Balance of Work and Benefit in a Modern Kibbutz

admin — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 22:21:15 +0000

Kibbutzim are a living example of the communal spirit that has been central to green living communities. Starting entirely with traditional, rural-style agriculture, Kibbutzim have increasingly been subject to financial stresses off and on during their one hundred years of adherence to socialist ideals. This is no wonder since most of the world’s economy, including that of the agricultural sector, is controlled by a capitalist economic model based on investment and interest. In the face of continual inflation, maintaining the communal way of life in a modern Kibbutz has therefore become something of a challenge.

One of the main strategies that a 21st century Kibbutz may adopt for keeping their communal culture intact is recognizing and intensifying their growing power for any food species or a group of them. Accepting investment from business groups or investors at an affordable rate of interest has been tried successfully in some Kibbutzim and this has also saved a good deal of profit for the coming generation. The best examples of these are Lohamei Hagetaot (aka Ghetto Fighters) and Hatzor – two Kibbutzim that resuscitated their dwindling economic states by relying on soy production. By making profitable deals with investors, usually manufacturers of soy food products, these Kibbutzim are near to becoming multinational forces in the soy food industry. Thus they secured themselves financially while also saving a good deal for communal wellbeing.

To make communal living feasible for families, an inviting proportion of benefits versus work is being followed in the Kibbutzim Lohamei Hagetaot and Hatzor. Demanding some private space goes in tandem with business economy as it gives greater benefits to those who work more for the community. This mode of capitalist living is now entering the 21st century Kibbutz. Lohamei Hagetaot is about to allow privatization of homes and fixing payments (including pensions) according to the work completed by the community members and not entirely according to their needs (as in the classic communal system of life). The changing situation of agricultural based communities, interacting with the corporate world, call for a balance between work and earnings such that the communal living may be preserved without compromising some essential equalities among the Kibbutz members. The quality of life can then go undaunted with a strong financial shelter and satisfaction of the basic needs of individual families.

farmcommunities.com

Kibbutz: A Brief Introduction

admin — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 19:16:07 +0000

Kibbutz is undoubtedly the classic and, perhaps, the only successful example of modern communities that are built on the principles of green living. Recognized as the world’s largest communitarian movement, the Kibbutz Movement dates back to the late 19th and early 20th century when a large number of Jews, mostly from Russia, moved to Palestine in order to escape their persecution, hoping to find a better future in using the barren Palestinian land for agriculture. Thus came into being the first kibbutz, founded in 1910 in Palestine, created by the farming Jewish community. While Jews from around the world helped acquire land for the emigrants to Palestine, building a community that could sustain itself on agriculture alone was a challenge to the newly settling Jews in the rough Palestinian terrain. But the people took up the challenge as a question of survival and in less than two decades, the number of people living by kibbutz communities had went up from a mere few hundreds to about four thousand.

The founding ideology of a kibbutz is essentially ‘socialist’ and advocates the need for communal life where the concept of the ‘communal’ extends to the Platonic view of having not only a common treasury but also to rearing children under communal supervision. While this over-communalizing has been criticized in certain matters of individual, family and social life, the ideals of mutuality and green living based on agriculture are still very entertaining to people of many urbanized societies where a sick competition for possessing most resources has given birth to a great conflict for power. For people who have a revived interest in green, rural living with a strong sense of community, kibbutzim remain an ever-gren utopia.

The modren kibbutz differs from the traditional one, set in the rural Palestinian land in the early 20th century, in several important ways. Unlike relying on agriculture as the sole, or even predominant, means of survival, it has been industrialized and urbanized according to the needs of modern urban living. A modern kibbutz need not necessarily be located in a classical rural locality but amidst the mainstream city life. In Israel, the number of urban kibbutzim is now more than a hundred. Business and industrial enterprises have become incorporated in the modren kibbutz, opening new challenges and, sometimes, bringing new controversies. In addition, there have been a number of significant organizational changes, deviating from the classical Palestinian kibbutzim. Nevertheless, the 21st century kibbutz still stands on the fundamental principles of communal ownership and mutual cooperation for collective solidarity.

farmcommunities.com

Farm Communities » Modern Kibbutz

Balance of Work and Benefit in a Modern Kibbutz

Kibbutz: A Brief Introduction