Deborah Bernstein received her B.A. and M.A. in sociology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and her Ph.D. from the University of Sussex, Great Britain. She has been teaching in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Haifa since 1977 and chaired the Women’s Studies program between the years 1987–2002. She specializes in historical sociology, the study of Israeli society and the study of women and gender in Israeli society in the pre- and post-state periods. Her books on women in pre-state Israeli society include The Struggle for Equality (1987) and Pioneers and Homemakers, an edited volume which appeared in 1992.