Reflexive postliberal peace: a cultural paradigm shift in Israel’s peacebuilding

To what extent does postliberal peace represent a substantive cultural paradigm shift relative to the liberal peace paradigm? We offer an empirical examination of the question through the Israeli case. An analysis of sixteen peace associations shows that peace activism has changed in the last twenty years in Israel in terms of organization, orientation, and action. Such change is clearly based on reflexivity, i.e. on the attempt by the activists to overcome the weakness of the liberal peace approach that has failed repeatedly in the Israeli-Palestinian context. The Israeli case reveals a cultural change that is creating a new, concrete, micro-level, “bottom-up” model of peacebuilding grounded, first and foremost, in everyday life. It is based on creating bridges on the social and cultural levels through practices, meetings, and networks. Although the peace process is not visible in the near future in Israel, and precisely because of that, the article presents the formation of a new cultural perception, which might be useful, and even necessary in time.