Exploring the Causes of the Failures of Islamic Exalted Governance in Iran Based on Grounded Theory

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Associate professor Department of Political Science, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Ardabil, Iran.

2 Doctoral candidate in Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada

Abstract

Purpose: The overarching aim of this study is to identify and examine the barriers that hinder Islamic exalted governance in Iran and arguably to reveal the underlying epistemological and institutional crises which inhibit the realization of Islamic tenets in systems of governance. Also, the aim of the study is to provide a contextualization of Islamic exalted governance which inherently can mediate the changing expectations of communities while remaining loyal to Islamic values. Thus, this study can help bring a theoretical view closer to the actual institutional realities of governance and provides potential for future work by providing insight into the future of Islamic governance for practitioners, academics, and religious authorities.
Methodology: The research utilized a qualitative framework rooted in Strauss and Corbin's grounded theory approach to identify obstacles to 
the implementation of Islamic exalted governance. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with 24 academic specialists, alongside the use of official documents, religious texts, and political discourses for data gathering. Theoretical sampling persisted until data saturation was achieved. Data analysis was conducted in three separate phases: open coding, then axial coding, and finally selective coding. A grounded model of the research along with its main concepts developed as the conclusion of the study. The study incorporated participant input alongside expert evaluations to improve the validity of the findings.
Findings: This study's results point to “the crisis of compatibility between religious wisdom and secular systems of power” as the first-order impediment to achieving Islamic exalted governance in Iran. The second-order barriers arise at several causal levels, chief among them is the incompatibility between Islamic political philosophy and the necessities of modern governance, the rigidity of some forms of traditionalism, the tension between utopian religious visions and the pragmatism of executive rationality, and the incomplete conceptual groundwork to address the intersection of jurisprudence and the structures of political authority. At the contextual level, existing barriers include secular authoritarianism illegacies, irreconcilable elite gaps between secular and religious elites, and the change in citizen expectations, moving towards more democratic and rights-based demands of governance. Intervention conditions are also compounding the barriers to governance including the reduction of the sacred in bureaucratic structures, rentier economies, and the internal differences and contradictions of the governing conversations. Responding to these structural and epistemological limitations, the governance system has limited itself almost exclusively to symbolic directionality. This can be manifested in the reduction of Islamic governance into ritualized political symbols, where the reproduction of authority takes precedence over the construction or reconstruction of institutional foundations to retain Islam's meaning for human flourishing. Value-laden identity sustainability can also replaced effective institutional reform and bargaining. Although these strategies conceal some indicators of legitimacy, they do not recognize structural inefficiencies, leading to sometimes substantial consequences. Perhaps most salient are the implications of presence, including the depletion of spiritual capital, the slow emergence of creeping secularism, stagnation of theory in religious political science, the estrangement of citizens from the fundamental principles of the Islamic system, and low levels of participation in civic society. In summary, the findings indicate that absent confronting the epistemological void between religious wisdom and ontology of practical governance structures within which it is expressed, Islamic exalted governance is in jeopardy of remaining wholly rhetorical as opposed to dignified in its transformatice, civilization building potential in the Iranian context.
Conclusion: The biggest impediment to Islamic exalted governance is the political environment because it is only partially supplying Sharia principles and never turning them into functional institutions and systems and act of policy making. The forward momentum of governance is sabotaged because religious and customary institutions refuse to change and there is a structural schism between religious discourse and reality. The present situation exists because there is no widely accepted theory of jurisprudential and power relations and Sharia and politics are not clearly understood. Governance effectiveness is diminished by superficial rituals that subordinate institutional development and because of strategic differences between state institutions and religious institutions. Governance contradicts itself as socio-cultural decline occurs with loss of spiritual capital, as well as with disconnection between citizens and others in society where there are shared bonds. Governance structures fail over time which leads to stagnation, and ultimately collapse. The evidence in this research indicates that these differences can only be resolved through deep engagement with the intentions behind religious teachings, and institutional change in the governance landscape as well.

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