Prof. Sam Lehman-Wilzig: Why is Israel Such a Mess Domestically?
Everyone’s attention is focused on Israel’s ongoing security issues (Gaza, Yemen, Syria et al). Meanwhile, the domestic situation – governmental, economic, judicial, social – is no less problematic. In a country known for its vibrant innovation and social resilience, why isn’t it able to resolve most of its serious problems at home?
The list of such failures is unfortunately quite long: thousands of teachers missing in the educational system; daily murders in the Arab sector, hardly any being solved; court cases that run on forever (e.g., PM Netanyahu’s trial is now in its sixth year!); very high cost-of-living along with a fast-rising national debt.
So why is Israel such a mess domestically? The answer can be found in an area hardly ever reported on in the news: human psychology. In Israel’s case, Abraham Maslow’s famous pyramid of needs – among social science researchers, a “pyramid” as famous as the ones in Egypt. However, here it’s not a physical pyramid but rather a hierarchy of human necessities – and Israel is stuck near the bottom.
Maslow’s pyramid is all about what motivates people – and by extension, societies. At the pyramid’s base are basic survival issues like food and shelter; you won’t live long if you don’t have these. But immediately above that (some would say, as important) are security and safety – here too critical for preserving one’s life. Atop that, Maslow offered three more needs in ascending order i.e., we usually don’t try to fill the one above until the one below is guaranteed: first, belonging and love (family, friendship, connection); then self-esteem (confidence, achievement, self-respect); and finally at the top is self-actualization (creativity, purpose, meaning).
Israel’s problem is being stuck worrying about security: you can’t chase after the good stuff on top of the pyramid if you’re continually worrying about the basics at the bottom. Over the long term, when that’s an almost permanent situation it becomes difficult to focus on anything else, on the micro and macro levels – for the individual and for the governmental system as a whole.
The problem can be found on two levels: budget and attention. The financial burden is easier to understand. From the time of Israel’s establishment in 1948 the country has been under almost constant threat from its surrounding enemies – national armies and terrorist groups. The result: Israel’s governments have had to pour an inordinately large part of the national budget into military readiness (Tzahal/IDF), intelligence (Mossad), and internal security (Shabak). In turn, that limits the amount that can be devoted to other “higher Maslowian needs”: housing, education, environment, justice, etc.
However, “attention” is also a significant resource that loses out when governments are forced to focus most of their mental energy on national security. There are fewer Cabinet sessions on such non-security matters, as well as having less powerful ministers and politicians running such non-military-related ministries and Knesset committees.
Added to this, of course, is the matter of media attention. Try this small experiment yourself: choosing any day you wish, run through all the news items in any Israeli national newspaper, and count which are devoted to Israel’s security and which are not. You’ll find that at least half the articles deal with the former.
Thus, it isn’t surprising that “security” almost always ranks first in any survey of what concerns individual Israelis. It’s not that the public has been “brainwashed” by the media but rather that the media reflect the citizenry’s ongoing personal and national security concerns.
In such an environment, little public attention is paid to domestic failings. True, Israelis are notorious for “kvetching” about anything and everything on the personal level, but that usually doesn’t translate much into public protest or policy on such domestic matters. This completes the cycle: with less public concern regarding socio-economic matters, the government has less incentive to deal with Israel’s internal problems in broad fashion.
The result: classrooms are overcrowded (up to 40 kids per class); teachers are underpaid (leading to far fewer seeking work in the educational field); hundreds of judgeship positions aren’t being filled (resulting in endless judicial backlogs and delays, in part because judges have to deal with numerous security-related cases); not enough police officers, leading to rising crime rates (albeit still relatively low by western standards, despite the high rate among Israel’s Arabs). Yes, Israel has top-notch universities and technology companies, but much of that is directly or indirectly to connected to national security, with research largesse devoted less to the humanities or social sciences and more to science and technology (e.g., huge subsidies and tax credits to companies such as Intel).
In short, education, health, justice, and welfare do receive funding in Israel, but rarely enough for deep reforms or ambitious change – things that also demand continual governmental attention.
To be sure, national security is not the only factor here: the structure of Israel’s political system plays a role too. The country’s coalition governments are famously divided and divisive, pulling in different directions to promote their dissimilar political needs and values. Most domestic issues demand coordination among several ministries, so that having a hydra-headed government of several parties is not a recipe for change or even consistent policymaking. Thus, it’s usually easier for coalition politicians to agree on beefing up security than on fixing domestic problems – further feeding the cycle of security-up/domestic-down.
To be fair, all is not bleak. A very bright spot In Israel are the very numerous civil society groups and grassroots efforts that step in where the government doesn’t. As of early 2025, Israel has an amazing 77,329 non-profit organizations (https://www.globalgiving.org/atlas/country/israel/), involving volunteer service in almost every socio-economic area of life: education, elder-care, general health, handicapped, disadvantaged youth, (mal)nutrition, etc. etc. Clearly, such non-profits are hugely beneficial to Israeli society but they can’t by themselves substitute for comprehensive and effective governmental action and budgeting.
The bottom line, Maslow’s pyramid is not just a “theory” – it’s a sharp lens through which we can see why Israel doesn’t succeed very well in solving many of its most pressing domestic problems. For Israelis, the matter is “survival” uber alles; when security is always threatened, everything else gets pushed aside.
Given the neutralization of most of Israel’s enemies these past two years, one can hope that domestic policy will begin to receive the attention it deserves. The aspiration is for Israel to become a country where people don’t just give and survive but also live and thrive.
