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Perception of Legal Inequality in Deeply Divided Societies: The Case of Israel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2009

Elia Zureik ,
Fouad Moughrabi  and
Vincent F. Sacco
Elia Zureik
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6, Canada.
Fouad Moughrabi
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Tennessee, 615 McCallie Avenue, Chattanooga, Tenn. 37403, U.S.A.
Vincent F. Sacco
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6, Canada.
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Extract

When commentators discuss the Israeli political system, they invariably single it out as the exception in a region otherwise lacking in democratic and representative regimes. Although political philosophers and theorists remind us that the test of de mocracy hinges on, among other things, the way a society treats its minorities and guarantees them civil and political rights in the face of majority opposition, the de bate over what constitutes justice, equality, and freedom is unlikely to be resolved in a discussion centered on abstract principles and their absolute meanings. It is one thing for a society to profess egalitarian values and another to measure the extent to which these values are perceived and experienced by those immediately affected by them. This does not mean that there are no universal standards of justice against which to measure performance of the law. Our point is that the experiential dimen sion of the law is equally relevant, for it mediates between the meaning of the law as derived from abstract principles and the way it is implemented in daily life.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 25 , Issue 3 , August 1993 , pp. 423 - 442
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

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References

NOTES

Authors' note: Research for this study was made possible through a grant from the Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security in Ottawa, and the School of Graduate Studies and Research at Queen's University. The authors are solely responsible for the results of the study.

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