Political Studies (1996). XLIV, 287-302 Rawls on Respect and Self-respect: an Israeli Perspective JOSE BRUNNER AND YOAVPELED’ Tel Aviv University This essay provides a detailed and critical analysis of Rawls’ notions of respect and self-respect from the vantage point of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It demonstrates that Rawls’ empirical and normative claims concerning respect and self-respect are pivotal to his theorizing on psychology and politics. It considers the extent to which processes and developments in Israeli-Palestinian relations can be said to be compatible with - or even corroborate - some of Rawls’ empirical hypotheses concerning the interdependence of respect and self-respect. It establishes where the values entailed in Rawls’ perspective on respect and self-respect would place a Rawlsian vis-a-vis some aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian question. This essay considers the extent to which Israeli-Palestinian relations can be said to be compatible with - or even corroborate - some of Rawls’ empirical hypotheses concerning the interdependence of psychological and political factors. Rawls develops such general hypotheses when he defends the viability and stability of his ideal of the well-ordered society in the third part of A Theory of Justice. He argues there that institutions, even if they were just according to his conception, would have to be dismissed as unworkable if one had to assume that they aroused and encouraged psychological propensities which undermined their stability.’ Since Rawls’ empirical generalizations are set within a normative discourse, we also wish to establish where the values entailed in Rawls’ perspective on self-respect would place a Rawlsian vis-a-vis some aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian question. Before we turn to this double test of Rawls’ theory, we demonstrate in the next section that Rawls’ empirical and normative claims concerning respect and self-respect are pivotal to his theorizing on psychology and politics. Our discussion provides a detailed analysis of the notion of self-respect and of the way in which Rawls makes its existence contingent on two factors: on (a) equal basic rights and (b) multiple standards of excellence or conceptions of the good. In each of the succeeding parts of the essay we then look at the Rawlsian theory of justice both in terms of its factual assumptions and its normative appraisals of the dynamics of respect and self-respect from the vantage point of the Israeli political experience. We start this dual examination by showing how the dominance of one standard of civic excellence in Israel’s political culture has ’ The authors are grateful to Ronit Peleg for her comments on an earlier draft of this paper. J . Rawls, A Theoq,ofJustice (Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press. 1971), p. 531. From hereon Rawls’ A Theory of Justice will be referred to as TJ. <C,PoliticalStudies Association 1996 Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road. Oxford OX4 IJF. UK and 238 Main Street. Cambridge, MA 02142. USA 288 Ran,ls or1 Respect and Self-respect produced a conception of civic identity which has resulted in a hierarchical order of respect and self-respect among members of the two ascriptive groups - Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs - living within the Israeli control system. Then we discuss the recently-crystallized demand of some citizen Palestinians i.e. Palestinians who live within the 1948 borders of Israel and who therefore possess Israeli citizenship - for national-cultural autonomy as an attempt to combat this hierarchical order within the bounds of law. Drawing on the work of two eminent social psychologists, we interpret this demand as a struggle for respect and self-respect by a collectivity marginalized by the dominant definition of Israeli civic virtue, Thus, from a Rawlsian vantage point this demand may be taken as compatible with - or even corroborating Rawls' empirical claims concerning the importance of self-respect as a primary good in politics. Moreover, we intend to show that on a normative leve(, a Rawlsian position is bound to lead to an endorsement of the demand of Israeli Palestinians for cultural autonomy. We then focus on the difference between reactions of citizen and non-citizen Palestinians - the latter living under military occupation since 1967 and, more recently, also within the boundaries of the interim Palestinian self-government analysing them in terms of the different relations these two groups have had with the Israeli state. Thus we contrast the Palestinian demand for national-cultural autonomy within the framework of the Israeli state with the ir?r(fada,the violent national uprising aimed at establishing an independent Palestinian state. In this instance we conclude that the events of the hjtfada are incompatible with the simple causality which Rawls has suggested in A Theor). of Justice, whereby selfrespect is predominantly made dependent on the existence of basic liberal rights. Instead, we suggest a dinlectics of disrespect, whereby the marginalization or exclusion of social groups leads to their growing into a social union with scales of value of their own and conceptions of the good which are independent of - or even opposed to - the one promoted by the dominant group. This alternative standard of excellence can then serve various strategies of social competition and become a source of respect - and hence selfrespect - for the members of an oppressed community who do not possess basic liberties. ~ ~ Rawls on Respect and Self-Respect In Rawls' 'original position' the parties can make decisions only on thc basis of desires which they are bound to have as individuals, regardless of what particular identity they might assume. Rawls describes these desires as aiming at primary social goods. Thus, primary goods 'are things which it is supposed a rational man wants whatever else he wants'.' Thus, primary goods can be assumed to be necessary for all people, wherever they are located on the social ladder, whatever their talents are, and however they wish to live. Rawls suggests that certain self-evident assumptions can be made about primary goods, such as that people, other things being equal, will prefer a wider rather than a narrower range of them, and a greater rather than a smaller share. Hence, he adds in Political Liberalism, the notion of primary goods allows 'a practicable public basis of interpersonal comparisons based on objective features of citizens' social ' TJ. p. 92. C Political Studies Association. 1996 JOSE BRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 289 circumstances open to view’.4 Among such primary goods Rawls mentions ‘rights and liberties, opportunities and powers, income and wealth’. However, in parentheses he also directs the reader of A Theory of Justice to Part Three of the book, where he says ‘the primary good of self-respect has a central p l a ~ e ’ . ~ And in Part I11 of A Theory of Justice one indeed finds self-respect mentioned as ‘perhaps the most important primary good’.6 Why does Rawls consider self-respect to be more important than other primary goods? He regards individuals as purposive, rational agents, who have to see value in their pursuits. However, without self-respect or self-esteem one’s life plan cannot seem worth carrying out. In other words, for Rawls self-respect is the most fundamental precondition of the human ability to make a rational life-plan and to actualize it in p r a ~ t i c e . ~ Without it nothing may seem worth doing, or if some things have value for us, we lack the will to strive for them. A11 desire and activity becomes empty and vain, and we sink into apathy and cynicism. Therefore the parties in the original position would wish to avoid at almost any cost the social conditions that undermine self-respect. The fact that justice as fairness gives more support to self-esteem than other principles is a strong reason for them to adopt it.’ How, then, do people gain self-respect? Rawls considers the parties to the ‘original position’ primarily as political persons, who acquire self-respect by the possession of basic liberties which prevent slavery and oppression and endow them with equalpolitical status. As he puts it: ‘[tlhe basis for self-esteem in ajust society is not then one’s income share but the publicly affirmed distribution of fundamental rights and liberties’. While he assumes that people are ready to accept economic inequality, in his view they are not ‘disposed to acknowledge a less than equal liberty’ since this would ‘publicly establish their inferiority as defined by the basic structure of society’.’ Thus Rawls also speaks of a ‘natural duty of mutual respect’, assuming ‘that those who respect themselves are more likely to respect each other and conversely. Self-contempt leads to contempt of others and threatens their good . . . Self-respect is reciprocally self-supporting’. l o What happens when there is a lack or loss of self-respect? According to Rawls, combined with feelings of humiliation and impotence, such a condition leads to what he defines as envy. In the third part of A Theory of Justice Rawls is deeply concerned about the danger of such envy, which he defines ‘as the propensity to view with hostility the greater good of others even though their being more fortunate than we does not detract from our advantages’. As Rawls emphasizes, ‘the main psychological root of the liability to envy is a lack of selfconfidence in our own worth combined with a sense of impotence. Our way of life is without zest and we feel powerless to alter it or to acquire the means of doing what we still want to do’.“ People acting out of envy are driven by spite ’ lo “ J. Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York NY, Columbia University Press, 1993), p. 181. TJ, p . 62. TJ, p . 396. TJ, p. 178. TJ, p. 440. TJ, p. 544. TJ, p . 179. TJ. p. 534. ‘CPolitical Studies Association, 1996 290 R a d s on Respect and Self-respect and actively seek to spoil things for others, even without benefiting from this destructive action themselves. They have lost all social solidarity and have become incapacitated for participation in the game of justice. Blinded by envy, they aim to deprive others of their good, in order to reduce inequality, even at the cost of reducing the well-being of everybody involved. In other words, when motivated by envy people may prefer absolute lower positions for all in exchange for less inferiority.” Although Rawls holds such envy to be ‘excusable’ he also regards it as irrational. In his eyes, ‘a rational individual does not suffer from envy. He is not ready to accept a loss for himself if only others have less as well‘.’3 Not surprisingly, Rawls suggests that in order to avoid envy, ‘[tlhe best solution is to support the primary good of self-respect as far as possible by the assignment of the basic liberties that can indeed be made equal defining the same status for Rawls’ principles of justice can be interpreted, then, as directed above all at preventing situations which might give rise to envy - the destructive impulse which plays the role of evil demon in his framework, with the power to ruin the rules of the game of justice and undermine its stability. In fact, Rawls justifies the serial ordering of the two principles of justice, in which the first principle - postulating an egalitarian distribution of basic liberties is accorded primary importance, by pointing to its impact on self-respect.” In his view, ‘[iln a well-ordered society . . . self-respect is secured by the public affirmation of the status of equal citizenship for all; the distribution of material means is left to take care of itself in accordance with the idea of procedural justice’.‘6 Since Rawls makes self-respect contingent primarily upon formal political equality, it is not a scarce good and not subject to rules of competition. Hence, Rawls can conceive of an egalitarian distribution of self-respect.I7 However, in other instances Rawls shifts his ground to some extent and refers to self-respect as a good which, although of great importance and necessary for the pursuit of any end in life, is itself dependent on the fulfillment of a number of conditions, which Rawls calls ‘social bases’. In such formulations, which can already be found in A Theor?, of Justice, but which prevail especially in his later writings, the social bases of self-respect rather than self-respect itself - are declared to form a type of primary good. As he puts it in Polirical Liberalism ‘we argue that self-respect depends upon, and is encouraged by certain public features of basic social institutions, how they work together and how people who accept these arrangements are expected to (and normally do) regard and treat one another. These features of basic institutions and publicly expected (and normally honoured) ways of conduct are the social bases of self-respect’.’* Although in some of his later writings Rawls points to weaknesses in A Theor), of Justice, he spares his emphasis on self-respect from self-criticism. Rather, he reiterates that it is necessary to point to ‘the fundamental significance of self-respect and self-esteem (. . .) and so of the social bases of ~ ~ I’ l4 I’ l6 l8 T J , p. 532. TJ. p . 143. TJ, p. 546. TJ. p. 543. T J , p. 545. See H. Shue. ‘Liberty and self-respect’, Ethics, 85 (1975).198 Rawls, Political Liberalism. p. 319. Political Studres Ascocialion. 1996 JOSE BRUNNER AND YOAVPELED 29 1 self-respect as a primary In Political Liberalism Rawls again speaks of ‘the fundamental importance of self-respect’.’O Thus, from A Theory of Justice to Political Liberalism Rawls’ discourse consistently establishes a triple-link between basic liberties, rational choice and self-respect. (1) In some instances self-respect appears as a primary good, that is, as a good which any rational human being will choose for his or her ends, and which together with basic liberties is to be distributed equally among all citizens. (2) Other passages invert the chain of reasoning and present it as rational to choose the Rawlsian principle of equal distribution of basic liberties because it provides the most efficient basis for self-respect. (3) Finally, Rawls’ common-sense psychology assumes self-respect to be interdependent with the respect which rational people accord one another on a mutual basis, and which finds its political expression in the public affirmation of basic liberties. By establishing this triple-link, Rawls diverges from the approach to liberties governing much of the Anglo-Saxon tradition of contractarian thinking since John Locke. This approach regards rights and liberties exclusively as elements of a reciprocal agreement among individuals, by means of which they aim to protect themselves from the interference of others with their lives and property. In contemporary political thought this approach has been articulated most unequivocally by Isaiah Berlin in his celebrated article on ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’. There Berlin differentiates a ‘desire for recognition’ from a ‘desire for liberty’. He defines the latter as aiming at the holding off ‘of others who trespass on my field or assert their authority over me, . . . intruders and despots of one kind or another’. In contrast, he identifies the desire for recognition with ‘a desire . . . for union, closer understanding, integration of interests, a life of common dependence and common sacrifice’.?’ Although Berlin claims that the ‘great cry for recognition’ expresses a deep-seated human craving which has to be grasped in order to understand political behaviour, the aim of his discussion is to draw a clear line between the two desires and to point to the dangers which a conflation of the two bears for the realization of a society based on ‘negative’ principles of liberty.22 In contrast to Berlin’s minimalist, hands-off attitude towards others, Rawls’ triple-link emphasizes the social side of individuals and their duties and obligations towards each other. Even though he advances a liberal contractarian approach, he regards the well-ordered society as a reciprocal and equal agreement to mutually respect each other. This is the type of liberalism which Fukuyama has associated with a Hegelian outlook. As Fukuyama explains, such a ‘Hegelian “liberalism” can be seen as the pursuit of rational recognition, that is, recognition on a universal basis in which the dignity of each person as a free and autonomous human being is recognized by all’.23Fukuyama regards this liberal vision both as more noble than the tradition which follows Locke ” J. Rawls, ‘Justice as fairness: political not metaphysical’ in J. A. Corlett (ed.). Equality and Liberty: Analyzing Rawls and Nozick (Houndsmill. Macmillan, 1991). p. 172. 2o Rawk, Political Liberalism, pp. 3 18-9. I. Berlin, ‘Two concepts of liberty’ in Four Essays on Liberiy (London, Oxford University Press, 1969), p. 158. 22 Berlin, ‘Two concepts of liberty’, pp. 154-62. We wish to thank Yael Tamir for drawing our attention to this passage. 23 F. Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man (London. Penguin, 1992), p. 200 (original emphasis). On Hegel and the right of recognition, see S.B. Smith, Hegel’s Critique of Liberalism (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1989), pp. 122-3 1. C Political Studies Association, 1996 292 Rawls on Respect and Self-respect and as 'a more accurate account of what people around the world mean when It may be astonishing to discover they say they want to live in a dem~cracy'.'~ Hegelian elements in Rawls' work. However, such components can also be found in the work of a number of notable contemporary liberal thinkers, such as Ronald Dworkin and Joel Feinberg. and, less surprisingly, in recent contributions by Axel Honneth and Charles Taylor. They all share with Rawls the assumption that self-respect is dependent on the respect one receives from others, and portray liberal rights as an expression of the respect which society as a whole is willing to grant its member^.'^ Thus, to focus on the Rawlsian understanding of the dynamics of respect and self-respect in an examination of his theory of justice from the vantage point of Israeli politics and the Arab-Israeli conflict. means to probe Rawls' theory at one of its cores - which, in addition, is also a core feature in the thought of other important contemporary philosophers. However, equal liberties are not the only basis of self-respect in Rawls' framework. The other factor which contributes to the growth of self-respect is the existence of a multiplicity of standards of excellence, or virtue, in society. According to Rawls, such a plurality of standards will make it more likely that every person feels esteemed by one standard or another, as opposed to a situation where people compete continuously for respect on the basis of a single standard. Thus, 'as citizens we are to . . . avoid any assessment of the relative value of one another's way of life . . . democracy in judging each other's aims is the foundation of self-respect in a well-ordered society'.'6 In later articles, and especially in Political Liberalism, Rawls expands on this point, explaining that according to the liberal view there are many reasonable but incommensurable conceptions of the good. each of them compatible with the full rationality of human persons, though they are incompatible with one another. Praising this liberal vision of cultural and political pluralism, Rawls argues that '[olne of the deepest distinctions between political conceptions of justice is between those that allow for a plurality of opposing or even incommensurable conceptions of the good and those that hold that there is but one conception of the good which is to be recognized by all persons, so far as they are fully rational'.'' By the late 1980s Rawls has also stated that modern society is characterized by four 'general facts of political sociology and human psychology'.28 One of the most important facts is, again, the diversity of doctrines, that is, of reasonable but conflicting conceptions of the meaning of life." As Rawls has repeatedly pointed out, 'the diversity of comprehensive religious, philosophical, and moral doctrines found in modern democratic societies is not a mere '' Fukuyama. The Etiii of Hislor!. (itid the Lart Mati. pp. 199 -200. R. Dworkin. 'Why liberals should care about equality' in A Matter of Principle (Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press. 1985); J. Feinberg. 'The nature and value of rights' in Rights, Justice and the Bounds qf'Liberij,:Essui..c m Social Philosopli!~(Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press. 1980); A. Honneth. Kattipf' um Anerketitiung: x r nioralischeti Gruntmarik soiialer Konflikte (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp. 1992); C. Taylor. Multiculturalisrtl and 'the Politics of Recognition' (Princcton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1992) 'b TJ. v . 442. Rawls. 'Justice as fairness', p. 163. J. Rawls, 'The domain of the political and the overlapping consensus'. New York Univcrsitj. L ~ Review. M 64 ( 1989). 234. l9 Rawls, 'The domain of the political and the overlapping consensus', p. 235. '' i Political Studies Association. 1996 JOSEBRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 293 historical condition that may soon pass away; it is a permanent feature of the public culture of d e m o c r a ~ y ’ .Thus, ~ ~ even though Rawls conceives of the possibility of imposing legitimate limits on the range of permissible conceptions of the he cautions that ‘in a constitutional democracy the public conception of justice should be, as far as possible, independent of controversial philosophical and religious doctrine^'.^^ Finally, throughout Political Liberalism Rawls emphatically affirms this pluralistic view and declares unequivocally that ‘justice as fairness does indeed abandon the ideal of political community if by that ideal is meant a political society united on one (partially or fully) comprehensive religious, philosophical, or moral doctrine’.33 Rawls’ argument in favour of multiple conceptions of the common good, which articulates his second condition for the presence of self-respect, is part of a ‘thin’ theory of social unity, which according to Rawls distinguishes a wellordered democratic society from both community and association. Thus, Rawls’ citizens take little interest in their relative social positions, and avoid assessing the value of one another’s way of life. They acknowledge that there are many and incommensurable standards of the good, each compatible with the rationality of persons. Respect and Self-Respect in the Jewish State Any attempt to read Rawls from the perspective of the Israeli political scene and the ethnic conflict dividing Israeli society between Jews and Palestinians, immediately reveals a serious shortcoming which the Rawlsian perspective shares with most contractarian theories: the Rawlsian corpus lacks references to conflicts among ethnic collectivities. In contrast to Rawls, Jurgen Habermas has rightly stressed that ‘[iln the political arenas . . . it is collective actors who face one another when arguing over collective goals and the distribution of collective goods’.34 Since Rawls theorizes on the basis of a simplified model of the nation-state, in which the political and the cultural frameworks of a community are identical, he consistently fails to take into consideration the political effects of the predominance of ethnic groups in most actually existing societies. Thus, Vernon Van Dyke has rightly pointed out that Rawls ‘tends to conceive individuals in their separate personal capacities rather than in their capacity as members of ethnic and national groups’.35 Hence Rawls treats the problem of justice exclusively as one of individuals and neglects to take account of the fact that virtually all societies are ethnically heterogeneous. In our view, however, a theory of justice must acknowledge the plural nature of societies and ultimately also be a theory of justice among groups. To quote Van Dyke once more: Actually, to stress individualism in a democracy and to ignore or neglect the claims of groups is to fight the battle of any ethnic community that Rawls, ‘The domain of the political and the overlapping consensus’, p. 234-5. Rawls. ‘Justice as fairness’, p. 165. 32 Rawls, ‘Justice as fairness’, p. 145. 33 Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 201. 34 J. Habermas, ‘Struggles for recognition in constitutional states’, European Journal of Pliilusophy, 1 (1993), 128. 35 V. Van Dyke, ‘Justice as fairness: for groups?’, American Political Science Review, 69 (1975). 609. 30 j’ ?’ Political Studies Association, 1996 294 R a n h on Respect arid Selfrespect happens to be in a majority. Those in a majority community can insist on individualism and the nondiscriminatory treatment of individuals. and can decry any differentiations based on race, language, or religion, knowing that this formula assures their dominance. If the less numerous ethnic communities are to preserve their identity and their culture, and even if they are simply to be assured of fair consideration of their interests, it may well be imperative to grant them special rights as collective entities.j‘ Our aim, however, is not so much to point to limitations and problematic ramifications of the Rawlsian perspective. Rather, we wish to show that even though Rawls’ individualist ontology regards only individuals as ‘selforiginating sources of valid claim^',^' his conception of self-esteem or selfrespect as a primary good does open the way to an extension of his individualist principles into an argument for collective rights or cultural rights. Kymlicka is right in claiming that a notion of a ‘primary good of cultural membership’ can be inferred from Rawls’ argument without distorting it.38 Kymlicka draws attention to Rawls’ acknowledgement of the fact that individuals do not decide on their life-plans from scratch, but rather rely on models and ways of life of those who have preceded them.” Rawls seems to be aware, therefore, that individuals cannot take their decisions on how to lead their lives in a social and cultural vacuum. In one way or another, the range of options they consider is embedded in their cultural heritage, that is, in the form of life or ethos into which they are born and which determines their sense of who they are to a large degree. Individuals are situated in cultural narratives of various kinds: they live through, and inherit memories of, culturally-specific individual and collective life-experiences which suggest what is worthwhile and valuable, and how they are to choose their ends.@ If the cultural heritage and standards of excellence of a minority culture are denigrated or marginalized by a dominant and exclusionary standard of civic virtue, and if access to role models. cultural norms and values, and participation in the common good are denied to members of a minority culture, their ability to gain self-respect, make rational life plans and decide what is worthwhile, might be seriously impaired. Thus. not only individualistically conceived basic liberties are to be counted among the social bases of self-respect. Rather, it follows that the public recognition of society as composed of a plurality of groups with equal status is also a fundamental condition of the self-respect of individuals. Israel is a particularly suitable case for examining the vicissitudes of respect and self-respect of groups and individuals in ethnic politics. It is a society which combines a liberal constitutional framework with a strongly republican ethos. A Jewish state by self-definition, Israel has a Palestinian-Arab minority of about 15%. and its Jewish population is divided almost equally between Jews of ” V. Van Dyke. ‘Collective entities and moral rights: problems in liberal democratic thought’, Journal of Polrfrcs, 44 ( 1982). 40. See also V. Van Uykc. ’ I-hc individual, the state, and ethnic communities in political theory‘, U’urld PolifiLs. 29 ( 1977). 343-69; W. Kymlicka, ’Liberalism and the politicization of ethnicity’. Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence, 4 ( I99 I), 239-56. I’ J. Rawls, ‘Kantian constructivism in moral theory‘, Journal of fhilosophj. 77 (1980). 543. 3x W. Kymlicka. Liberulism. Cumrnimir). and Culture (Oxford, Claretidon, 1989). ch. 8. ‘9 Kymlicka, L i h e r a l i . ~Cornniunitj ~. and Culture. p. 177; see TJ, pp, 563-4. 4o Kymlicka, Liberalism. Communitr and Culture. p. 165; J . Raz; ‘Multiculturalism: a liberal perspective‘. Disserir, 41 (1994). 71, 1 P O ~ l l l C dSlUdle< ~ A W K I ~ I I O1996 ~. JOSEBRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 295 European and of Asian-African origin. In addition, at present the Israeli ‘control ~ystem’,~’ encompasses non-citizen Palestinians living on the West Bank. Until recently, this control system included non-citizen Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as well as on the West Bank, who had lived under Israeli occupation since 1967 but who now live within the boundaries of the recently established Palestinian self-government. Within its own borders, Israel has been able to maintain a stable democratic regime which has withstood five major wars, thirteen national elections, massive immigration waves and at least one serious economic depression. However, the political stability within Israel itself is contrasted sharply by the intifada, or national uprising, of the non-citizen Palestinians, which took place in the occupied territories between the end of 1987 and 1993. An important reason behind Israel’s ability to manage its internal ethnic conflicts within the framework of the law, is the particular character of its political system. As Peled has previously shown, Israeli political culture distinguishes two types of citizenship: republican citizenship for Jews and liberal citizenship for Arabs.42 For, as Peled explains, while Jewish and Palestinian citizens formally enjoy equal citizenship rights, only Jews can exercise their citizenship as practice, by attending to the dominant common good prevailing in the society. Only they share in the historical experience and political ethos which are at the heart of this common good and form the core of the dominant cultural lifeform. Israel’s political culture and its constitutional arrangements are rooted in the experience of the yiskuv, the Jewish community in Palestine under the British Mandate (1922- 1948). Jewish settlement in Palestine was conducted through most of its pre-statehood period under the ideological banner of Labour Zionism. The dominant ethos of that period was chalutziyut (pioneering) - the mutual redemption of the Jewish people and their land through physical labour, agricultural settlement and military defence. As a political community the yishuv was semi-voluntary in nature under the aegis of the British Mandate. Chalutziyut served as its dominant standard of excellence, or desert, the criterion by which, in theory at least, civic recognition was accorded to individuals and social groups. Thus, from the very beginning, contrary to Rawls’ ideal of competing notions of the common good, the members of the yishuv had to compete continuously for respect on the basis of a single standard, and the relative values of different ways of life were measured against one another. As the civil religion of the yishuv, chalutzivut had a distinctly republican character. It served to distinguish not only between Jews and Arabs, but also between the (mostly European) Jews who, having given up on the comforts of European life, regarded themselves as idealistic pioneers, and the (mostly nonEuropean) Jews who were regarded simply as immigrants and placed in a secondary position in terms of public esteem. Thus, while individual rights and the procedural rules of democracy were widely respected in the yishuv, they were 4 1 B. Kimmerling, ‘Boundaries and frontiers of the Israeli control system: analytical conclusions’ in B. Kimmerling (ed.), The Israeli State and Society: Boundaries and Frontiers (Albany N Y , State University of New York Press, 1989). 42 Y. Peled, ‘Ethnic democracy and the legal construction of citizenship: Arab citizens of the Jewish state’, American Political Science Review, 86 (1992), 432-43. Our summary of the development of Israeli ethno-republicanism draws heavily on Peled’s essay. C: Political Studies Association. 1996 296 Rawls on Respect and Sev-respect clearly seen, in line with republican thinking, as secondary in value to the collective Zionist mission. The hegemonic standard of excellence mandated by this mission, chalut,-iyut, privileged not only Jews in general over their Palestinian neighbours, but also European over Middle Eastern Jews. The ethos designed to legitimize the transition to statehood in 1948 was termed mamlachfiyut.The conventional translation of mamlachtiyut is ‘statism’, which is unfortunate, because of the proto-fascist connotations of the latter term. Although, literally, mumlachu means ‘kingdom’, mamlachtiyut conveys a sense of common purpose, as determined by an all-encompassing socialpolitical community and expressed in the rule of law. Thus the concept borders on Rousseau‘s General Will. Its introduction emphasized the shift from sectoral interests to the general interest, from semi-voluntarism to binding obligation, from foreign rule to political sovereignty. Equal application of the law was of paramount importance if the state was to assert its authority over the various Jewish social sectors. which had enjoyed a large degree of autonomy in the JYshUV. Mamlachtiyut. however, was not meant to displace chalutzi-vut as the legitimating ethos of society, but rather to subsume it within the organizational framework of the state. In the words of David Ben-Gurion: ‘[elven if in their private lives they act as chahrtzini, both the individual, and the organizations of individuals, will fail if they do not put their chalufzic activity in the service of the state. and if the state’s financial, organizational and legislative power is not committed to the clialutzic tasks that are thrust upon us’.43Thus, as Peled has pointed out, individuals and social groups were to continue to be evaluated on the basis of their contributions to the dominant common good, defined by the Zionist code of civic virtue. Following Peted’s argument. then, we regard the dominant strain in Israel’s political culture as an ethno-republicanism. Jewish ethnicity is a necessary condition for membership in the political community, and the contribution to the Zionist project of redemption. which is defined in Jewish and European terms, is a measure of one’s civic virtue. In other words, the Israeli political community is constituted around one standard of civic excellence which (a) creates inequalities among Jews and (b) e.ucludes Palestinian Arabs who. as nonJews, cannot belong to the ethnically-defined community, and as those from whom the land is to be redeemed, cannot partake of Zionist civic virtue. Yet, Peled has also stressed that despite the exclusion of Palestinian citizens from the republican definition of citizenship, the Israeli policy did not take the form of an apartheid Herrenvnlk democracy for Jews only. Rather, Israel’s Palestinian citizens, who could not acquire full. republican citizenship, were granted a residual. truncated political status: they do not share in attending to the common good, but they are more or less secure in their possession of basic liberal rights (although many of these rights were suspended from 1948 till 1966, when Israel’s Palestinian citizens were ruled through a military administration). The dominance of one standard of civic excellence, which characterizes the Israeli political ethos, clearly contradicts Rawls’ ideal of a well-ordered society, which should accept a plurality of conflicting but reasonable world views, and where ‘the state is not to do anything intended to favour or promote any ‘’ Cited in P. Medding. The Founding of Israeli Democracy (New York, Oxford University Press, 1990), p. 136. i Political Studzes Asrmatmn. 1996 JOSEBRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 297 particular comprehensive doctrine rather than another, or to give greater assistance to those who pursue it’.44For even though the imposition of such a dominant conception of the good does not necessarily entail a denial of basic rights to parts of the citizen-body, it still creates a hierarchical order of mutual respect and self-respect, to which Rawls is strongly opposed. Since this conception of justice excludes Israel’s Palestinian citizens from attending to the common good and bars them from presenting their own alternative conceptions of the good, the best they can look for under present conditions is further consolidation in practice of the individual, liberal rights they already possess in law. It should come as no surprise, then, that many of them have come to demand autonomous control over their own communal affairs. Sammy Smooha explains that as part of this demand, citizen Palestinians seek ‘control over their educational system, state recognition of Arab national organizations . . . the freedom to form nationalist Arab parties, the right to establish an Arab university, and a proportional share of the national resource^'.^' In 1988 Smooha found that 47.5% of his citizen-Palestinian respondents supported the option he defined as ‘consociationalism (‘allowing Arabs to organize independently and become partners in state institutions’ and ‘granting Arabs separate legal status, like the autonomy offered to the Arabs in the West Bank and Gaza Strip’). In 1976, only 36% of Palestinian respondents supported that option. More significantly, perhaps, support for this option among Jewish respondents increased from 5 % in 1980 to 17% in 1988. Among Palestinian respondents, about an equal number (48.3%) supported the liberal-democratic option (‘achievement of equality and integration with Jews’), while among Jewish respondents this option was supported, for the first time, by fewer people (1 5.3%) than the consociational one.46However, official Israel rejects this drive for autonomous institutions because it appears as impinging on its JewishZionist character and engendering secessionist sentiments. In the wake of the work of social psychologists John Turner and Henri Tajfel, we regard the demand for cultural autonomy as part of a strategy which can be termed ‘social competition’. As Tajfel explains: ‘ “[s]ocial competition” consists of the minority’s attempts to retain their own identity and separateness while at the same time becoming more like the majority in their opportunities of achieving goals and marks of respect which are generally valued by the society at large’.47According to Turner and Tajfel there are two preliminary conditions which usually lead minorities to choose the strategy of social competition. (a) The successful assimilation or integration of individuals from the minority does not lead to an improvement of the status of the minority as a group. (b) The minority group possess strong separate cultural norms and values Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 193. S. Smooha, Arabs and Jews in Israel, vol. 2, Change and Continuity in Mutual Intolerance (Boulder CO, Westview, 1992), p. 266. 46 Smooha, Arabs and Jews in Israel, vol. 2, p. 113; see also A. Bishara, ‘On the question of the Palestinian minority in Israel’, Theory and Criticism: an Israeli Forum, 3 (1993), 7-20. [Hebrew]. 4’ H. Tajfel. Human Groups and Social Categories: Studies in Social Psychology, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 335; J. Turner, ‘Social comparison and social identity: some prospects for intergroup behaviour’, European Journal of Social Psychology, 5 (1975). 5-34,We are grateful to Ephraim Ya’ar-Yuchtman for drawing our attention to this literature. 44 45 ‘CJPolitical Studies Association, 1996 298 Ran-Is on Respect and Se(f-respect which its members do not wish to give up.48 There can be little doubt that the situation of citizen Palestinians in Israel can be characterized in precisely this fashion. As Tajfel explains, ‘[tlhere is now a good deal of evidence that the achievement of some forms of clear differentiation from others is an important ingredient of people’s ideas about their personal worth and ~elf-respect’.~~ Thus, we regard the strategy of social competition as an attempt to achieve or restore the self-respect of members of a minority culture who have been excluded from partaking in the common good as defined by the majority. Hence, appearance to the contrary notwithstanding, a Rawlsian point of view should favour the demand for communal autonomy for citizen Palestinians. From a Rawlsian perspective it has to be seen as a demand for the institutional recognition of an alternative community of shared interests, where Israeli Palestinians can receive and provide support for their own self-respect, while still sharing in the Israeli constitutional framework which guarantees them formal liberal rights. Only these conditions fulfill the fundamental Rawlsian postulate ‘that there should be for each person at least one community of shared interests to which he belongs and where he finds his endeavours confirmed by his associates’.’’ Moreover. communal autonomy would bring Israel a step closer to the Rawlsian ideal of the well-ordered society, which he has described as ‘a social union of social unions’,j’ that is, as a society where ‘a plurality of conflicting and incommensurable conceptions of the good are affirmed by its citizens’.’’ Thus the logic of our argument is as follows. Rawls presents individual selfrespect as one of the most important primary goods. However, the boundaries which membership in a cultural community imposes on an individual’s capacity to make rational life-plans and to choose worthwhile options constitute a major determinant of an individual’s self-respect. Protection of an individual’s claim to the primary good of self-respect necessitates, therefore, the allocation of equal rights to collectivities and the assertion of diverse value scales in the state, which allow no one cultural group a monopoly over government and the definition of the common good and civic virtue. Although we stretch the logic of Rawls’ theory far beyond what can be found in his texts, this argument does not contradict any of Rawls’ basic tenets. It does not, for instance, give priority to the community over the individual or to the good over the right.53Hence, even though we turn Rawls’ approach into a defence of multiculturalism, this justification still proceeds within a liberal framework. As Raz has stressed, ‘[lliberal multiculturalism stems from a concern for the well-being of the members of society. That well-being presupposes respect for one’s cultural group and its prosperity’.j4 Similarly, Kymlicka has made the point that ‘[lliberals should be concerned with the fate of cultural structures, not because they have some moral status of their own, but because it’s only through having a rich and secure cultural structure that people can become aware, in a Tajfel. Hutnun Groups and Social Caregories. p. 3 3 5 . Tajfel. Hutnuti Groups and Soc.ial Caregories. p. 337. ‘” 7 J . p. 440. 5 1 TJ, p. 521. ” Rawls. ’Justice as fairness‘, p. 164. j3 See Kymlicka. Liberalism, Cornmunit?,and Culture. pp. 167-8. ” Raz. ’Multiculturalism: a liberal perspective‘, p. 74. 48 49 I Political Studies Associaiton, 1996 JOSEBRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 299 vivid way, of the options available to them, and intelligently examine their value’.j5 Finally, Habermas also joins this trend of thought in arguing that ‘a correctly understood theory of rights calls precisely for a politics of recognition which also protects the integrity of the individual in his or her identity-forming life context. This does not require a counter-model and additional principles to correct the individualistic design of the system of rights; all that is required is the consistent realization of that system’.56He emphasizes: ‘the protection of identity-forming lifeforms and traditions is ultimately intended to foster recognition of its individual members. It does not have the meaning of an administrative preservation of cultural species’.57 Respect and Self-Respect Under Occupation The intifada - the violent uprising of non-citizen Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation - greatly increased the momentum of protest activity by citizen Palestinians inside Israel (strikes, rallies, demonstrations, petitions to the government) which had already been on the rise since the mid1970s. Unlike the uprising in the occupied territories, however, these activities, with few minor exceptions, remained non-violent and were conducted within the framework of the law. The reason for this has been clearly articulated by Israeli Palestinian leaders. As Nadim Rouhana has put it, ‘the Arab leadership made clear that the Arabs in Israel would act only within the law. It was argued that their status is different from that of other Palestinians and therefore, that their efforts would be expressed differentl~’.~~ Furthermore, the citizen Palestinians’ increasing political confidence is fed, according to Rouhana, ‘by the sense of security that their status as Israeli citizens provides, as well as their formal equality before the Israeli law’.j9 The differences between the means used in the intifada and those employed by citizen Palestinians to further their political aims, seem to confirm Rawls’ contention that granting basic liberties can prevent the outbreak of destructive actions. For while citizen Palestinians shared with those living under occupation the experience of discrimination and deprivation, and were excluded from the Zionist notion of the common good, they enjoyed basic liberal rights which were denied to their brethren in the occupied territories. It appears, then, that the liberal citizenship rights enjoyed by Israel’s Palestinian citizens have been consequential enough to both induce and enable them to confine their political struggles within the framework of the law. From a Rawlsian perspective this might plausibly be interpreted as corroborating the claim that equal basic rights will prevent people from resorting to destructive actions originating in envy, even if they are excluded from full citizenship practice. However, there is another side to this coin: while citizen Palestinians may possess greater selfrespect than they would if they had no rights at all, by granting them these Kymlicka, Liberalism, Community and Culrure, p. 165. J. Habermas, ‘Struggles for recognition in constitutional states’, p. 132. 57 J. Habermas, ‘Struggles for recognition in constitutional states’, p. 142. N. Rouhana, ‘The political transformation of the Palestinians in Israel’, Journal of Palestine Studies, 18 (1989), 47. 59 Rouhana, ‘The political transformation of the Palestinians in Israel, p. 54. 55 56 ’* C! Political Studies Association, 1996 300 Rawls on Respect arid Sef-respect rights the Israeli state has also pacified them and channelled their protest in a more easily manageable direction. In contrast. the Palestinians living under the Israeli military occupation since 1967 did not enjoy any citizenship rights. According to Rawls’ postulate that self-respect is contingent on the existence of liberal rights, conditions for the emergence of violent and harmful envy are always present under military occupation. By its very nature a military government denies basic liberties and publicly confirms the legal inferiority of the occupied population, among which it creates feelings of humiliation. resentment and powerlessness. The intifada, which was intended to harm the Israeli oppressors even at the price of much greater harm to the Palestinians themselves, might thus be portrayed from a Rawlsian perspective as a collective action motivated by envy. Yet, it would be erroneous to declare the violence of the intlfada as irrational, as Rawls does with destructive actions motivated by envy. The intifada certainly led to a loss of lives, wealth, rights and security for everyone involved. Yet, as we look at the intifada with hindsight - after the Oslo negotiations, the Declaration of Principles signed in Washington. the Cairo agreement and Yasser Arafat’s election - one can conclude that it may have been rational for non-citizen Palestinians living under occupation to resort to violent action in order to achieve recognition by their occupiers and a basis for a political framework of their own. The dynamics of respect and self-respect involved in the origins of the intifada merit interpretation which does not trace it to envy. As we have seen, Rawls makes self-respect not only dependent on political equality, but also on the presence of a multiplicity of standards, which allows each individual to find a social union within which they can gain respect, and hence also self-respect. Both the demand for cultural autonomy within Israel and the uprising in the occupied territories suggest that there might be a dialectics ojdisrespect at work, whereby the marginalization or exclusion of social groups may lead to their growing into social unions with scales of value of their own and conceptions of the good which are independent of - or even opposed to the one promoted by the dominant group. In other words, in real life there are no societies with only one standard of excellence and only one conception of the good. The question is, rather, whether the plurality of standards - which exists even under military occupation allows a democratic coexistence of equals, or establishes a hierarchical order which denies public recognition to all but the dominant standard. Even under hierarchical conditions. marginalized and denigrated standards of excellence can then serve a variety of strategies of social competition and become a source of respect - and hence self-respect - for members of an oppressed community. The difference in behaviour between the citizen Palestinians and non-citizen Palestinians suggests that as long as a marginalized group is still granted basic liberties, it tends to regulate its level of dissent within the constitutional order, while a denial of rights may lead to violence. The example of the infijiada suggests. moreover, that an oppressed community is able to generate an alternative scale of values, in which the experience of disrespect and the complete deprivation of rights - in imprisonment, detention or deportation, for instance - can become a matter of honour and prestige. Moreover, this experience can not only lead to the construction of alternative value scales, but also to a redefinition of concepts such as rights, freedom, and liberty - whose liberal meaning Rawls takes for granted - in - - 6 Polilical Studies Awxiatbon 1996 JOSE BRUNNER AND YOAV PELED 30 1 terms of what Isaiah Berlin has defined as ‘positive liberty’.60 In such cases, respect and self-respect may depend on values such as solidarity, self-denial, self-sacrifice, courage, comradeship, etc., which belong to the family of values which are crucial in ‘positive’ conceptions of freedom and democracy. As we see, the simple causality which Rawls has suggested in A Theory of Justice, whereby self-respect is made dependent above all on the existence of basic liberal rights, is insufficient to conceptualize the relationship between the two bases of self-respect - basic rights and the diversity of doctrines - which he mentions in his theory. Rawls’ failure to elaborate on the dialectic between the two sources of self-respect and on ways in which self-respect can be gained even when basic rights are denied, stems from his neglect of the intermediary status of groups, between individual and state, and their role in the distribution of respect and self-respect. We have tried to suggest here that by conceiving of politics as an interplay between groups rather than individuals, avenues open up for further thinking along Rawlsian lines on the relationship between the actual possession of basic rights by members of a social group, and their conception of liberties and virtues. Conclusions This article has attempted to take Rawlsian theory out of its customary discursive boundaries and to provide a critical assessment from the vantage point of Israeli politics, in particular, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. An inquiry into the dynamics of respect and self-respect between the two collectivities Palestinians and Israeli Jews - which make up the Israeli ‘control system’ can be used as a paradigmatic case to (a) test whether Rawls’ descriptive claims can be said to be compatible with processes in the real world, and (b) assess the practical implications of the normative dimension of Rawls’ work in an evaluation of the Palestinian question. Thus, it has been our aim to show that one’s own political reality can provide a useful vantage point for a critical reading of a contemporary political theorist. In the course of our attempt to read Rawls from an Israeli perspective we have made the following five claims: (1) Rawls’ discourse consistently establishes a triple-link between basic liberties, rational choice and self-respect, which emphasizes the social side of individuals and their duties and obligations towards each other, and regards the well-ordered society as a reciprocal and equal agreement to mutually respect each other. We conclude, therefore, that Rawls’ type of liberalism is more closely associated with a Hegelian outlook than with the liberal tradition stemming from Locke. (2) Although Rawls’ individualist ontology regards only individuals as ‘selforiginating sources of valid claims’, his conception of self-esteem or self-respect as a primary good does open the way to an extension of his individualist principles into an argument for collective rights or cultural rights. Hence a notion of a ‘primary good of cultural membership’ can be inferred from Rawls’ argument without distorting it. (3) A Rawlsian point of view should favour the demand for communal autonomy for citizen Palestinians. From a Rawlsian perspective it has to be seen as a demand for the institutional recognition of an alternative community 6o Berlin, ‘Two concepts of liberty’, pp. 130--2. ~CPolitical Studies Association, 1996 302 R a n h on Respect und Self-respect of shared interests. where Israeli Palestinians can receive and provide support for their own self-respect, while still sharing in the Israeli constitutional framework which guarantees them formal liberal rights. (4) Through a dialectics of disrespect the marginalization or exclusion of social groups may lead them to grow into social unions with scales of value of their own and conceptions of the good which are independent of - or even opposed to - the one promoted by the dominant group. This alternative standard of excellence can then serve various strategies of social competition and become a source of respect - and hence self-respect - for the members of an oppressed community who do not possess basic liberties. (5) Rawls' failure to elaborate on the dialectic between the two sources of self-respect. and on ways in which self-respect can be gained even when basic rights are denied, stems from his neglect of the intermediary status of groups between individual and state - and their role in the distribution of respect and self-respect. (First submitted: 12 August 1994;j'itialI~~ accepted: 20 March 1995) [ Political Srudics Asmciation. 1996