Stability and change: Pluralistic organization of the social representations of the educational system in the Kibbutz

Abstract

The research investigates how social stability or change were related to multiple group membership and pluralistic organization of social representations. The ideas and attitudes of members in four kibbutzim regarding introducing change in their educational system provided us with the opportunity to do so. The children of these kibbutzim studied for the last four decades in a kibbutz -oriented shared high-school (mosad). The educational system was constructed with the aim of raising new generations of kibbutz members, and the organization of the mosad was in line with this aim. Two years ago, however, the leadership of these kibbutzim had suggested that the children would join a regional school which was, economically, more affordable, whose students came from urban and other social settings, and whose system was similar to other non-kibbutz secular schools in Israel. Our general hypotheses were that individuals would endorse a multiple set of ideas, those which supported the distinctiveness of kibbutz school and those which support integration with the Israeli society. The attitudes of old-timers in the kibbutz (vatikim), for whom the kibbutz SR would be dominant, would be against the proposed change in the educational system, whereas the attitudes of younger kibbutz members (tseirim) for whom the SR of the majority of the Israeli society would be dominant, would favour a change. The results supported these hypotheses, but additionally, showed that half of the respondents, independently of their age-group or dominance of idea, were reluctant to express a clear attitude regarding stability or change. Extensive participating in the voting process, though, showed that 60% favoured a no-change decision. The empirical data demonstrated that multiple group membership was associated with a pluralistic set of SR, that on the individual level, this incompatibility was tolerated, and did not, necessarily, imply the formation of one-sided attitude. In social paractice, though, the incompatibility was solved by one-sided choice rather than by any innovative intergration of the two sets of SR.