ABSTRACT
The dining area reserved for the tourists faced the Sea of Galilee, a location that Kibbutz members also considered attractive. The ethnography looks at the tourism workers – i.e., Kibbutz members, most of them women – who had to invent strategies to enhance their prestige, given their low status compared to that of production workers in general and agricultural workers in particular. Members were forced to make decisions that brought on radical changes in their lifestyle. Following the pressures exerted by influential Kibbutz members, professional advice was sought from an outside organizational consultant – at a high price. The rise of right-wing governments diminished governmental support and accelerated the deterioration of the Kibbutz’s prestige. The appeal of Kibbutz tourism – i.e., of hosting and displaying itself to the world – became for the Kibbutz a strategy for facing both its economic and image crises. Kibbutzim developed a heritage industry that included pioneer settlement museums and archives.
