Need over Merit: Tracing the History of Israel’s Anti-Discrimination Legislation in the Early Welfare State with Anat Ovadia-Rosner

This talk uncovers a forgotten chapter in Israeli legal history, offering insights into contemporary anti-discrimination jurisprudence. Israel’s 1959 Employment Service Law introduced the nation’s first statutory prohibition on discrimination in job referral and hiring; affirmative action measures; and a prohibition of segregation in employment bureaus between Jews and Palestinian-Arab citizens. This law was rooted in Israel’s early welfare-state structures, nation-building imperatives, and a non-meritocratic view of labor as a public resource allocated by the state according to economic needs. This, in turn, yielded broad conceptions of the purposes and boundaries of anti-discrimination protection among policymakers. However, implementation was limited and failed to transform Israel’s discriminatory labor allocation, particularly against Mizrahi Jews and Palestinian-Arab citizens. While inviting us to reimagine anti-discrimination beyond a liberal rights vocabulary, this history offers both alternative pathways and cautionary tales.
Moderated by Sharon Block