Download or read book The Ayatollahs Democracy An Iranian Challenge written by Hooman Majd and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2011-09-12 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "One of America's most astute revealers of Iranian culture and identity."-Reza Aslan, The Atlantic Hailed as one of the year's best foreign policy books, Hooman Majd's latest offers dramatic perspective on a country with global ambitions, an elaborate political culture, and policies with enormous implications for world peace. Drawing on privileged access to the Iranian power elite, Majd "gives a harrowing description of the aftermath of the 2009 presidential elections in Iran" (Haleh Esfandiari). This "nimble take on Iran's fraught political landscape" (Kirkus Reviews) "sounds a dire warning to those in the West who want a democratic Iran. . . . Let us hope the President is listening" (Reza Aslan, The Atlantic).
Download or read book The Ayatollah Begs to Differ written by Hooman Majd and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2009-07-28 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Including a new preface that discusses the Iranian mood during and after the June 2009 presidential election and subsequent protests, this is an intimate look at a paradoxical country from a uniquely qualified journalist. The grandson of an eminent ayatollah and the son of an Iranian diplomat, Hooman Majd offers perspective on Iran's complex and misunderstood culture through an insightful tour of Iranian culture, introducing fascinating characters from all walks of life, including zealous government officials, tough female cab drivers, and open-minded, reformist ayatollahs. It's an Iran that will surprise readers and challenge Western stereotypes. A Los Angeles Times and Economist Best Book of the Year With a New Preface
Download or read book The Ministry of Guidance Invites You to Not Stay written by Hooman Majd and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2014-08-12 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In February 2011, Hooman Majd disembarked at the Tehran airport, a place he had passed through many times to visit family or accompany a news crew. But this time he had his wife, Karri; his infant son, Khash; and an oversize stroller in tow—and plans to stay for a year. Few American journalists gain entry to Iran; for Majd, the son of a diplomat under the shah and the grandson of an ayatollah, it would be the first time he had lived in his homeland since childhood. In The Ministry of Guidance Invites You to Not Stay, he recounts both his family’s domestic adventures and a tumultuous year in Iranian politics. The result is an unforgettable portrait of an elusive country whose government, in the more than thirty years since its Islamic revolution, has been the United States’ most intractable nemesis.
Download or read book Democracy in Iran written by Ali Gheissari and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-07 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today Iran is once again in the headlines. Reputed to be developing nuclear weapons, the future of Iraq's next-door neighbor is a matter of grave concern both for the stability of the region and for the safety of the global community. President George W. Bush labeled it part of the "Axis ofEvil," and rails against the country's authoritarian leadership. Yet as Bush trumpets the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East, few note that Iran has one of the longest-running experiences with democracy in the region. In this book, Ali Gheissari and Vali Nasr look at the political history of Iran in the modern era, and offer an in-depth analysis of the prospects for democracy to flourish there. After having produced the only successful Islamist challenge to the state, a revolution, and an Islamic Republic, Iranis now poised to produce a genuine and indigenous democratic movement in the Muslim world. Democracy in Iran is neither a sudden development nor a western import, Gheissari and Nasr argue. The concept of democracy in Iran today may appear to be a reaction to authoritarianism, but it is an old ideawith a complex history, one that is tightly interwoven with the main forces that have shaped Iranian society and politics, institutions, identities, and interests. Indeed, the demand for democracy first surfaced in Iran a century ago at the end of the Qajar period, and helped produce Iran'ssurprisingly liberal first constitution in 1906. Gheissari and Nasr seek to understand why democracy failed to grow roots and lost ground to an autocratic Iranian state. Why was democracy absent from the ideological debates of the 1960s and 1970s? Most important, why has it now become a powerfulsocial, political, and intellectual force? How have modernization, social change, economic growth, and the experience of the revolution converged to make this possible?Gheissari and Nasr trace the fortunes of the democratic ideal from the inchoate demands for rule of law and constitutionalism of a century ago to today's calls for individual rights and civil liberties. In the process they provide not just a fresh look at Iran's politics but also a new understandingof the way in which democracy can develop in a Muslim country.
Download or read book Appeasing the Ayatollahs and Suppressing Democracy written by Iran Policy Committee and published by Iran Policy Committee. This book was released on 2006 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Iran is emerging as the primary threat against the United States and its allies. Iran’s drive to acquire nuclear weapons, continuing support for and involvement with terrorist networks, publicly-stated opposition to the Arab-Israel peace process, disruptive role in Iraq, expansionist radical ideology, and its denial of basic human rights to its own population are challenges confronting U.S. policymakers. In trying to solve the puzzle posed by Iran, Iran Policy Committee's report suggests that Iranian opposition groups play a central role in U.S. policymaking.
Download or read book Democracy in Iran written by Misagh Parsa and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2016-11-07 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Misagh Parsa’s view, the outlook for democracy in Iran is stark. Gradual reforms will not be sufficient for real change: the government must fundamentally rethink its commitment to the role of religion in politics and civic life. For Iran to democratize, the options are narrowing to a single path: another revolution.
Download or read book Democracy in Iran written by R. Jahanbegloo and published by Springer. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Democratic government is something that has eluded Iran despite a series of non-violent revolutions aimed at establishing a system of governance that would promote both public freedom and political accountability. This explores the obstacles to the growth of democracy in Iran and posits a plan for non-violent action to help Iranians achieve it.
Download or read book The Road to Democracy in Iran written by Akbar Ganji and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2008-03-21 with total page 43 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A famous Iranian dissident calls for universal human rights and democracy based on our common humanity. Akbar Ganji, called by some “Iran's most famous dissident,” was a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. But, troubled by the regime's repressive nature, he became an investigative journalist in the 1990s, writing for Iran's pro-democracy newspapers. Most notably, he traced the murders of dissident intellectuals to Iran's secret service. In 2000, Ganji was arrested, sentenced to six years in prison, and banned from working as a journalist. His eighty-day hunger strike during his last year in prison mobilized the international human rights community.The Road to Democracy in Iran, Ganji's first book in English, demonstrates his lifelong commitment to human rights and democracy. A passionate call for universal human rights and the right to democracy from a Muslim perspective, it lays out the goals and means of Iran's democracy movement, why women's rights trump some interpretations of Islamic law, and how the West can help promote democracy in Iran (he strongly opposes U.S. intervention) and other Islamic countries. Throughout the book Ganji argues consistently for universal rights based on our common humanity (and he believes the world's religions support that idea). But his arguments never veer into abstraction; they are rooted deeply in the realities of life in Islamic countries, and offer a clear picture of the possibilities for and obstacles to improving human rights and promoting democracy in the Muslim world. Since his release from prison in March 2006, Akbar Ganji has been traveling outside Iran, meeting with intellectuals and activists in the international human rights community. He is currently living in the United States.
Download or read book The Battle of the Ayatollahs in Iran written by Alex Vatanka and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2021-04-08 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Understanding the foreign policy agenda and behavior of the Islamic Republic of Iran is a critical challenge for the world. But where do the principal Iranian regime actors come from in terms of political background, experiences and interests? Which types of ambitions or policy conflicts have dominated and shaped foreign policy debates since 1979? This book explains the internal policy process in Tehran by following two regime personalities, Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who before his death in January 2017 held some of the most powerful political positions in Iran. No two men have been more influential in dictating the regime's decision-making processes since 1979. Yet little is known about how their competing worldviews and interests, their key moments of dispute – both personal or policy-based – or their personal ambitions have informed the trajectory of Iranian politics. The book analyzes Khamenei and Rafsanjani's own words and writings - and accounts of them given by others - to reveal how the domestic policy contest has shaped Tehran's actions on the regional and international stage. Comprising primary and secondary Iranian sources - including untapped memoirs, newspaper reports, and Iranian electronic media and personal interviews - the book highlights the principal rivalries over the lifespan of the Islamic Republic and offers new insights into the present and future of Iranian foreign policy.
Download or read book Islam and Democracy in Iran written by Ziba Mir-Hosseini and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2006-05-26 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In today's world all eyes are on Iran, which has grappled with an experiment that has had a massive global impact. For some, the Iranian Revolution of 1978-79 was the triumph of a modern, political Islam, heralding Muslim justice and economic prosperity. Others, including many of the original revolutionaries, saw religious fanatics attempting to roll back time by creating a despotic theocracy. Either way, the Iranian Revolution changed the Muslim world. It not only inspired the Muslim masses but also reinvigorated intellectual debates on the nature and possibilities of an Islamic state. The new 'Islamic Republic of Iran' combined not just religion and the state, but theocracy and democracy. Yet the revolution's heirs were soon engaged in a protracted struggle over its legacy. Dissident thinkers, from within an Islamic framework, sought a rights-based political order that could accept dissent, tolerance, pluralism, women's rights and civil liberties. Their ideas led directly to the presidency of Mohammad Khatami and, despite their political failure, they did leave a permanent legacy by demystifying Iranian religious politics, and condemning the use of the Shariah to justify autocratic rule. This book tells the story of the reformist movement through the world of Hasan Yousefi Eshkevari. An active supporter of the revolution who became one of the most outspoken critics of theocracy, Eshkevari developed ideas of 'Islamic democratic government', which have attracted considerable attention in Iran and elsewhere. In presenting a selection of Eshkevari's writings, this book reveals the intellectual and political trajectory of a Muslim thinker and his attempts to reconcile Islam with reform and democracy. As such it makes a highly original contribution to our understanding of the difficult social and political issues confronting the Islamic world today.
Download or read book Guests of the Ayatollah written by Mark Bowden and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 710 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times–bestselling author of Black Hawk Down delivers a “suspenseful and inspiring” account of the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979 (The Wall Street Journal). On November 4, 1979, a group of radical Islamist students, inspired by the revolutionary Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini, stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran. They took fifty-two Americans captive, and kept nearly all of them hostage for 444 days. In Guests of the Ayatollah, Mark Bowden tells this sweeping story through the eyes of the hostages, the soldiers in a new special forces unit sent to free them, their radical, naïve captors, and the diplomats working to end the crisis. Bowden takes us inside the hostages’ cells and inside the Oval Office for meetings with President Carter and his exhausted team. We travel to international capitals where shadowy figures held clandestine negotiations, and to the deserts of Iran, where a courageous, desperate attempt to rescue the hostages exploded into tragic failure. Bowden dedicated five years to this research, including numerous trips to Iran and countless interviews with those involved on both sides. Guests of the Ayatollah is a detailed, brilliantly recreated, and suspenseful account of a crisis that gripped and ultimately changed the world. “The passions of the moment still reverberate . . . you can feel them on every page.” —Time “A complex story full of cruelty, heroism, foolishness and tragic misunderstandings.” —Pittsburgh Post-Gazette “Essential reading . . . A.” —Entertainment Weekly
Download or read book Iran under the Ayatollahs Routledge Revivals written by Dilip Hiro and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-05 with total page 459 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1985, this is a comprehensive study of the Middle East's most strategic country, set against the background of the Islamic heritage of Iran and the rise and fall of the Pahlavi dynasty. Dilip Hiro describes the various phases through which the Islamic revolution has passed, gives an incisive account of the first Gulf War, and provides an historical survey of Iran's relations with the West, the Soviet bloc, and other countries of the region.
Download or read book The Ayatollahs and Democracy in Iraq written by Juan Ricardo Cole and published by Amsterdam University Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 29 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Annotation. Iraqi Shiism is undergoing profound changes, leading to new elaborations of the relationship between clerics and democratic principles in an Islamic state. The Najaf tradition of thinking about Shiite Islam and the modern state in Iraq, which first developed during the Iranian constitutional revolution of 1905-1911, rejects the principle that supreme power in an Islamic state must be in clerical hands. Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani of Iraq stands in this tradition, and he has striven to uphold and develop it since the fall of Saddam Hussein. At key points he came into conflict with the Bush administration, which was not eager for direct democracy. Parliamentary politics have also drawn in clerics of the Dawa Party, the Sadr movement, and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, all of which had earlier been authoritarian in outlook. Is Iraqi Shiism experiencing its enlightenment moment? This title can be previewed in Google Books - http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN9789053568897.
Download or read book Democratic Uprisings in the New Middle East written by Mahmood Monshipouri and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-01-08 with total page 221 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As Egypt retreats from its newly elected government and Syria moves from one crisis to another, this book’s reflection on the Arab Spring could not be more timely. Monshipouri’s account of the role of emotion, solidarity, and online activism is informed by several trips to the region that continue to this day. The uprisings were fueled by a demographic surge of young people unable to find employment and frustrated by the lack of freedom, and now the elected regime has been ousted for failing to address these continuing circumstances. While modern technologies and social media may have brought new politics to the streets, organization on the ground trumps the enthusiasm of young protesters when it comes to shaping a country’s political future. How to turn elections into democracy in these post-conflict societies continues to be a daunting task, especially in countries with a longstanding history of military involvement in politics now experiencing a resurgence. This book addresses all of these subjects in an engaging and accessible narrative. Key features of the text:
Download or read book Guardians of the Revolution written by Ray Takeyh and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-05-05 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over a quarter century, Iran has been one of America's chief nemeses. Ever since Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah in 1979, the relationship between the two nations has been antagonistic: revolutionary guards chanting against the Great Satan, Bush fulminating against the Axis of Evil, Iranian support for Hezbollah, and President Ahmadinejad blaming the U.S. for the world's ills. The unending war of words suggests an intractable divide between Iran and the West, one that may very well lead to a shooting war in the near future. But as Ray Takeyh shows in this accessible and authoritative history of Iran's relations with the world since the revolution, behind the famous personalities and extremist slogans is a nation that is far more pragmatic--and complex--than many in the West have been led to believe. Takeyh explodes many of our simplistic myths of Iran as an intransigently Islamist foe of the West. Tracing the course of Iranian policy since the 1979 revolution, Takeyh identifies four distinct periods: the revolutionary era of the 1980s, the tempered gradualism following the death of Khomeini and the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1989, the reformist period from 1997-2005 under President Khatami, and the shift toward confrontation and radicalism since the election of President Ahmadinejad in 2005. Takeyh shows that three powerful forces--Islamism, pragmatism, and great power pretensions--have competed in each of these periods, and that Iran's often paradoxical policies are in reality a series of compromises between the hardliners and the moderates, often with wild oscillations between pragmatism and ideological dogmatism. The U.S.'s task, Takeyh argues, is to find strategies that address Iran's objectionable behavior without demonizing this key player in an increasingly vital and volatile region. With its clear-sighted grasp of both nuance and historical sweep, Guardians of the Revolution will stand as the standard work on this controversial--and central--actor in world politics for years to come.
Download or read book Answering Only to God written by Geneive Abdo and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2003 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Riveting . . . a side of Iran that is often misrepresented by the world’s media—[an] insightful, captivating book.” —San Francisco Chronicle Taking the reader inside Iran’s key institutions, Geneive Abdo and Jonathan Lyons argue that the 1979 Iranian revolution, long viewed in the West as the pursuit of an imagined medieval Utopia, was in fact a political movement designed to modernize Islam. Twenty years later, a power struggle between conservative and reform elements provoked a clash that has destabilized the country and limited Iran’s ability to integrate with the world community. Answering Only to God challenges the prevailing Western belief that the Islamic world is an undifferentiated mass of disaffected and dangerous fanatics or that a Western-style democracy will soon transform this ancient land of Shi’ite and Sufi tradition. Instead, the authors explore the controversial view that beyond their quarrel with the West, stemming from decades of exploitive foreign policies, the real struggle in Iran is between reformers and conservative mullahs.
Download or read book The Turban for the Crown written by Said Amir Arjomand and published by Studies in Middle Eastern Hist. This book was released on 1988 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This comprehensive history of the Iranian Revolution views it in the context of an ongoing conflict between religious and political authorities dating back to the establishment of Shi'ism as the state religion of Iran in 1501. The historical context is seen as being critical in understanding the staying power of Khomeini's regime and its ruthless elimination of internal opposition to the Islamic Republic. The significance of the appearance of widespread popular discontent, the ideological differences among the ruling clergy, and the issue of Khomeini's succession are also considered, and the book concludes with a comparison between the Iranian Revolution and other famous historical revolutions.
