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Erez Tzfadia, Associate Professor

Erez Tzfadia
Contact Info

The Open University of Israel Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication 1 University Road, P. O. Box 808, Raanana 43107, Israel
Email:erezt@openu.ac.il

Additional Information

Areas of Interest
  • Space and Policy
  • Public policy
  • Local politics
  • Center-Periphery relations
  • Urban and regional planning
  • Land regimes
  • Settler-colonial studies
  • Settler-colonialism

I am a public policy Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology, Politics, and Communication at The Open University of Israel. My research interests include public policy, spatial politics, and place-making, with a particular focus on peripheral regions in Israel/Palestine. In recent years, I have researched the legal geography of spatial development in peripheral areas, with a focus on informal development, displacement of marginalized communities, local governance in peripheral regions, and digital urban citizenship in the periphery. My research has been supported by the Israel Science Foundation and published in numerous academic articles and co-authored books such as Rethinking Israeli Space (Routledge, 2011), Israel since 1980 (Cambridge, 2008), and Abandoning State—Surveillance State: Social Policy in Israel, 1985–2008 (Sapir and Resling, 2010). 

During the academic year 2022-2023, I was a visiting Associate Professor at The Frankel Institute for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan. Previously, from 2015 to 2016, I was an Israel Institute Visiting Scholar at the Bildner Center for the Study of Jewish Life in the Department of Jewish Studies of Rutgers University. Before joining The Open University, I held various academic positions at Sapir College, where I served as the head of the Department of Public Policy and Administration (2011-2015), chaired the Research Committee (2021-2022) and the Excellence Committee (2018-2021), and was a member of the Executive Committee (2011-2013), Board of Governors (2013-2015), and Academic Council (2011-2022). I have also taught as an adjunct lecturer at the University of Maryland (USA) and Ben-Gurion University (Israel). 
I am an alumnus of the Leadership in Academia program (2020-2021), an initiative of the Rothschild Foundation and the Israeli Council for Higher Education. I received my Ph.D. in geography from Ben-Gurion University in 2002 and was a Lady Davis Postdoctoral Fellow at the Hebrew University from 2003 to 2004.  
Apart from my academic work, I am also involved in social justice and human rights activities. I was on the board of Bimkom: Planners for Human Rights (NGO) from 2004 to 2022, and I co-founded Hagar, an Arab-Jewish school in Beer Sheva, Israel. Currently, I am an activist and steering committee member at the Mizrahi-Civic Collective, a social movement that advocates democracy and social justice. 

2003
Post-Doctorate, Lady-Davis Postdoctoral fellow, Department of Geography, Hebrew University, Israel.
1996-2003
Ph. D. Doctor of Philosophy and M.A. (integrated program), Department of Geography and Environmental Development, Ben Gurion University, Israel (M.A. with distinction). 
1993-1996
BA, Bachelor of Arts in Geography and Environmental Development (Major), Political Science (division) and Philosophy (division), Ben-Gurion University, Israel (with distinction).
2023
Associate Professor, The Open University of Israel
2022-2023
Visiting Associate Professor of Judaic Studies, College of Literature, Science,
and the Arts, University of Michigan
2016-2023
Associate Professor, Department of Public Policy and Administration, Sapir College
2016-2018
A visiting lecturer at The Gildenhorn Institute for Israel Studies, UMD
2015-2016
The Israel Institute Visiting Scholar at the Bildner Center for Jewish Studies, Rutgers University, NJ
2008-2015
Senior Lecturer, Department of Public Policy and Administration, Sapir College
2005-2007
Lecturer, Department of Public Policy and Administration, Sapir College

Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi H. (2011). Rethinking Israeli Space, Routledge.

Ben-Porat, G., Levy, Y., Mizrachi, S., Naor. A. and Tzfadia, E. (2008). Israel since 1980, Cambridge University Press.

 Tzfadia, E. and  Chiodelli, F. (Guest eds.) (2016). “Formal Institutions and the Production of Informal Urban Spaces” (Special Issue), Geography Research Forum, 36, https://grf.bgu.ac.il/index.php/GRF/issue/view/36

 Tzfadia, E. and Benjamin, O. (Guest eds. + editorial introduction) (2014). "Public Housing: The Failure and the Fight" (special issue), Social Security, 94 (in Hebrew), http://www.btl.gov.il/Publications/Social_Security/bitachon94/Pages/default.aspx

Katz, C. and Tzfadia, E. (Eds.). (2010). Abandoning State – Surveillancing State: Social Policy in Israel, 1985-2008, Sapir and Resling (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (Guest ed. + introduction) (2012). "Center and Periphery" (special issue), Panim, 57 (in Hebrew),

 Tzfadia, E. and Gigi, M. (2022). “Peripheralities”, in: G. Ben-Porat, Y. Feniger, D. Filc, P. Kabalo, J. Mirsky (eds.). Routledge Handbook on Contemporary Israel, Routledge.

Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi, H. (2018). “Privatization and Nationalization of Space in Israel: Are they Complementary Processes?”, in: Amir Paz-Fuchs, Ronen Mandelkern and Itzhak Galnoor (Eds.). The Privatization of Israel: The Withdrawal of State Responsibility, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 51-71.

Tzfadia E. (2017). “Informal Outposts in the West Bank: Normality in Gray Space”, in: M. Allegra, A. Handel, and E. Maggor (eds.). Normalizing Occupation: The Politics of Everyday Life in the West Bank Settlements, Indiana University Press, pp. 92-111.

Yiftachel, O. and Tzfadia, E. (2016). "The Gray Space: The Substance and Implications of Spatial Planning and Development in the Future", In: S. Hasson, O. Kutok, D. Drukman and D. Roter (eds.). Israel 2048: Spatial Development and Planning, Jerusalem: Hebrew University, pp. 159-170 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi, H. (2015). "The Privatization of Space", in: Galnoor, Y., Paz-Fuchs, A. and Zion, N. (eds.). Privatization Policy in Israel: State Responsibility and Boundaries between the Public and the Private, Jerusalem: Van Leer and Hakibutz Hameuhad, pp. 405-440 (in Hebrew).  

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2014). "The Gray City of Tomorrow", in: Fenster, T. and Shlomo, O. (eds.). Cities of Tomorrow: Planning, Justice and Sustainability Today? , Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, pp. 176-192 (in Hebrew).

 Tzfadia, E. (2014). "Spatial Policy", in: Levy, Y. and Sarig, E. (eds.). The Local Government: Between the State, the Community and the Market Economy, Raanana: The Open University of Israel, pp. 479-531 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2013). "Informality as Control: The Legal Geography of Colonization of the West Bank" in: Chiodelli F., De Carli B., Falletti M., Scavuzzo L. (eds.). Cities to Be Tamed? Spatial Investigations across the Urban South, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 192-214.

Tzfadia, E. (2013). "Exception", in: Hatuka, T. and Fenster, T. (eds.). The Planners: Directions in the Israeli Planning Discourse, Tel-Aviv: Resling, pp. 65-75 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2012). "Peripheries", in: Handel, A. (ed.). The Political Lexicon of the Social Protest: Israel, (Summer 2011 – ), Hakibbutz Hameuchad – Kav Adom (in Hebrew), pp. 298-308.

Katz, C. and Tzfadia, E. (2010)."The Hyphen between State Abandoning and State Surveillancing", in: Katz, C. and Tzfadia, E. (eds.). Abandoning State – Surveillancing State: Social Policy in Israel, 1985-2008, Sapir and Resling, pp. 9-31 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2010). “Manipulating Political Visibility: Russian Immigrants in Urban Context”, In: Rappoport, T. and Lomsky-Feder, E. (eds.). Visibility in Migration: Body, Gaze, Representation, Jerusalem: Van Leer / Hakibbutz Hameuchad, pp. 192-211 (in Hebrew).

 Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi, H. (2010). “Transparent Walls: Planning, Privatization and Ethnicization in Urban Context”, In: Lehavi, Amnon (ed.). Gated Communities (Law, Society and Culture), Tel-Aviv: The Buchman Faculty of Law, Tel-Aviv University, pp. 469-492 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2008). “Are Separated”? Society and Armed Forces in light of Spatial Ideologies and Practices”, In: Gabriel Sheffer, Oren Barak and Amiram Oren (eds.). An Army that Has a State? New Approaches to Civil-Security Relations in Israel, Jerusalem: Carmel, pp. 45-66 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2008). “New Settlements in the Metropolis of Beer Sheva: the Involvement of Settlement NGOs”, In: Gradus, Y. and Meiri-Glitzenstein, E. (eds.). Beer Sheva – Metropolis in Making, Beer Sheva: Ben Gurion University Press, pp. 105-123 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2007). “Public Policy and Growth of Small Cities: The Experience of Israel’s Development Towns”, In: Ofori-Amoah, B. (Ed.). Beyond the Metropolis: Urban Geography as if Small Cities Mattered, Lanham, MD: University Press of America, pp. 325-342.

Tzfadia, E. (2006). “The Israeliness of the Development Towns”, In: Fenster, T. and Yacobi, H. (Eds.). Israeli City or City in Israel? Questions of identity, Meanings and Power, Jerusalem: Van Leer and Hakibutz Hameuhad, pp. 191-215 (in Hebrew).

 Roded, B. and Tzfadia, E. (2006). "Territoriality", In: Ram, U. and Berkowitz, N. (Eds.). In / Equality, Beer-Sheva: Ben Gurion University of the Negev Press, pp. 197-203 (in Hebrew).

Yiftachel, O. and Tzfadia, E. (2004). “Between Periphery and ‘Third Space’: Identity of Mizrahim in Israel’s Development Towns”, In: Kemp, A., et al. (Eds.). Israelis in Conflict: Hegemonies, identities and Challenges, Sussex Academic Press, pp. 203-235.

Tzfadia, E. (2004). “Trapped Sense of Peripheral Place in Frontier Space”, In: Yacobi, H. (Ed.). Constructing a Sense of Place  - Architecture and the Zionist Discourse, Burlington: Ashgate, pp. 119-135.

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2004). “State, Space and Property: Immigrants in Israel and Socio-Spatial Stratification”, In:  Filc, D. and Ram, U. (Eds.). The Power of Property: The Israeli Society in the Global Age, Jerusalem: Van Leer and Hakibutz Hameuhad Publishing House, pp. 197-221 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2002). “The Israeli Space in the Era of Peace: Between National and Economic Forces”, In: Benvenisti, M. (Ed.). The Morning After: The Era of Peace - No Utopia, Jerusalem: Carmel and The Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace, pp. 257-322 (in Hebrew).

Gigi, M. and Tzfadia, E. “Frontieriphery: An anti-positivist ontological approach to intersectional investigation”, Ethnopolitics (accepted for publication), https://doi.org/10.1080/17449057.2023.2176586

Meir, A. Tzfadia, E. and Roded, B. (forthcoming). “Temporal dynamics of contested local government among the Bedouin in Israel”, Territory, Politics, Governance. https://doi.org/10.1080/21622671.2020.1860809

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2022). “Displaceability”, Mafte’ach, 17 (Hebrew), https://mafteakh.org/%d7%a2%d6%b2%d7%a7%d7%99%d7%a8%d7%95%

Tzfadia, E. (2021). “Three Frames for Displacement and Eviction: Givat Amal Previews the Future of Urban Citizenship”, Planning, 18(2), pp. 107-119 (Hebrew), https://www.aepi.org.il/loadedFiles/1014.pdf.

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2021). “Urban Displaceability: A Southeastern Perspective”, Theory and Criticism, 54, pp. 59-86. (Hebrew),

Tzfadia, E., Meir, A., Roded, B., & Atzmon, E. (2020). “Gray local governance and Israeli Indigenous Bedouin: Credibility, functionality and the politics of refusal”, Cities, 97. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2019.102484

Yacobi, H. and Tzfadia, E. (2019). Neo-settler colonialism and the reformation of territory: Privatization and nationalization in Israel, Mediterranean Politics, 24(1), pp. 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1080/13629395.2017.1371900

Tzfadia, E. (2016). “The Grey Space of Colonization: A Legal-Geography Analysis of the Outposts”, Theory and Criticism (Teorya u-Bikoret), 47, pp. 133-158 (in Hebrew).

Chiodelli, F. and Tzfadia E. (2016). “The Multifaceted Relation between Formal Institutions and the Production of Informal Urban Spaces” (An Editorial Introduction), Geography Research Forum, 36, pp. 1-14. http://raphael.geography.ad.bgu.ac.il/ojs/index.php/GRF/article/view/485

Roded, B. and Tzfadia, E. (2012). "Recognition of Indigenous People's Land Rights: The Bedouins in Comparatison", Public Sphere, 7, pp. 66-99 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2011). "Mixed Cities in Israel: Localities of Contentions", Israel studies Review, 26(1), pp. 153-165. https://doi.org/10.3167/isr.2011.260114

Tzfadia, E., Levy, Y. and Oren, A. (2010). "Symbolic Meanings and the Feasibility of Policy Images: Relocating Military Bases to the Periphery in Israel", Policy Studies Journal, 38 (4), pp. 723-744. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1541-0072.2010.00381.x

Tzfadia, E. (2010). “Militarism and Space in Israel”, Israeli Sociology, 11(2), pp. 337-361 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2009). “Immigrant Absorption in Israeli Development Towns”, Idan (special issue on Development Towns), 24, pp. 217-232. (in Hebrew).

Yacobi, H. and Tzfadia, E. (2009). “Multiculturalism and the Changing Politics of the Israeli City”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, 41, pp. 289-307. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020743809090679

Tzfadia, E. (2009). "Settlement in Israel: A Perspective on Militarism", Van Leer Forum, 11 (special issue: Space of Security: New Approach to the Use of Land (Resources) for Security and Military Needs, Editor: A. Oren), pp. 15-36 (in Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2008). “Abusing Multiculturalism: Politics of Recognition and Land Allocation in Israel”, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 26(6), pp. 1115-1130. https://doi.org/10.1068/d6307

Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi, H. (2007). "Identity, Migration, and the City: Russian Immigrants in Contested Urban Space in Israel", Urban Geography, 28(5), pp. 436-455. https://doi.org/10.2747/0272-3638.28.5.436

Tzfadia, E. (2007). “Public Policy and Identity Formation: The Experience of Mizrahim in Israel’s Development Towns”, Journal for the Study of Sephardic and Mizrachi Jewry, 1, pp. 57-82 (available at: http://Sephardic.fiu.edu/journal/index.htm).

Tzfadia, E. (2007). “Urban Space and Ethno-National Politics: Control and Resistance in Contemporary Writing on the City”, Jama’a: Interdisciplinary Journal for the Study of the Middle East, 16, pp. 131-147 (in Hebrew) https://in.bgu.ac.il/humsos/jamaa/DocLib/%D7%92%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%95%D7%9F%2016/%D7%90%D7%A8%D7%96.pdf.

Tzfadia, E. and Yacobi, H. (2007). “Multiculturalism, Nationalism and Urban Politics: The Case of Ashdod”, Israeli Sociology, 9(1), pp. 127-148 (in Hebrew) https://www.israeli-sociology.sites.tau.ac.il/%D7%98-1.

Tzfadia, E. (2006). “The Ethno-class Trajectory of New Neighborhoods in Israel”, GeoJournal, 64(1), pp. 141-151. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41147993

Tzfadia, E. (2006). “When the Logic of Late Capitalism Meets the Logic of Ethno-nationalism: An exhibition review of “Separation”, Hagar: Studies in Culture, Polity and Identities, 7(1), pp. 49-54.

Tzfadia E. (2006). “Public Housing as Control: Spatial Policy of Settling Immigrants in Israeli Development Towns”, Housing Studies, 21(4), pp. 523–537 https://doi.org/10.1080/02673030600709058.

Tzfadia, E. (2005). “Academic Discourse on Making New Towns in Israel: Three Approaches in Social Science", Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, 23 (4), pp. 475-491 https://doi.org/10.1068/c41m.

Tzfadia, E. (2005) “Planning Critique and Its Origins in Social Theories: the Case of Israeli Development Towns”, Planning: Journal of the Israeli Association of Planners (version in Hebrew of “Academic Discourse on Making New Towns in Israel”).

Tzfadia, E. (2005). "'Local Autonomy and Immigration: Mayoral Policymaking in Israeli peripheral Towns", Space and Polity, 9 (2), pp. 167-183 https://doi.org/10.1080/13562570500305052.

Tzfadia, E. (2005). “Privatization and Communality: A Critical Viewpoint on Liberal Discourse on New Housing-Communities in Israel” (a comment on Lehavi), Haifa Law Review (Din U-Dvarim), 2(1), pp. 141-157 (in Hebrew) 

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2004). “Between Urban and National: Political Mobilization among Mizrahim in Israel’s ‘Development Towns’”, Cities, 21 (1), pp. 41-55 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2003.10.006.

This paper was translated to Italian:
Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2012). "Tra Scale Urbane e Nazionali: La Mobilitazione Politica dei Mizrachi Nelle Development Town Israeliane", In: S. Sinigaglia (ed.). Ebrei Arabi: Terzo Imcomodo? Zambon Editore, pp. 306-346 (ISBN: 888782682X).

Yacobi, H. and Tzfadia, E. (2004). "On the Construction of Territorial Identity: Nationalism and Space among Immigrants in Lod", Theory and Criticism, 24, pp. 45-71 (in Hebrew) https://theory-and-criticism.vanleer.org.il/product/%d7%a2%d7%9c-%d7%92%d7%99%d7%91%d7%95%d7%a9-%d7%96%d7%94%d7%95%d7%aa-%d7%98%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%98%d7%95%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%90%d7%9c%d7%99%d7%aa-%d7%9c%d7%90%d7%95%d7%9e%d7%99%d7%95%d7%aa-%d7%95%d7%9e%d7%a8/.

Tzfadia, E., Yacobi, H. and Yiftachel, O. (2002). “The Shifting Sands of Urban Politics, Planning and Identities”, Geopolitics, 7 (3), pp. 183-194 https://doi.org/10.1080/714000974

Tzfadia, E. (2002). “Between Nation and Place: Localism in Israeli Development Towns Confronts Russian Immigration”, Studies in 
the Geography of Israel, 16, pp. 97-122 (in Hebrew) https://geography.huji.ac.il/sites/default/files/geography/files/studies_16.pdf

Tzfadia, E. and Yiftachel, O. (2001). “Political Mobilization in the Israeli Development Towns”, Politika, 7, pp. 79-96 (in Hebrew) https://www.jstor.org/stable/23390928.

Tzfadia, E. (2001). “Competition on Political Resources: The Development Towns’ Municipal Elections”, Horizons in Geography, 53, pp. 59-70 (in Hebrew) https://www.jstor.org/stable/23704632.

Tzfadia, E. (2000). “Immigrant Dispersal in Settler Societies: Mizrahim and Russians in Israel under the Press of Hegemony”, Geography Research Forum, 20, pp. 52-69 https://grf.bgu.ac.il/index.php/GRF/article/view/215

Tzfadia, E. (2021). “Planning as Lawfare”, Urbanologia, https://urbanologia.tau.ac.il/planning-as-lawfare/ (Hebrew).

Tzfadia, E. (2020). “Exception in pandemic”, Urbanologia, https://urbanologia.tau.ac.il/state-of-exception-under-coronavirus/ (Hebrew).

 Tzfadia, E. (2020). “Fair decentralization to protect from displacement”, Urbanologia, https://urbanologia.tau.ac.il/urban-regeneration-erez-tzfadia/ (Hebrew)

Tzfadia, E. (2019). “Israel’s National Law boosts settlements”, Urbanologia, https://urbanologia.tau.ac.il/nationlaw/ Hebrew).

Yiftachel, O. and Tzfadia, E. (2013). "Grey Space and the Israeli City", Panim, 64, pp. 95-105 (in Hebrew), http://www.dmag.co.il/pub/histadrut/panim64/index.html#4

Tzfadia, E. (2012). "The Politics of Protest between Two Summers", Panim, 58, pp. 38-46 (in Hebrew), http://www.dmag.co.il/pub/histadrut/panim58/view_book.html.

Yiftachel, O. and Tzfadia, E. (2008). "Frontieriphery: the Development Towns and the Mizrahi Place", Block, 6, pp. 40-46 (in Hebrew).

 Tzfadia, E., Oren, A. and Levy, Y. (2008). “The IDF Goes South: Between Zionism and the Free Market”, Mifne, 56-57, pp. 14-19.

Tzfadia, E. (2008). “The Urban Community”, in: Barnir, S., Darel-Fossfeld, T. and Moria-Klain, Y. (curators). Hosting 2008: Bat-Yam International Biennale of Landscape Urbanism (Catalogue), pp. 212-217.

Tzfadia, E. (2007). “Design in Parallel Lines: On Globalization Processes and Identity”, Vitrina, 1, pp. 11-21.

Tzfadia, E. (2006). “Municipal Borders and the Provision of Cultural and Material Justice: New Direction for Local Government in Israel”, in: Razin, E. (ed.). Redistibuting Municipal Revenues: Financial Measures and Territorial Modifications, Tel-Aviv University and The Floersheimer Institute for Policy Studies, pp. 33-39.

Tzfadia, E. (2005). “Conquest of the Land: Settlement Project in the State of Israel”, In: Feldstein, A. (ed.). Hagidu “Ken” Lazaken: Dialogue with the Pioneering Spirit, The Ben-Gurion Heritage Institute, Keter and Ministry of Defense, pp. 46-47.

Yiftachel, O. and Tzfadia, E. (2000). “Trapped Men”, Panim, 13, pp. 44-59 (in Hebrew).

*** I have published 27 op-ed articles in daily newspapers since 2002.

Hirsch, D. (2019) (ed.). Encounter: History and Anthropology of the Israel-Palestine Space, Jerusalem: Van Leer Institute Press. Reviewed at: Megamot, 55(2), 2020, pp. 247-249 (in Hebrew).

Shdema, I. (2016). Jewish-Arab Relations in Mix-Cities Lod and Ramleh, Jerusalem: Carmel. Reviewed at: Israeli Sociology, 20(1), (2019), pp. 125-126 (in Hebrew).

Bar-On, S. (2013). Weaving Community, Jerusalem: Magnes Press, The Hebrew University. Reviewed at: Israeli Sociology, 17(1), (2015), pp. 176-179 (in Hebrew).

Yaron, H. (2010). Zionist Arabesques, Brighton, MA: Academic Studies Press. Reviewed at: Israeli Sociology, 14(2), 2013, pp. 429-431 (in Hebrew).

Porat, C. (2009). The Negev: Transformation fro a Desert Frontier to a Metropolis, Sede Boqer: The Ben-Gurion Research Institute (in Hebrew). Reviewed at: Ofakim BeGeographia, 76, 2011, pp. 174-175 (in Hebrew).

Noach, H. (2009). The Existent and Non-Existent Villages, Haifa: Pardes (in Hebrew). Reviewed at: Social Security, 84, 2010, pp. 164-165 (in Hebrew).

Barnett, C. and Low, M. (eds.) (2004). Spaces of Democracy: Geographical Perspectives on Citizenship, Participation and Representation, London: Sage. Reviewed at: Geography Research Forum, 26, 2006, pp. 165-167.