Partners: Office of the President of Israel, Ruderman Family Foundation, UJA Federation of New York
CONTEXT
In recent years, Israel has entered a deep polarization crisis. Five election cycles, the ‘judicial reform’, and the war of October 7th all exposed widening divides that weaken trust in institutions, fuel hostility between communities, and erode the resilience of the Israeli society.
Recognizing the urgency, Pnima set out to create a shared knowledge base that could guide collective efforts to understand and reduce polarization. They turned to Q to design and lead the process.
CHALLENGE
Polarization in Israel was widely recognized as urgent, but the field faced three barriers.
First, efforts were fragmented: many actors worked in parallel without a shared framework for coordination.
Second, polarization is multifaceted — ideological, emotional, and social — and looks different across politics, media, institutions, and daily life. This made it hard to compare insights or design systemic solutions.
Third, there was no unifying language. Stakeholders often meant different things when they spoke of “polarization,” leading to confusion about what the problem actually was, which dynamics perpetuated it, and what reducing it should look like.
The challenge, then, was to build a shared knowledge infrastructure: a common way to define, diagnose, and address polarization so that collective action could be both coordinated and effective.
OUR APPROACH
Q designed and facilitated a six-month collaborative learning process that combined rigorous research with wide engagement:
- Expert Forum: in-depth interviews and consultations with 12 leading Israeli academics and practitioners, holding diverse perspectives and experience.
- Literature Review: synthesis of cutting-edge Israeli and international research into an accessible framework.
- Stakeholder Engagement: dialogue with over 60 organizations and leaders at the President’s Residence to refine and validate the framework.
Knowledge Map: production of a structured, practical resource that integrates research insights with actionable pathways.
RESULTS
The process produced Israel’s first shared and comprehensive knowledge map for understanding polarization. At its core stands a novel scheme: three types of polarization (ideological, emotional, and social) mapped across four arenas (political leadership, public institutions, media, and the public). This matrix, grounded in the academic literature and validated through broad consultation, created a common reference point for the entire field.
To make the framework practical, Q created a set of detailed “identity cards” for every type of polarization and every arena. Each card defined how polarization manifests in that context, explained the drivers and incentives that sustain it, highlighted indicators that can be tracked over time, described the risks of escalation, and mapped how that dimension interacts with other forms of polarization.
This systematic mapping turned abstract debates into a concrete tool that equips policymakers, NGOs, funders, and educators to identify entry points, prioritize interventions, and evaluate outcomes against a shared baseline. By engaging more than 60 organizations at the President’s Residence, it also created broad validation of the framework and helped align actors around next steps: developing a national strategy, building a Polarization Index to measure progress, and fostering an ecosystem that can coordinate efforts across sectors.
INSIGHTS
Several key insights emerged from the process:
- In Israel, social polarization (tribal divisions) is as central as ideological or emotional divides – a unique feature compared to many other democracies.
- Polarization has beneficiaries: politicians and media actors gain from it, while society at large pays the costs.
- There is no single lever for change: systemic progress requires coordinated action across all arenas.
- The opposite of polarization is not forced unity, but a healthy culture of disagreement and civic engagement.
With the right tools, Israel can serve as a global laboratory for countering polarization, offering lessons to other democracies.