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The Kibbutz Culture and Social Transmission
On one hand, Alesina and Paola define Culture is defined as a way of life for people who are connected geographically or virtually and have a common goal (910). On the other hand, Doepke and Fabrizio define social transmission of the culture as the verbal and nonverbal sharing of information throughout a group of people or organisms (13). Culture is however dynamic and changes over time. This paper will discuss culture among the kibbutz in Israel and two examples of cultural transmission among them namely; the culture of child communal sleeping and Zionist culture
The kibbutz in Israel was a collective community traditionally based on agriculture. Kibuttz is a Hebrew word-meaning gathering or clustering with its plural as kibbutzim. Pavin reiterates that kibbutzim started as utopian communities formed through a combination of socialism and Zionism. Its members ideologically wanted to break away from European traditions of a nuclear family (59).
Across the world, cultures tend to engage in communal child rearing. However, the kibbutz culture is the only one known in history to try communal sleeping in child rearing. In the spirit of demolishing the nuclear family structure, children in kibbutzsm were brought up in a microcosm to train for future life. They ate, played and slept in the children’s house and could only visit their parents in the afternoon to early evening. Cultural transmission of doctrines such as material possession being evil was passed to the children thus making them look down on city children. This system however overlooked vices such as child abuse and the effectiveness and existence of the children’s house was turned away in the 1990s (Amit-Cohen 223). Women who had grown up in the house refusing their children to experience the same system majorly drove the move.
Amit-Cohen describe Zionist ideal among the Jews in the past being embodied as strong people that were earthy and capable of farming, they were also courageous soldiers and free of influence by fear and discomfort brought about from Diaspora. They therefore believed in the culture of socialism where income from their work was put in a common pool and shared among members equally (227). However, with time this was not sustainable as the socialist labor system was flawed with rewards to people regardless of their contribution. The socialist culture being unsustainable had the kibbutz open up to new members that were less committed in terms of ideology and history after the Second World War. This led to privatization and transformation of the kibbutz system into fully-fledged capitalism, which is the case up to date.
In conclusion, culture as a way of life among people in a certain group or community is sustained through social transmission. Culture is however fluid and changes with time and events. For example, the kibbutz culture of communal sleeping and socialism was eroded with time due to economic and social impact that did not favour them. Even though the heritage is maintained up to now, some part of the culture has changed, for example from socialism to capitalism and from common sleeping to total abandonment of the practice. It is therefore important to maintain positive aspects culture and abandon the negative aspects.
Works Cited
Alesina, Alberto, and Paola Giuliano. “Culture and institutions.” Journal of Economic Literature 53.4 (2015): 898-944.
Amit-Cohen, Irit. “Values and Sites, Attitudes, and Development—The Status of Cultural “Built Heritage” in the Kibbutz.” One Hundred Years of Kibbutz Life. Routledge, 2017. 215-230.
Pavin, Avraham. “Crisis, social capital and community resilience.” One Hundred Years of Kibbutz Life: A Century of Crises and Reinvention (2017): 59.
Doepke, Matthias, and Fabrizio Zilibotti. “Culture, entrepreneurship, and growth.” Handbook of economic growth. Vol. 2. Elsevier, 2014. 1-48.