ETHNICITY, CLASS AND FRIENDSHIP: THE CASE OF ISRAEL

Abstract

Debates over the forms and levels of ethnic pluralism and the relationship between class and ethnicity in the Israeli Jewish population provide the background of an analysis of friendship networks of four groups of origin, two from the Middle East and two from Europe. It is shown that, whereas only small minorities have homogeneous networks based on country of origin, the broad ethnic division between `Middle Easterners' and `Europeans', and the class division between white-collar and blue-collar workers are important bases of friendship. Differences among the eth-class categories in the ethnic heterogeneity/homogeneity of their networks are largely a consequence of the class distribution of Jews of Middle Eastern and European origin in Israeli society.