Before and Beyond Neoliberalism: The Political Economy of National Liberation, the PLO and ‘amal ijtima’i

Abstract

The role of neoliberal economic policies and accompanying political philosophy has received significant attention in the scholarship on contemporary Palestinian political economy.1 Earlier studies focused their attention on the role of international organizations and donors on Palestinian economy and politics in the period following the signing of the Oslo Accords.2 More recent scholarship has focused on the policies of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank under the leadership of Salam Fayyad with its adoption of a state-building strategy founded on conspicuously neoliberal tenets.3 This literature has examined the flaws and contradictions within such plans as they seek to be implemented in the Palestinian context. In particular, a number of scholars have reached the same conclusion and, citing the failure of the Palestinian state-building project, contributed to a growing consensus around the need to return to the basic understanding of the Palestinian condition as a liberation movement seeking to overcome a settler-colonial regime.4 Indeed, as this volume seeks to underline, a focus on the outcomes of settler colonialism should not distract our attentions from both its foundations and the attempts by the colonized people to overcome it. In the spirit of this ‘coming full circle’ of the literature, this chapter returns to the origins of the modern Palestinian liberation movement in the hope of shedding light on a Palestinian political economy that preceded neoliberalism.