Israel–Palestine, explored through interactive cases.

Instructor guide

Purpose

A Right on Paper is a self-contained case game for introductory students, based on Gershon Shafir and Yoav Peled’s Being Israeli: The Dynamics of Multiple Citizenship (2002). Students act as a policy desk. They learn through choices, evidence, and explanations. No prior reading is required. Reconstruct the authors accurately before evaluating their claims.

Learning goals

Explain how liberal, republican, and ethno-national claims combine through institutions.
Distinguish a formal right from usable access, resources, and decision authority.
Trace how coalitions, organizational resources, and vetoes produce institutional change.
Apply democratic multiculturalism: cultural authority, material provision, and individual protections.
Use evidence to qualify an explanation while preserving differences in legal status.

Suggested segmentation

Plan about 90–120 minutes for the full class activity, solo or in pairs. This is a planning estimate; writing and discussion affect the pace. The 20 scenes form eight chapters. Keep their order so earlier decisions carry forward. Split across two class meetings if useful; chapter 4 offers a convenient break.

Chapter	Scenes	Focus
Start with a case	1–3	Make an initial prediction, help Samira reach work, and learn the three citizenship claims.
Resources and organized claims	4–6	Choose consultations, negotiate a grant route, and distinguish employment data from political influence.
Contribution and national standing	7–8	Compare service-based eligibility, historical recognition, and collective-national standing.
An institution changes	9–10	Trace health-insurance reform and compare explanations of religious authority.
Boundaries and political authorship	11–13	Distinguish legal statuses, analyze an exception, and reconstruct democratic multiculturalism.
An order and its enforcement	14–16	Predict implementation, inspect a documented return attempt, and compare unequal legal positions.
Scope, rivals, and later evidence	17–18	Evaluate institutional pressure and distinguish a mechanism from its historical prediction.
Apply and explain the authors	19–20	Apply the authors to a new school case and write an evidence-based account.

Running the activity

Students choose Class, enter a name, read the short case, select a route where offered, and explain their reasoning. Required word counts and evidence selections are shown beside each task. “Use this card” selects evidence; opening source details does not. Let students write individually before comparing accounts at reflection pauses. Ask them to identify a rule, an actor, and a consequence rather than repeat theory labels.

Assessment

Use this proposed rubric across the fieldbook. Give each criterion 0–3: 3 = clear and supported; 2 = partly developed; 1 = labels or assertions; 0 = missing. Total: 12.

Criterion	Strong work
Author understanding	Accurately reconstructs interacting citizenship claims and the authors’ institutional argument.
Institutional reasoning	Connects a rule, actor, resource, coalition, or veto to a bounded outcome.
Evidence and scope	Uses relevant evidence, preserves dates and populations, and separates historical findings from invented model outcomes.
Application and judgment	Applies the ideas to a new case and identifies a serious alternative or a finding that could weaken the account.

Grade reasoning, not political agreement. Students may defend a bounded reform or challenge the authors. The game’s completion check verifies required entries; it does not establish learning or assess argument quality.

Saving and submission

Class mode requires a name, writing, decisions, and selected evidence where indicated. Explore uses the same cases with optional writing. Work saves locally in the current browser. Students should download a JSON backup before changing devices or file locations. PDF and semantic HTML provide submission records; full HTML/TXT preserve context. Desk notes are excluded by default unless the student chooses to include them. Nothing automatically submits to Canvas: students download their record and upload it through your course assignment.

Debrief

Which intervention achieved a real improvement, and who authorized it?
When did an opportunity require another resource or institution to become usable?
How did health reform change both entitlement and organizational power?
What did the school case reveal about authority without resources?
Which evidence could strengthen or weaken your preferred explanation?

Keep documentary events separate from modeled consequences. Students analyze institutions rather than impersonate communities or disclose personal histories.