One middle class, three different lifestyle: The Israeli case

Traditionally, both the general public and the media have perceived of Israel's secular-Jewish population as a homogeneous entity. This broad over generalized view of the Israelis overlooks the variety of subcultures that make up Israel's secular population. This paper proposes a new and original typology for categorizing social groups in Israel, in particular the middle class. The methodology used to characterize the new typology attempts to overcome the problems inherent in traditional methods applied by Israeli social scientists in classifying Israeli society. The author suggests the sociological notion of 'lifestyles' to explain behavioral diversity in this social class. Three major lifestyles are identified in Israel's large middle class: Post-Zionist Yuppies; the Veteran Zionist Bourgeoisie; and the 'Mitsubishi Mobiles' (the nouveau-riche middle class). The typology proposed is based on five years of research using scholarly material collected and catalogued from numerous disciplines, as well as field research based on diverse means of collection and analytic methods.