Sociology in Crisis: Knowledge Production in Israeli Sociology amid War, Occupation, and Political Upheaval

• In Event: Science, Knowledge & Technology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 3: Expertise, Knowledge Production, and Authority

Abstract

Moments of socio-political rupture pose particular challenges for disciplines whose object of study is deeply entangled with contested political realities. This paper examines how Israeli sociologists have interpreted and responded to the period surrounding October 2023 and the subsequent wars, within the broader context of occupation and political upheaval. Rather than treating disagreement as ideological fragmentation, the paper analyzes how variation in interpretation is structured by institutional location, professional capital, and the organizational architecture of the academic field.
Drawing on 40 in-depth interviews, supplemented by participant observation and analysis of semi-professional Facebook pages, the study identifies four recurring, though overlapping, ways of framing the crisis: as an existential threat to Israel and Jews; as a moment demanding internal reform from within a Zionist commitment; as part of longer histories of structural violence and colonial relations; and as a morally urgent yet analytically bracketed event within disciplinary life. These framings are not randomly distributed. Scholars positioned within internationally oriented research circuits more often situate their interpretations in relation to global disciplinary audiences, while those in teaching-oriented institutions emphasize locally grounded forms of sociological engagement. Career stage and employment vulnerability further shape willingness to assume public risk.
Building on Mannheim, Bourdieu, and Swidler, the paper argues that crisis reveals how authority, voice, and interpretive legitimacy are mediated through institutional structures within a semi-peripheral academic field navigating tensions between national embeddedness and global alignment.

Author

• Noam Keren, University of Toronto