How do government ministries perform during war? - opinion

The functioning of the Israeli government since the outbreak of the war on October 7 has been severely criticized. Many people feel that the government ministries do not fulfill the role required of them during emergencies.

How pervasive is this criticism in the Israeli public? How does the public perceive the performance of the government and its ministries?

A survey conducted by The Institute for Liberty and Responsibility at Reichman University, in collaboration with iPanel, examined how the public views the government’s performance. The survey was conducted during the sixth week of the war and comprised a representative sample of 803 respondents.

The public's satisfaction with government ministries

According to the survey, 27% of respondents are satisfied with the overall performance of the government. However, there are vast differences between coalition voters and opposition voters. 55% of coalition voters surveyed are satisfied with the government’s performance, as opposed to just 8% of opposition voters.

The fact that coalition voters are more content with the government’s performance than opposition voters is hardly surprising, of course. This is a well-known bias, whereby perception is skewed by political views or party affiliations.However, there is also variation in the levels of satisfaction with the different ministries. 61% of respondents are satisfied with the performance of the Ministry of Defense, and 55% are satisfied with the performance of the Ministry of Health.

For all other government ministries reviewed, approval rates are significantly lower, and in fact most of the respondents are not satisfied with their performance.

The Finance and Justice Ministries receive particularly low satisfaction ratings: less than 25% of respondents are satisfied with their performance. Only 29% are satisfied with the performance of the Ministry of National Security. As for the Ministries of Education, Transportation, Welfare, and Foreign Affairs, their satisfaction ratings hover around 31% to 33%. On the other hand, the satisfaction rating for the Ministry of Interior is slightly higher (39%).

Nevertheless, even the satisfaction scores of the various ministries conceal significant differences between coalition voters and opposition voters. A majority of coalition voters are satisfied with the performance of the Ministries of Education, Welfare, Interior, Foreign Affairs, Transportation, and National Security; while an overwhelming majority of opposition voters are not satisfied with the performance of these ministries.

The biggest disparity in satisfaction with the ministries’ performance is found in the Ministry of National Security, headed by minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. Only 12% of opposition voters are satisfied with the performance of this ministry, compared to 53% of coalition voters. Large gaps can also be seen in relation to the Finance Ministry headed by Bezalel Smotrich, and the Transportation Ministry headed by Miri Regev.

Just 10% of opposition voters are satisfied with the performance of the Ministry of Finance, as opposed to 45% of coalition voters; just 20% of opposition voters are satisfied with the performance of the Ministry of Transport, as opposed to 53% of coalition voters. In other ministries, such as Health, Welfare, Justice, Interior, and Education, the gaps between coalition and opposition voters are smaller, yet for each one of them the satisfaction rate among coalition voters is higher than that of opposition voters.

The smallest gap applies to the Ministry of Defense, where 62% of opposition voters are satisfied with the ministry’s performance, compared to 71% of coalition voters. This small gap may be related to the inherent positive appreciation towards the military apparatus in Israel – appreciation which may intensify during wartime.

The large, consistent differences between opposition and coalition supporters demonstrate that we tend to evaluate government ministries through the lens of our political views. This tendency is augmented when the ministry is headed by ministers with distinct, polarizing public presence, such as Ben-Gvir.

This fact is related to the personalization process taking place in Israeli politics in recent decades: over time, the politicians themselves take a more central place in politics, in the way the public perceives politics, and in the prominence of the media discourse around their personality – overshadowing the discussion of ideas and political parties.

The rise of politicians inevitably diminishes the role of political parties, which play a significant part in a democracy.

Consequently, policies and views are formed through an interpersonal discourse, rather than as a product of a profound discussion within or among parties or professional officials.

Personalization also encourages the rise of populist politicians, who introduce rhetoric and discourse that may weaken the gatekeepers of democracy as well as the democratic-liberal ethic itself, including the principle of equality before the law.

Under such circumstances, even government ministries struggle to gain public trust, since everything becomes dependent on the minister and his or her image.

The writer is a senior researcher at the Institute for Liberty and Responsibility, Reichman University.