Industry in Israel [antikvár]

The Background HE industrialization of a country's economy is a pro-cess always and everywhere beset with problems and difficulties, even where it seems spontaneous, as it did in Western Europe and the United States of America. There, geared to suitable manpower, the obvious exploitation of indigenous resources—coal, wood, ores, non-metallic minerals, agricultural raw materials—evolved industry, as it were automatically, yet in truth it only happened in a long sequence of crisis and prosperity, of success and failure. After World War I, certain totalitarian States endeavoured to industrialize by massive planning and to avoid the ups and downs of natural growth by compulsory use of both resources and manpower. Such plans, of course, depend on the all-powerful capacity of the State. The industrialization of Israel has never been— could never be—so planned. First, because Israel is not a totalitarian State; free enterprise exists side by side with a special type of Labour- and Government-owned industries. Second, because Israel is a land of immigration, but immigration that is unpredictable, for its numbers and nature depend almost wholly on whether, when and how far given Governments allow Jews to depart, and only in a minor degree on individual choice. In such circumstances, to formulate rigid, long-term plans of economic development is impossible. Israel's industrialization is not academically planned but empirically purposeful. Nevertheless a certain guidance of industrial de- [3]