Were the 1973 Elections in Israel Critical

TLDR: The results of the 1973 election showed that the Likud-Mapam alignment had a steadily declining share of the vote, or is it the low point of a curve that will again swing up and underscore the rule of the continued dominance of the labor movement in Israeli politics as discussed by the authors.

Abstract: Israel's dominant party system has proved to be very hardy. One party-formerly Mapai, now Labor-has consistently won a plurality of the votes in Israel's eight elections and has always been the major factor in the coalition governments that have ruled the country.'1 The elections on the last day of 1973 had great potential for changing the allocation of power in Israeli politics. Since they occurred shortly after the Yom Kippur War, these elections caught the Labor-Mapam alignment suffering from a shortage of public confidence. In addition, the opposition Likud, newly formed from a number of center and right parties, was encouraged by its good showing in the Histadrut (Labor Federation) election before the war. The popular identification of the Labor party with the achievements of the state was bound to be put to a test after the war. Were the 1973 elections in Israel critical?2 Will they be remembered as the elections "in which more or less profound readjustments occur in the relations of power within the community, and in which new and durable election groupings are formed"?3 Is the 1973 alignment showing signs of a steadily declining share of the vote, or is it the low point of a curve that will again swing up and underscore the rule of the continued dominance of the labor movement in Israeli politics? Before turning to these questions, it is important to establish the extent of change in voting behavior in Israeli elections. The size of the floating vote provides a base point for assessing whether the 1973 elections deviated from previous patterns. The results of the 1973 vote allowed the Labor-Mapam alignment to retain power; but its strength was curtailed from 57 seats in the outgoing 120-seat Knesset to 51 seats in the new one. The second largest parliamentary bloc, the Likud, increased its seats from thirtyone to thirty-nine. But the results emphasize the consistent voting behavior of a large segment of the population in election after election.