Research Grants

The research project presented here explores health markets in Jerusalem between the 16th and 20th centuries (that is the Ottoman period). Based on the protocols from the Ottoman Muslim Court in Jerusalem written in Arabic, I will analyze the modes and formats of financial and ethical engagement between healers and patients: What were the types of arrangements between healers and patients in the Ottoman Middle East? What were the dynamics in these relationships? What considerations did the patients entertain when they chose their healers? How did they contact them? How did healers determine their salary and manage to collect it from their patients? In what ways did the healers and the patients protect their interests in these cases? How did all these change throughout Ottoman history?

Decision-making regarding health relies heavily on personal, cultural and religious values. Therefore, the multi-religious, national, ethnic and lingual Ottoman case will add to our understanding of how health markets operate in multifaceted cultural situations, which is the growing reality in the modern world. In the Middle East and even more so in the State of Israel, these historical lessons have a great contribution to an informed choice in the present and in the future.

In this project I develop a unifying theoretical framework for civil procedure that can help academics, policy makers, judges, and lawyers to re-envision the civil legal system in ways undeveloped before. Using insights from economic analysis of law I attempt to shed a new light on old as well as on recent debates about court administration, civil procedure, litigation cost and delay, arbitration, and more. The novel framework synthesizes multiple normative approaches to explain the existing system and to identify win-win legal reforms. The main, but by no means the only, product from the normative framework is the insight that civil procedural rights should be traded in regulated markets, hence the title of this research project. 

The rise of neoliberal economy created a reality where citizens are expected to “manage” complex financial risks, often without any knowledge, awareness or understanding. That dissonance gradually motivated decision makers worldwide to add financial education (FE) programs that teach basic financial abilities and skills to their curriculum offering. By and large, such programs adopted a neoliberal approach that minimizes the collective responsibilities of the state, and lacks the commitment to a fair and just society. Taking a critical view of FE programs in Israel’s high-schools, we explore how such programs are designed and practiced, from teachers' and students' perspectives.

The theoretical framework of this research will be based on: (1) the notion of social fields (Bourdieu, 1985), with which we shall explore how teachers and students position themselves vis-a-vis the narratives and interests held by the dominant agents who control the field (2) the hidden curriculum [Apple (1971); Dreeben (1968)], that will expose the underlying neoliberal notions and inferred goals of public education as reflected in FE (3) humanistic education approaches, such as “critical pedagogy”, illuminating social and economic inequalities and ways to build alternatives to the exploitative financial system.

This research utilizes qualitative critical discourse analysis to explore how teachers and students at schools serving low to medium SES populations perceive and understand FE programs, including their ideological assumptions, their overall mission in the general economy and society, and their expectations from schools. Insights could provide an original and fresh view about the possibilities of reshaping a FE curriculum more conducive for civic values resting on social justice and critical pedagogy approaches.

On November 4th, 2021, the Government of Israel approved Government Resolution 550, the second multibillion shekel, 5-year economic development plan for the Arab minority in Israel. The amount at issue—approximately NIS 30 billion (USD 9.6 billion)–is more than double than that of GR-550’s predecessor, GR-922, the groundbreaking five-year plan for the Arab society approved in 2015. These two economic development and inclusion plans are often referred to as exceptional and unprecedented. However, drawing on archival research, this project shows that these plans were actually preceded by similar programs. Though understudied and undertheorized, periodical large-scale group-based economic development plans for the Arab population have deep roots in Israel’s early history. This project aims to start filling this gap by providing a historical account of group-based economic development plans, and developing a better theoretical understanding of how such plans operate. It seeks to explore the nature of this legal tool and its rationales. It examines the conditions under which such plans were previously adopted and the obstacles for their successful implementation. Studying these policies over time could enhance our understanding of how they operate today in Israel and elsewhere.