Transformation of Collective Education in the Kibbutz: The End of Utopia?

The kibbutz movement is now 90 years old. It still exists as the world’s biggest secular movement of communes, which seemed to have realized the Utopia of a free, egalitarian and just society. In order to ensure the lasting Utopia of a New Society and of a New Human Being, the kibbutz pioneers conceptualized and realized a unique concept of a comprehensive collective education, which adopts many ideas of the New Education Movement (Reformpaedagogik) and of the psychoanalysis of S. Freud, which were in each case adapted to the reality of kibbutz life. For some years the kibbutzim have undergone a far-reaching transformation, which also affects the educational system profoundly. The changes that have been taking place and are still continuing, are analyzed in this volume by historians and sociologists, but especially by educationalists and psychologists.