California Dreaming : Ideology, Society, and Technology in the Citrus Industry of Palestine, 1890-1939

by Karlinsky, Nahum; Greenwood, Naftali

• ISBN13: 9780791465271
• ISBN10: 0791465276
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-08-04
• Publisher: State Univ of New York Pr

Summary

The citrus industry of Palestine has often been associated with the myths and ideals of the Labor Movement and its Zionist-Socialist ideology. The Jaffa orange, like the young pioneer and the collective Kibbutz, was emblematic of a colonizing meta-narrative that marginalized or even denounced the private entrepreneurs--both Arabs and Jews--who were the true founders and proponents of the flourishing citrus industry in Palestine. California Dreaming reveals that these private entrepreneurs regarded the California citrus industry as their primary model of emulation. Utilizing an innovative multidisciplinary approach, Nahum Karlinsky vividly reconstructs the social fabric, economic structure, and ideological tenets of the Jewish citrus industry of Palestine in the early twentieth century. Also accentuated is the role of Palestinian-Arab citrus growers, whose industry predated that of their Jewish counterparts, and the complex relationship between the two national sectors that operated side by side.

Table of Contents

LIST OF MAPS AND FIGURES	ix
LIST OF TABLES	xi
PREFACE	xiii
ONE The Tantalizing Aroma of Citrus Blossoms	1	(20)
PART I. IDEOLOGICAL PLATFORM
TWO Degania or Petah Tikva?: Private Enterprise in the Worldview of Jewish Citrus Growers in Palestine and Their Opponents	21	(28)
PART II. SOCIAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL PLATFORM
THREE Spatial Distribution and Social and Entrepreneurial Profile	49	(38)
PART III. TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATIONS
FOUR From Jaffa to Petah Tikva: Technological Development in Citriculture during the Ottoman Period	87	(24)
FIVE Technological Innovations during the Mandate Era	111	(44)
SIX Technological Innovations in Arab Citriculture	155	(12)
PART IV. GROWING PAINS
SEVEN Pursuit of Profit	167	(14)
EIGHT The British Mandate Government's Policy toward the Citrus Industry	181	(6)
NINE Attempts to Establish a Cartel	187	(30)
TEN Conclusion: Jewish Citriculture as a Private-Enterprise Industry	217	(4)
NOTES	221	(26)
BIBLIOGRAPHY	247	(20)
INDEX	267