(עולמות של הגירה: הפרדה והטמעה של היגיון כלכלי, פוליטי ואוניברסלי בעיצוב משטר ההגירה בישראל)

תקציר

This article seeks to describe the piecemeal process of creation of what may, arguably, be a new immigration regime in Israel. In order to do so, we focus on three distinct waves of non- Jewish entry to Israel. The first is the day-labor entry of Palestinian workers from the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) since 1967; the second is the entry of migrant workers from various countries, primarily since 1993; and the third is the entry of asylum-seekers, primarily from Africa, since 2007. Each of these waves was carved out by the state as a distinct sphere of migration, a narrow exception to Israel’s general Jewish Settler Regime, which is based on a different functional imperative. The entry of Palestinians is justified primarily by a political imperative – the political relationship between Israel and the Palestinians under occupation. The entry of migrant workers is, first and foremost, seen as the result of economic imperatives – a way to supply cheap labor to cater to the needs of the domestic labor market and fulfill the economic needs of the state. The entry of asylum-seekers (and their rights upon entry) rests primarily on a universal humanitarian imperative led by the state’s moral and convention-based responsibility toward those who are in dire need, and particularly in need of a safe territorial haven. Traditionally, the three spheres of migration have been seen as narrow and confined departures from Israel’s immigration logic since the laws that developed in each sphere continued the rejection of non-Jewish migrants as prospective members of the society. The inclusion of each of these waves has been per¬formed on a temporary and partial basis, which opens practically no legal routes for naturalization or permanent residency. Although each sphere is attached to a dominant imperative, the process of constructing Israel’s new immigration regime has hardly been based on a neat linkage between a sphere of migration and a single imperative. This article shows that the development of the new regime is based on the interplay between the different functional imperatives and on the strategic use of the imperatives by different actors. While the state is ultimately responsible for writing the rules and devising the institutions that implement them, the process of change is better understood against the backdrop of constant manipulation and contestation among the imperatives, within the state, whereby different branches and agents display different preferences and hold on to different interests, and between the state and civil society. Drawing on a neo-institutionalist approach, which looks at the role of interest groups in shaping a regime that distributes the benefits of migration between competing groups, the article tracks the utilization of the functional imperatives by different stakeholders, as well as their inter¬action. The analysis demonstrates that imperatives belonging to one sphere often ‘infiltrate’ other spheres, and, in fact, all three spheres are governed by a combination of all three functional imperatives – political, economic, and universal. Moreover, the integration of chronological, thematic, and institutional analyses accommodates an understanding of incremental path-dependent transformation. We claim that fundamental junctions in this process of regime transformation are characterized by attempts to con¬test the appropriateness of the imperatives in each sphere and offer a new amalgam of imperatives. Such incidents of contestation are indicative of a controversy over the nature of Israel’s immigration regime and its raison d’être. Hence, to understand the political economy of Israel’s changing immigration regime, it is important to map and understand the rhetorical use of its “separate spheres ideology” – the insistence on a separation between spheres of migration and their imperatives – and the challenges posed to this ideology by the infiltration of imperatives from one sphere into another.