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History and the Quest for Liberty
Oxford University Press
June 2006
232 pages
ISBN: 0195189671
EAN: 9780195189674
Hardcover
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Non-Fiction | Non-Fiction Political
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 of
Evil," 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, Iran
is 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 idea
with 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's
surprisingly 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
powerful
social, 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 understanding
of the way in which democracy can develop in a Muslim country.
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