On "people voting against their material interests". Some reflections from Israel (a thread)
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I grew up to the familiar tune of the Ashkenazi Israeli middle class complaining that poor Mizrahi Israeli voters are "voting against their interests" by supporting the Likud. "How can they be so stupid, this government doesn't care about them, all it cares is the settlements".
In some ways it reflected the odd and skewed history of Israel's labour movement, which ended up being a vehicle for the country's Ashkenazi upper middle class, and thus was thoroughly resented by working class Mizrahim.
From the 1980s, the question was "which neo-liberalism do you want?" Israel was a bit ahead of the curve here. The Mizrahim voted (more) for a right wing, Jewish-centric version (Likud); even when somewhat-more-civic versions were available (Labour, Meretz). But why?
In Israel, where access to state resources and citizenship depends critically on being Jewish, and as the state was privatising and weakening public services, it made little sense for Mizrahim to give up their only card (being Jewish) for a civic neo-liberal vision.
In a civic neo-liberal Israel, the elites would do better, and all the others would have to compete for the attention of the diminishing welfare state. Why, in such circumstances, give up your relative advantage? It's not rational.
So right wing Mizrahim were very much voting for what they thought was their material interest.
There were Mizrahim who put forward ideas of civic equality and socialism as a way to achieve justice for all. But they were and remain a minority.
There were Mizrahim who put forward ideas of civic equality and socialism as a way to achieve justice for all. But they were and remain a minority.
I think this pattern has been now replicated widely in the developed world. For the "left behind", the "white working class", in a diminished, privatised world, post 2008, protecting their relative advantage and nativist claim for citizenship looks like a rational choice
With white nationalism in the US and English nationalism in the UK, voting for the Tories may not seem a vote against material interest. And it would take more than just pointing to Tory cuts to make the point that it is. End/
