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1998 | Book

Historical Overview Read chapter Read first chapter

Country on the Move: Migration to and within Israel, 1948–1995

Author: Gabriel Lipshitz

Publisher: Springer Netherlands

Book Series : GeoJournal Library

Included in: Professional Book Archive

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About this book

Country on the Move presents original research and a comprehensive multidisciplinary analysis of the spatial aspects of migration. It considers the spatial results of two diametrically opposed policies: planning from above to settle the North African and Asian newcomers in the 1950s, and planning by market forces for immigrants from the former Soviet Union in the 1990s. Unlike other books on immigration, Country on the Move also analyzes internal migration within Israel, which is an outcome of the regional disparities produced by immigration. Moreover, it compares the empirical findings in Israel with international trends, and its analysis can serve as a foundation for setting spatial immigration policy.
Audience: Researchers specializing in population geography, migration, and regional development; university students on all levels who are taking courses in these subjects; and top officials in government ministries that deal with immigration.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter
Historical Overview
Abstract
Between the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and the end of 1995, roughly 2.4 million people immigrated to Israel. They include approximately one million immigrants who arrived in the 1950s, mostly from North Africa and Asia, and around 700,000 who arrived in 1990–1995, most of them from the former Soviet Union (FSU).
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 1. Immigration: An Integrative Perspective
Abstract
Worldwide political and economic changes have altered the spatial patterns of international migration (Salt 1989; Castels and Miller 1993; King 1993b; Nijkamp and Spiess 1993, 1994a, 1994b; Gould and Findlay 1994). The political world order during most of the second half of this century revolved around the Cold War between the United States and the USSR and these two superpowers’ control of various parts of the world. When the Communist regime collapsed, bringing down the Iron Curtain between Eastern and Western Europe, Western European and other Western countries experienced new influxes of immigration, requiring special measures by the destination countries. Immigration from the former Soviet Union to Israel is one outcome of the recent worldwide political changes.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 2. Immigration to Israel in the 1950s: Core Versus Periphery
Abstract
In order to understand the geographical distribution of the immigrants of the 1950s and the government policy that produced it, one should be familiar with the geographical distribution of the population on the eve of Israeli independence in 1948 (for a thorough discussion of this subject, see Kellerman 1993). This distribution was shaped by pre-State waves of immigration that began in 1882. The year 1882 marked the renewal of Jewish settlement in Palestine. Until then there were organized Jewish communities in only four cities in Palestine: Jerusalem, Tiberias, Safed, and Hebron.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 3. Internal Migration and Regional Disparities in the Core-Periphery Structure
Abstract
The previous chapter showed that the geographical distribution of immigrants in the pre-State period—most of them from Europe—determined the distribution of the affluent population in Israel; and that the geographical distribution of the immigrants of the 1950s determined the distribution of the disadvantaged population. The high level of well-being of the former is partly due to the “import of development” by the immigrants and partly the result of their economic success in Palestine in the 1930s and 1940s. The economic hardship of the immigrants of the 1950s is mainly the result of their “import of underdevelopment,” which is related to their economic, educational, and occupational traits in their countries of origin.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 4. The Geographical Distribution of the Immigrants from the Former Soviet Union in the 1990s
Abstract
As we saw in previous chapters, there was little immigration to Israel from the early 1960s until 1989. During this period, 10,000–15,000 immigrants arrived each year, most of them from North America and Western Europe. Many of them were religiously motivated, and therefore a large percentage chose to settle in Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria. A large portion of the newcomers were fairly affluent and well educated, and they settled in the major cities and their environs.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 5. The Economic Absorption of Immigrants from the Former Soviet Union in the 1990s: The National and Regional Levels
Abstract
This chapter examines the economic aspects of the absorption of immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Israel on two geographical levels: the national level and the regional level. On the regional level, emphasis will be placed on the Israeli peripheral regions, where the hiring of immigrants (or the immigrants’ desire to be hired) has been strongly felt.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Chapter 6. Conclusion
Abstract
Israel is perhaps the only country in the world whose immigration policy has hardly anything to do with quotas. Israel is the state of the Jews, as asserted in its Declaration of Independence, read out by the first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, when he proclaimed the establishment of the State in May 1948. Consequently, under the Law of Return, the country’s gates are open to all Jews in the world. Israeli governments in the past and present have not only encouraged Jewish immigration, but have even taken care of the immigrants in their first years in Israel, helping them obtain (or in some cases giving them) housing, employment, education, and welfare. Whereas few—if any—other countries that take in immigrants pay attention to the geographical dispersion of the immigrants, this dispersion, which leads to geographical dispersion of jobs and infrastructure, is an important aspect of immigrant-absorption policy in Israel.
Gabriel Lipshitz
Backmatter
Metadata
Title
Country on the Move: Migration to and within Israel, 1948–1995
Author
Gabriel Lipshitz
Copyright Year
1998
Publisher
Springer Netherlands
Electronic ISBN
978-94-017-1191-3
Print ISBN
978-90-481-4948-3
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1191-3