Jonathan Ben Efrat, a 35 year-old filmmaker from Israel, received a $5,000 award for his project entitled “Shock Therapy”

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

It is impossible to understand the process of privatization that has swept across Israel without some knowledge of the “Wisconsin program” – the program that led the way to the privatization of Israel’s employment services. The Wisconsin program has caused stormy debate.

“Unemployment is a kind of personal problem, an addiction to dependence on the state,” says Aki Efron, the Israeli partner of the Hadera branch of the Dutch company Agen. “This program is a good way of kicking the habit.”

The film exposes the human puzzle, contrasting the optimism and the affluent world of the program’s operators with the hopeless existence of the program’s participants. It will demonstrate undergoing changes in Israeli society, from a state of solidarity to one of glaring social inequalities.