Thus, a culture of mutual help and support in the Russian-speaking community is developed, but it seems that the compensatory potential of Russian-speaking Israelis’ social networks is not enough to solve common problems. We need effective solutions at the policy level, which can be achieved through consolidated efforts and actions.
Meanwhile, respondents’ assessments of the people who have been in power in Israel for the past few years are not encouraging. The most common characteristic of them is “they are people who are only concerned about their privileges, incomes, and interests” – this is the opinion of 54.2% of respondents, and another 45.5% – “these are people who, upon coming to power, quickly forgot about the problems of the population and their promises to them.
What is the potential for solidarization of the Russian-speaking Aliyah in solving their socio-economic problems? To assess it, we used several questions related to the readiness of the population to participate in mass action.
As it turned out, almost a third of respondents (30.2%) are ready to support mass demonstrations against the fall in living standards, in defense of their rights, with political demands. This is certainly a significant figure. But at the same time, the number of people who will not participate is significantly higher – 43.8%.
The data on readiness for solidarity action roughly coincide with the practice of such participation, which can be seen as some confirmation of their truth. They reported that in the last 12 months they had participated in demonstrations, protests, signing petitions and other social and political events about the same amount, in total 31% of respondents (of which 23.8% took part 1-2 times and 7.1% repeatedly). Approximately 60% of those surveyed report that there are people among their acquaintances who have taken part in such events. Of these, 14.5% say there are many such people around them, and 45.1% say there are 1-2 people.
Based on sociological statistics, let us draw social portraits, first of a repatriate from the CIS countries, characterized by readiness to participate in mass actions, and then by actual participation in them.
When it comes to those who express a willingness to participate in solidarity actions, there is a strong statistical correlation between this willingness and the presence of discrimination against returnees from CIS countries in Israeli society (ρ +164). Thus, in the group that expressed readiness to participate in mass actions, 50.5% were convinced of the presence of discrimination, while among those who were not ready, there were 2.5 times fewer (20.9%) who were convinced of it. In the group of those who are not ready to participate in mass socio-political actions, the prevailing opinion is that there is rather no discrimination against repatriates from the former Soviet Union in Israel (31%). (See: Table below). Thus, a sense of discrimination is an important prerequisite for the willingness to participate in mass action.
In your opinion, does Israel discriminate against repatriates from the former Soviet Union? / If in your community in the near future there will be mass demonstrations against the fall in living standards, in defense of rights and freedoms, with political demands, will you take part in them?
| Does Israel discriminate against repatriates from the former Soviet Union? | …take part in them? | Yes | No | I can’t answer that. |
| Yes | 50,5% | 20,9% | 30,6% | |
| More likely yes than no. | 33,3% | 36,5% | 41,2% | |
| More likely no than yes. | 12,1% | 31,1% | 22,4% | |
| No | 4,0% | 11,5% | 5,9% |
The formation of such a readiness is also influenced by an assessment of the effectiveness of using the intellectual and professional potential of Russian-speaking repatriates in Israel. Among those who report readiness for mass action, a total of almost 80% say that capacity is used rather or definitely not effectively (versus 61% who feel the same way but are not prepared to support mass action) (ρ -190**).
In your opinion, how effectively is the intellectual and professional potential of repatriates from CIS countries used in Israeli society? /If in your community in the near future there will be mass demonstrations against the fall in living standards, …with political demands, will you take part in them?
| Evaluating the effectiveness of capacity utilization | …Will you participate in them? | No | Difficult to answer | |
| Definitely effective | 5,3% | 4,3% | 7,5% | |
| Rather effectively | 16,0% | 34,5% | 18,8% | |
| Rather ineffective | 34,0% | 41,7% | 45,0% | |
| Not effective | 44,7% | 19,4% | 28,7% |
A statistically significant relationship was revealed between the readiness to participate in mass actions and the attitude of the respondents to lobbying (ρ -198*). Among those characterized by a willingness to participate in mass actions, 26.1% of respondents report that they will support the lobby, and among those who are not willing, only 8%.
Certainly awareness plays an essential role in supporting this form of advocacy. And it is logical to assume that potential activists are more familiar with the various tools for pursuing their interests, including lobbying. So, predictably, those who are willing to support mass action are 10 pp less likely to say they don’t know, or don’t know well, what a lobby is and how it works.
Butmore important is the data, according to which in the group of those who are not ready to support mass actions, almost half (the relative majority -48.7%) are convinced of the principle effectiveness of the lobby, but … not in the case of repatriates from the former USSR, which is additional evidence of the fragmentation and atomization of the Russian-speaking group.
What do you think of lobbying as a tool for advocating group interests by repatriates from the former Soviet Union? / If in your community in the near future there will be mass demonstrations against the fall of the standard of living, … with political demands, would you take part in them?
| What do you think of lobbying? | If in your community… …. | Yes | No |
| Don’t know / don’t know well what it is and how it works | 13,6% | 23,9% | |
| It is an effective tool, but not for repatriates from the USSR | 28,4% | 48,7% | |
| Ready to participate | 26,1% | 18,8% | |
| I can’t answer that. | 31,8% | 8,5% |
Predictably, people who have already participated in mass actions, more often express their willingness to participate in them if they take place in the near future in their locality than those who have not participated (ρ +190**), and the values of willingness to participate directly correlate with the frequency of participation.
Thus, the value of the support index (is calculated as the difference between the shares of positive and negative responses regarding support for the shares, divided by 100%, where positive values of the index characterize the prevalence of positive responses and negative – negative ones.) positive among those who participated in mass socio-political actions regularly (0.46) and 1-2 times (0.27), and negative among those who did not participate (-34.3).
In the last 12 months, have you participated in demonstrations, protests, petition signings and other socio-political events? / If in your community, in the near future, there will be mass demonstrations against falling living standards, …. with political demands, will you take part in them?
| …Have you participated in the last 12 months? | Regularly | 1-2 times | No | |
| If in the near future… will you support it? | Yes | 62,5% | 48,2% | 20,2% |
| No | 16,7% | 21,2% | 54,5% | |
| Stock support index | 0,46 | 0,27 | -34,3 |
It is also worth noting a slightly higher readiness to participate in mass public and political actions among men, as reported by 57.3% of them against 42.7% of women (ρ +136*).
The absence of a statistically significant connection between the willingness of Russian-speaking Israelis to participate in mass actions and a number of variables, for which we expected to see a connection in accordance with the hypotheses of the study, is also indicative.
Thus, readiness to participate in mass actions is not related to the experience of asking for help in a difficult situation, it does not depend on what the respondents encountered more often: support, indifference or aggression. In addition, those who are willing to participate in mass actions provide gratuitous assistance to those in need in proportion to those who are not willing to participate in mass actions.This means that microsocial practices of mutual aid and support have no meaningful influence on readiness for mass action.
In the study, we found no reliable evidence that perceptions of group cohesion are related to willingness to participate in mass action. In particular, there is no statistically significant correlation between the data on the willingness to participate in mass actions and the answers whether or not there is solidarity, unity of interests and goals in Israel among the natives of the former Soviet Union. Both those who are ready and those who are not ready for mass action answer this question in roughly the same way.