BDS, a critical appraisal

Abstract

The following pages conduct a critical discursive analysis of the BDS movement by placing it in juxtaposition to Robert Meister’s recent articulation of the “Human Rights Discourse” (HRD) as described in his book, After Evil. Using Meister’s framework in conducting such an analysis will allow the uncovering of the BDS movement’s ideological assumptions, political limitations, and potential social consequences. The question I ask is to what extent does the discourse of the BDS movement fall under the orbit of the Human Rights Discourse, and to what extent it escapes its critique as posited by Meister. To answer the question this paper investigates the underlying notions of justice, evil, and politics, as adopted by the BDS movement. The research finds that the BDS movement, despite its notable efforts at challenging and breaking out of the HRD paradigm, nonetheless ultimately remains within its orbit, and is hence subjected to some of the same critiques, limitations, and pitfalls. Hence, although the BDS movement challenges the “exception of Israel” in several and significant ways, it does so only by defending the discursive (and material) structure that ultimately both created the exception and which limits-undercuts future political action-vision.