Anat Balint
Dr. Anat Balint is the inaugural Jeffery B. Plevan Chair in Modern Israel Studies at the Center for Judaic Studies. A scholar in media studies and a former journalist, Dr. Balint has an extensive background in writing about the political economy of the media.
As a journalist, she worked across print, public radio, and commercial television in Israel, specializing in investigative writing on the media industry. She served as the media correspondent for Israel’s leading daily newspaper, Haaretz, and was both a staff member and later a board member of the Israeli media watchdog, The Seventh Eye. In these capacities, Dr. Balint published numerous investigative articles addressing the politics of Israeli media and the pressures faced by both local and foreign journalists. Some of her reports led to significant changes, including the dismissal of the general manager of Israel's broadcasting service due to corruption, which paved the way for the successful reform and the establishment of a new public broadcasting corporation.
As a media scholar, she has dedicated extensive efforts to researching the growing blur between editorial content and advertising, focusing her PhD dissertation at Goldsmiths, University of London, on this phenomenon, known as branded content or native advertising (in digital environments). Her work investigates the behind-the-scenes negotiation processes surrounding sponsorship deals that integrate leading brands into entertainment programming (reality TV) in both the UK and Israel. Her book, Inside the Box (2012, Israeli Democracy Institute, Hebrew), explores the rise of branded content in Israeli commercial television, based on comprehensive fieldwork within the Israeli media industry. The book has been adopted by the Israeli Ministry of Education as part of the curriculum for media studies in high schools and is used in undergraduate media studies courses in Israel. Dr. Balint has also served as an expert in several class action lawsuits concerning branded content in Israeli courts and has been invited to present her research at various academic and popular forums in Israel, the UK, and the US.
At the University of Arizona, Dr. Balint teaches courses on various aspects of Israel, including a course on Modern Israel that introduces students to Israeli society and documentary filmmaking, as well as a course that focuses on Israel as a society of immigrants. She continues to publish investigative pieces, opinion articles, and media analyses in Haaretz, and is frequently interviewed on issues related to Israel and media. In August 2023, one of her reports highlighted the role of Israeli commercial channels in promoting extreme right-wing politicians who subsequently became part of the current far-right government.