Modern Iran in Perspective by Ali Pirzadeh

Author:Ali Pirzadeh
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9783030257088
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

3.2 Political Culture

Here I briefly discuss the phenomenon of political culture so that the reader may have a better grasp of the political events in contemporary Iran.4 The notion of political culture in this study assumes that the attitudes, sentiments, and cognition that inform and govern political behavior in Iran, or anywhere else for that matter, are not the result of mere arbitrary collections, but denote coherent patterns which fit together and are mutually reinforcing. In spite of given diversity in political orientations in Iran as well as any other society, there is a limited and particular political culture which renders meaning, predictability, and form to the political process. This sense of political culture assumes that each community is innately inclined, by its own historical context, to learn and incorporate into its own quality the knowledge and sentiments about what constitute politics in a local sense of the word. This specificity confines what can be considered politics with the parameters imbedded in the dynamic psychology of a culture. Yet it also transforms politics into a relevant process that evolves as each generation collects its own experience from the previous one, and hence each must react against that process to find its own politics and, subsequently, the laws that govern the general culture of a society.5

To minimize possible misinterpretation, the notion of political culture in this study is closely linked to that of Sidney Verba’s definition; “The political culture of a society consists of the system of empirical beliefs, expressive symbols, and values which define the situation in which political action takes place. It provides the subjective orientation to politics .” (Pye and Verba 1969, pp. 513, Emphasis added) Gabriel A. Almond also reaffirms this explanation by stating, “Every political system is embedded in a set of meanings and purposes… Every political system is embedded in particular pattern of orientations to political action.” (Almond 1956, pp. 396)

I initially characterized the political culture in Iran and then broadened the discussion to go beyond specificity in terms of political action. The main attributes of the political culture in Iran are rooted in its history and culture, where communal identities are strong. This is the reason why one does not find political regimes of citizens throughout history, but rather is generally faced with what Gellner calls “government by network,” in which allegiances or loyalties come first, and most belong to locality in the sense that they correspond to personal, family, ethnic, or similar cohesions.(Gellner 1994, pp. 26) Under this type of situation, institutional rules become less important than personal arrangements and affiliations based on reciprocities (real or symbolic, explicit or implicit). Moreover, the events of the past few 100 years and disclosures in Iran prove that beneath the framework of modern-oriented institutions, clientelism and patronage relations tend to endure. Relations of friendship or kinship can open or shut access to positions of power more effectively than legal provisions.6

The conviction in this study on what is defined as political action leans toward a view that considers political action as context-bounded, and hence subjective.

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