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Berghahn Books Diamonds and War State Capital and Labor in British-Ruled Palestine 2010 Edition by David De Vries
The mining of diamonds, their trading mechanisms, their financial institutions, and, not least, their cultural expressions as luxury items have engaged the work of historians, economists, social scientists, and international relations experts. Based on previously unexamined historical documents found in archives in Belgium, England, Israel, the Netherlands, and the United States, this book is the first in English to tell the story of the formation of one of the world's main strongholds of diamond production and trade in Palestine during the 1930s and 1940s. The history of the diamond-cutting industry, characterized by a long-standing Jewish presence, is discussed as a social history embedded in the international political economy of its times; the genesis of the industry in Palestine is placed on a broad continuum within the geographic and economic dislocations of Dutch, Belgian, and German diamond-cutting centers. In providing a micro-historical and interdisciplinary perspective, the story of the diamond industry in Mandate Palestine proposes a more nuanced picture of the uncritical approach to the strict boundaries of ethnic-based occupational communities. This book unravels the Middle-eastern pattern of state intervention in the empowerment of private capital and recasts this craft culture's inseparability from international politics during a period of war and transformation of empire. Table of contents :- List of Figures and TablesList of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsList of AbbreviationsMapIntroductionGlobal and National: War, Diamonds and the Colonial StateChapter 1. Palestine as an AlternativePreconditionsLocal InitiativesThe Pressure of the WarThe Logic of Limited ExpansionChapter 2. The Making of a MonopolyEffects of the OccupationOrganizing CapitalPower and ContestationChapter 3. Diamond Work and Zionist TimeThe Reign of the Small StoneGain and DisciplineFacing the 'Triangular Thread'Splintering Labor's VoiceZionist LegitimacyChapter 4. The Challenge and its ConstraintsIn Antwerp's AbsenceThe Politics of SupplyAdamant LondonAccountability and VindicationChapter 5. Labor UnrestActors and IssuesThe First General StrikeLabor-CapitalRapprochementPropensity to StrikeThe Long ShowdownChapter 6. Liberation and LiberalizationContrasts at War's EndIncipient De-ControlDeregulationChapter 7. Crisis and RestructuringReversal of FortunesNational InterventionLabor's MomentChapter 8. Reproducing the PactState of TransitionThe PactEpilogueAppendicesTable A.1 Explanation of Names of Diamond Factories in 1930-1950 PalestineTable A.2 Establishment of Diamond Factories in Palestine, 1937-1941Table A.3 Origins of Main Owners of Diamond Factories in Palestine, November 1941Table A.4 Diamond Factories (PDMA Membership), Palestine November 1944Table A.5 Diamond Factories (PDMA Membership), Palestine November 1946Table A.6 Diamond Cooperatives in Palestine/Israel, 1946-1949BibliographyIndex