or editor of eleven books and over ninety scholarly essays. A former president of the Association of Israel Studies, he is the founding editor-in-chief of Israel Studies Forum, the scholarly journal of the Association for Israel Studies.
Joel Migdal- Creating the Public in a Society of Strangers: Inclusion and Exclusion in American Cities
Migdal is the Robert F. Philip Professor Emeritus of International Studies in the University of Washington’s Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies. Among his books are Strong Societies and Weak States; The Palestinian People: A History (with Baruch Kimmerling); and Shifting Sands: The United States in the Middle East.
National Memory, Memorialization, and Dramatization 1:00- 1:45 pm EST (8:00-8:45 pm IST)
Yael Zerubavel- The Bible Now: Political Satire and National Memory
Zerubavel is professor emerita of Jewish studies and history at Rutgers University and the former founding director of the Bildner Center for the Study of Jewish Life. She is the author of the award-winning Recovered Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli National Tradition (University of Chicago Press, 1995), and Desert in the Promised Land (Stanford University Press, 2019). Professor Zerubavel is the recipient of the 2019 Lifetime Achievement Award in Israel Studies from the Association for Israel Studies and the Israel Institute.
Roland Vazquez- Victim Sculpture and an Aesthetic of Basque Politics
Vazquez is professor of Anthropology and Social Science at Upper Iowa University. His book Politics, Culture, and Sociability in the Basque Nationalist Party (University of Nevada Press, 2010) is an ethnographic study of Basque partisan competition.
Jan Kubik- Tadeusz Kantor’s Theater as an Antidote against the Excesses of Nationalism and Idiocy of State Socialism
Kubik is professor in the Department of Political Science at Rutgers University and professor of Slavonic and East European Studies at University College London (UCL). Among his publications are The Power of Symbols against the Symbols of Power; Anthropology and Political Science, with Myron Aronoff.