A New Electoral System
Elections are around the corner, and once again we hear the tune that has become so familiar over the past few years. Most Israelis reject the judicial overhaul, and most refuse to go on carrying the burden of military service alone. Yet when they reach the ballot box, something gets stuck. Israel's electoral system gives voters only one ballot, and it decides the future of our democracy and our security policy at the same time. Anyone who wants to replace the government because of its domestic policies has to wonder whether that vote is also a vote for concessions to the Palestinians. For many, that is a red line they will not cross.
In our movement's view, the failure to pursue a political reconciliation between Jews and Palestinians alongside the military fight for our security is a deep failure in its own right. But it is not the only one. Our electoral system makes it worse, because it binds every decision into a single ballot and narrows the choices open to all of us.
A protest against Netanyahu and Justice Minister Yariv Levin's plans to weaken the Supreme Court, March 26, 2023. Photo: Oren Rozen, via Wikimedia Commons.
This bundling of security and domestic issues into a single vote shapes the campaigns of both blocs. Most parties in the "change bloc", the opposition parties seeking to replace the Netanyahu government, repeat the same slogan again and again: "We are right-wing on the Palestinian issue, but we oppose the government's domestic policies." That was evident at the end of September, when the bloc's party leaders met and published a joint statement of principles for replacing the government, yet carefully avoided any mention of the Palestinian issue. On that, they simply could not agree.
The right-wing bloc does the opposite. The ruling coalition wants to convince us that the election is mainly about the Palestinian issue. It plays up the divide between the Zionist and Arab parties and stokes fears of military withdrawals. Netanyahu's Likud party once circulated an AI-generated video in which the leaders of the change bloc gather for a cabinet meeting with Mansour Abbas and Ahmad Tibi. The message was clear: the prospect of Arab parties joining a future coalition casts a menacing shadow over the change bloc.
The result is absurd. The question of reconciliation between Jews and Palestinians is barely discussed on its merits. Both camps treat it mainly as a counterweight to the domestic disputes.
In my previous article I argued that this is not fate. It is the result of two flaws in our electoral system. The first is centralization: a single ballot bundles every contested issue together, forcing us to vote against our conscience on one issue in order to protect it on another. The second is party-list voting: we elect lists, not people. A Knesset member cannot turn directly to the public at election time and ask for its support. As a result, Knesset members answer to party operatives rather than to voters.
Israeli democracy can no longer bear the current electoral system. We must offer an alternative.
Vera Weizmann casts her vote in Israel's first elections, with Chaim Weizmann, Israel's first president, standing behind her. Source: Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
Communities Instead of Districts
Israeli society holds real contradictions between values, and they coexist in a tiny space. The Jewish town of Kochav Yair sits right next to the Arab town of Tira, the Haredi neighborhood of Kiryat Sanz lies in the heart of the city of Netanya, and the Haredi city of Bnei Brak in the heart of Gush Dan, the largely secular cluster of cities in central Israel. That is why Israel cannot be divided into electoral districts, as many democracies are. Any geographic line would disadvantage some group and spark a bitter, even violent, struggle.
Our alternative is non-geographic civic communities. Any group of citizens amounting to about 6–7 percent of the population will be able to organize, gain official recognition and form a community of its own: secular, religious-Zionist, Haredi, traditional, Arab and more. Membership will be a free, personal choice, not a matter of origin. Every citizen will belong to one community and may switch to another once a year, and those who do not wish to belong to any particular stream may join a general civic community. Each community will be run by elected institutions and will provide its members with religious, cultural and values-education services anywhere in the country, regardless of where they live. To illustrate: in a single apartment building in Beersheba, a family belonging to the Arab community may live across the hall from a family belonging to the Jewish-traditional community.
On this foundation we have built a proposal for a new electoral system. The Knesset will be divided into two chambers of equal standing, as in many democracies, and every law will require the approval of both. The lower house will be elected as the Knesset is today, through national party lists. The upper house, by contrast, will be elected personally. A secular woman and her Haredi neighbor will go to the same polling station. Both will receive the same ballot for the lower house, but for the upper house each will choose from among her own community's candidates.
For the first time, we will elect our representatives directly. An upper-house member's fate will be decided by voters, not by party operatives. They will be free to hold the government to account, and at the next election they will answer to the public for their record. At the same time, our disputes will no longer be bundled together. The explosive questions of religion, culture and values education will move to the communities, and each community will decide them for itself without imposing its views on the others. The government and the Knesset will be freed from having to settle these disputes, and not everything will be decided on a single ballot.
The electoral system is only the starting point. This article is an invitation to get to know our movement's proposal for a new, unifying Israeli constitution. Whether you come from the right or the left, from Jewish or Arab society, you are invited to join us on a shared Israeli journey of repair and growth.
תגובות