U.S. and Non-U.S. Scholars

Fulbright New Century Scholars Program
Overview • Previous NCS Programs • NCS Scholar List • NCS Brochure • 2002-2003

Dan Rabinowitz

Senior Lecturer
Tel Aviv University, Department of Sociology and Anthropology
A Comparative Study of the Use of Demographic Forecasts in Ethnically Divided Situations
Israel

Dan Rabinowitz, an anthropologist, is Senior Lecturer at the department of sociology and anthropology at Tel-Aviv University. His academic research areas include The Palestinian citizens of Israel, Nationalism, Ethnicity, Social aspects of environmental issues and Demographic projections in ethnically divided states and regions. He received his PhD from the department of Social Anthropology at Cambridge University in 1990, where his thesis, supervised by Ernest Gellner, was based on ethnographic research amongst Palestinian citizens of Israel in Galilee. A regular contributor to the op-ed page of Haaretz, he is a leading commentator on politics, environmental issues and society in Israel and the Middle East. He was President of the Israeli anthropological Association between 1998 and 2001, and is a Founding Member of PALISAD - a group of Palestinian and Israeli academics involved in on-going exchange and intellectual debate since 1998. In 2000 he initiated and was chief editor of After the Rift - an unsolicited emergency report submitted to Prime Minister Barak by 26 leading researchers in Israel, which included far reaching recommendations for new government policies towards the Palestinian citizens of Israel. He has been a board member of Greenpeace Mediterranean since 1997 and a Trustee on Greenpeace International Council since 1998.

Selected Publications:

The Stand-Tall Generation. (Co-authored with Khawla Abu-Baker.) Jerusalem, Keter Publishing, 2002.
"Race from the Bottom of the Tribe that Never was: Segmentary Narratives amongst the Ghawarna of Galilee." (Co-authored with Khawaldeh, Sliman.) Journal of Anthropological Research. Vol 58 (2002): 225-243.
" Oriental Othering and National Identity: A Review of Early Israeli Anthropological Studies of Palestinians. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power. Vol 9 (2002): 305-325.
Anthropology and the Palestinians. Jerusalem. Institute of Israeli Arab Studies. 1998.
Overlooking Nazareth. Cambridge University Press, 1997.

Population Sizes and their Discontents: A Comparative Study of the Use of Demographic Forecasts in Ethnically Divided States and Regions

Forecasts and predictions of future populations and their sizes are an integral part of many ethnic situations. Demographic arguments are constantly being introduced into public discourse in ways that may exacerbate, stabilize or improve inter-ethnic strife. This comparative interdisciplinary project, which fuses insights from population studies, anthropology and political science, will attempt to describe and analyze the ends, means and eventual political impact of introducing demographic concepts into public spheres in ethnically divided states and regions.

Focusing on indigenous rather than immigrant minorities, and emphasizing the predicament of trapped minorities spread across at least one international border, the project will identify a dozen or so countries and regions which represent between them various degrees and histories of ethnic strife. A survey of the histories and characteristics of demographic debates in these locations will be conducted, coupled with a more detailed review of three or four, including Israel/Palestine. The results will inform an evaluation of the ways in which forecasts of future population sizes feature in popular and scientific discourse, and the impact they have on policies and politics.

The project, which will include collaboration with scholars and institutions at the Office of Population Research in Princeton, addresses a number of issues pertinent to ethnic and cultural conflict within and across national borders. Amongst them are the predicament of stateless ethnic groups and nations; Cross-border ethnic identity and diasporas; Emigration, immigration and their impact on multiculturalism and pluralist existence; and tensions between values of tradition and modernity. Additionally, the research will identify junctures in which preoccupation with inter-ethnic demographic balance cross-cuts, amplifies or contradicts some of the concerns that feature in the growing debate of population size and its environmental, economic and developmental.