Iran & Saudi
Arabia: Monarchies & Islamism
Iran & Saudi
Arabia: Monarchies & Islamism
Sam Ghandchi
http://www.ghandchi.com/2478-saudi-iran-monarchies-islamism-english.htm
ایران و عربستان سعودی: سلطنت و اسلامگرایی
http://www.ghandchi.com/2478-saudi-iran-monarchies-islamism.htm
http://isdmovement.com/2022/0822/081522/081522-Sam-Ghandchi-Kasravi-Saman-Rushdi-Alinejad.htm
P.S. Feb 16, 2019: The following article was written on August 7, 2002 and was first posted on Jebhe Melli Bulletin Board of Washingtin DC. Jebhe BB was a discussion forum in English where many Iranian/Americans with diverse viewpoints participated during the late 1990s and early 2000's. Jebhe BB was founded and managed by Dr. Morteza Anvari (1). Unfortunately this article has not been translated to Persian yet, but it has been cited by some academic publications (2) not known to this author. Although the following analysis has been written 17 years ago, the discussion is still relevant to the political situation in Iran, Saudi Arabia and the Middle East as a whole. Later in 2002, I published a book entitled "FUTURIST IRAN: Futurism vs Terrorism" which is also available in Persian, where I have not discussed the topics related to Saudi Arabia that are found in this article, but most of the discussion about Iran is covered in that book (3). SG
The rulers of Saudi Arabia are repeating Shah's mistake by thinking their
problem is the US. Lack of democracy and progress in the social system of Saudi
Arabia is increasingly being challenged not only by intellectuals and
progressive-minded individuals inside Saudi Arabia, but it is also being
challenged by the progressive people in the region and all around the world.
Despite so much economic and technical advancements of the last half century in
Saudi Arabia, beheading and other barbaric practices are commonplace in Saudi
Arabia and basic rights of women and Jews are readily dismissed, and we are in
the 21st Century and there is still no democratic structure in the political
system of Saudi Arabia.
Democracy and human rights are still foreign words for the rulers of Saudi
Arabia and they think their problem is only to convince the US government to
support Saudi Arabia as-is. This is a good reminiscent of the last days of the
Shah and how Shah was trying to convince Carter and the US administration that
human rights was not the issue in Iran. In fact, even though Shah did care for
economic and technical progress, nonetheless, ever since the coup of 1953, Shah
thought that democracy was his enemy, and this is why, on the one hand he always
appeased the clergy, and on the other hand clamped down on the most harmless
democratic gatherings of people, beginning with the 16-Azar (1953) killing of
the students at the Technology Faculty of Tehran University (4).
The reality is that because of lack of democracy, nobody was able to form any
organization to run Iran, and the clergy which already had its traditional
organization was unchallenged to take over Iran, when the Shah's regime fell
apart. Shah should have modernized the political structure of Iran if he wanted
to save his government and the cornerstone of that modernization was protection
of democracy and secularism. The latter would be opposed by the clergy and this
is why they opposed even the partial secularism of enghelaabe sefid (White
Revolution) of the Shah. But Shah instead of moving forward with a thorough
secularism and augmenting it with democracy, tried to appease the clergy on
secularism by giving them concessions here and there, while blocking all
democratic forces from forming their own organizations thru arrests, torture,
and executions.
And all this did not help the Shah to save his government, and only helped the
successor of his regime to be a Mediaeval Theocracy rather than a democracy.
Shah was successful in his suppression of Iranian democratic movement by
curtailing the further secularization of the state which had started at the time
of mashrootiat and Reza Shah. The clergy regained their status in the judicial
branch of the state and it is a fact that clergy's role in Iranian state is not
something that happened in the Islamic Republic and it is still not understood
by many monarchists who support the 1906 Constitution which allows the veto of 5
mojteheds and considers Shi'a as the official religion of Iran. In an article
entitled "What is
Secularism" (5),
I have explained how pivotal full secularism is for any future constitution in
Iran.
And Khatami and his supporters today still want us to believe democracy is just
the rule of law and my response to him has been written in an article entitled "Democracy
is Not People's Rule, It is People's Judgment"
(6). Also many of the monarchists like to blame Shah's fall on U.S. or the
British. The reality is that US and UK supported the inevitable when the time
came, because the clergy were the only ones who could rule Iran at that time,
thanks to Shah's eradication of secular democratic movement for over 30 years
prior to the revolution. In fact, US has approached the clergy in two ways
depending on US interests at any given time, and also depending on the general
world situation. For example US, not only in its fight with the Soviet Union in
the past, but even still now, appeases the Islamists when they see it fit, like
they have done in Afghanistan, by calling for a new state with an Islamic tag
long before the Loya Jirga. Nonetheless, after Sept 11th, the US is distancing
itself from the fundamentalist forces in the region, and these forces are more
and more using terrorism, as their way of attacking progressive forces, and the
Western interests. In an article entitled "From
Salman Rushdie to WTC,"
which I wrote a few days after the Sept 11th tragic event, I have discussed this
topic in details (7).
Today, Saudi Arabia is going thru a similar process as Iran's 1979 Revolution.
The fear of the West is that the fundamentalists can take over Saudi Arabia by a
revolt or a coup and in a post-911, this is a danger for the US. The rulers of
Saudi Arabia keep appeasing the fundamentalists. They think the lesson of Iran
is to appease the fundamentalists more than what the Shah did, instead of seeing
the true lesson of Iran, which is, to endorse democracy, progress, and
secularism, so that the secular and democratic forces can create their own
organizations, which may support constitutional monarchy or may support forming
a democratic republic in Saudi Arabia, and these organizations would be the real
block to any retrogressive takeover of power by the Islamist fundamentalists.
In such a situation, if Saudi Arabia was not going to make the same mistake as
the Shah, they should allow democracy to fully flourish; and of course many
political organizations and parties will get formed; and they may challenge the
monarchy itself, the same way monarchies that chose the democratic alternative
in Europe were constantly challenged by other democratic and republican forces;
and some like Sweden and UK survived but they face such challenge all the time,
which *is* democracy. And yes this means that there is a chance that
Constitutional Monarchy can lose power to a democratic republic in a democratic
Saudi Arabia, but avoiding it like the monarchy of Iran did, means losing power
and at the same time leaving the scene unchallenged for the traditional
organizations of the fundamentalists, which incidentally do not need democracy
to flourish. A few months ago in an article entitled "What is Modern Democracy"
(8), I have delved more into details about what really democracy is!
Will Saudi rulers allow secular democratic forces to organize themselves; or
they will either do it late; or keep appeasing the Islamists, until the
Islamists take over Saudi Arabia for good? That is still an open question. The
reality of democracy is that any force accepting it, risks the possibility of
losing power. But those European monarchies which took the path of democracy
realized that going back to the appeasement of clergy and disregarding the
separation of state and religion is not the solution to the problems of
monarchy; and in fact it can cause their quicker demise; as many monarchies in
the Middle East from Egypt and Iraq to Iran and Afghanistan have experienced
with so much bloodshed. The way of the future is democracy and secularism and
appeasing the fundamentalists is not going to save the monarchies and will only
postpone the progress of the countries of this region at a high human and
capital cost, as one can best see in the experience of Iran's reactionary 1979
Revolution. Let me give a bit of details here about understanding the 1979
Revolution in Iran because misunderstanding it has caused, and is still causing,
many errors among forces of different political and ideological inclinations.
In 1987, in my article in Iran Times, entitled "Progressiveness in the Present
Epoch" (9), I wrote that 1979 Revolution of Iran was a reversal of a Modern
Times' synonymy of Revolution and Progress, which was assumed as a given, since
the American 1775 and the French 1789 Revolutions. This synonymy was now
reversed, and I wrote that the world may need a new Immanuel Kant to formulate
this reversal when the retrogression has become the epitome of a major political
revolution in Iran. In fact, Kant never bothered writing about revolutions till
the American and French Revolutions happened and when writing on topics of armed
conflicts, his topics were war and peace between different states. Kant's
formulations of his ideal state and the topic of individual rights were in
reference to a state of affairs achieved thru reform and *not* revolution. I
will explain more below but let me first say my main point about Iran's 1979
Revolution.
As I had noted in my article of 1987, not all the forces in the revolution were
seeking reactionary goals but the main forces of the revolution *were* seeking
reactionary goals. In contrast, the main forces of the American and French
Revolutions were seeking the individual rights, civil society, fairness, and
social freedom, and this is how a thinker like Kant who basically did not
advocate revolutions, became a supporter of those events. In contrast to the
French and American Revolutions, the main forces of Iranian 1979 Revolution were
*against* individual social rights and *social freedom* and even the Shah
believed in more social freedom than them, and this is why the Islamists started
wiping out those rights, from the first days after the revolution with the
slogan of "yA roosari, yA toosari" when suppressing the demonstration of women
in Tehran, right after Bahman of 1357, they spoke of Islamic principle of "amre
beh maroof va nahi az monker", which became the rule, which was used to suppress
the individual social rights of every citizen in Iran.
If during the Shah's regime, only the political rights of the individual were
suppressed, the new Islamic state would not even stop at political rights and
decided on how people could eat or dress or have sex or even live inside their
own house. It was a total reactionary direction of the 1979 revolution which
developed by the strong presence of Islamists, thanks to Shah's blocking of any
democratic organization in the three decades prior to the 1979 Revolution. As I
had noted in my article, it is noteworthy that in the French and American
Revolutions, the reverse was true. In other words, in those revolutions, the
reactionary forces were not all against the revolution, and there were
reactionary forces also present on the side of the revolution. *But* the main
forces on the side of the revolution in the American and French Revolutions
sought progressive goals, such as the *individual rights* and civil society.
This is how those revolutions became the epitome of the ideals which Kant had
called for in his writings, the ideal social norms which he was trying to
achieve through *reform* in Germany of the successor of Frederick the Great,
Frederick William II, who contrary to Frederick the Great, had no respect for
individual rights and even had banned Kant from writing on religious matters,
after Kant's publication of his 1793 "Religion within the Limits of Reason
Alone", and the fact that as long as King Frederick William II was alive, Kant
did not write on religion.
So Kant was a symbol of a democratic-minded individual who did his most to work
by civil obedience and the only reason he supported the American and French
Revolutions was because he saw them to usher in the ideals which he saw as
necessary for a modern state, and not because he liked to advocate revolutions,
which he did not. In contrast, many who supported the Iranian 1979 Revolution
forgot about asking what ideals that revolution was seeking, and supported it
just because it was a revolution to overthrow the dictatorial and corrupt system
of the Shah, and not because the revolution was seeking progressive and
democratic ideals, which it was not.
Calling the 1979 Revolution a coup by some monarchists only means for some of
them that they still have not understood that revolution is not synonymous with
progress, and for some others, means that they just want to blame the problems
of Iran on foreign forces, when it is so obvious that at the time when the world
is progressing towards a post-industrial society, Iran fell to a reactionary
force that offered a reactionary retrogression of the society, as the solution
for the real problems of development that Iran was facing, thanks to the
suppression of secular democratic forces in Iran's society, for three decades
prior to 1979, under Shah's dictatorship.
Today the events of Saudi Arabia remind me of the same type of development. If
the Saudis do not move quickly towards a secular and democratic state, I would
not be surprised to see a fundamentalist overthrow by the likes of Bin Laden in
Saudi Arabia. Iran in contrast will be moving away from the fundamentalism, as
the Iranian people learned it the hard way that the solution to the problems of
Iran is only through a democratic and progressive state and the Islamic
theocracy, one way or the other, has not been able to offer any solution for the
present and future of Iran and one way or the other, it is doomed.
Many of the Iranian intellectuals waste their time discussing whether 1979
Iranian Revolution was a coup or a revolution and I have already adequately
responded about this issue. What follows from my theory is that Iranian
Revolution was the most major reactionary revolution of our times which has
symbolized the reactionary response to the development of the world from an
industrial society to a post-industrial society. What this means is that the
futurists have the best perspective to offer a real solution for Iran and the
region because Iran is the country that faced the decision of choosing an
alternative for the future, a future which was not going to be a capitalist or
communist solutions of the industrial society (which as explained in my article
in 1987 were not considered as viable in the Iranian movement of 1970s).
Thus the ones looking for an alternative beyond the industrial society, either
ended up in a pre-industrial solution with Islamists at the top, or they had to
be futurists going beyond the liberal and communist traditions. Unfortunately a
futurist force was almost nonexistent in Iran of 1979 and even three years
later, it was strongly opposed and threatened by the Iranian opposition which
was mainly leftist. Here is what I wrote two years ago about the lesson of 1979
Revolution of Iran that there are no quick panaceas for those who really want to
work for democracy and progress in Iran and the issue is not about how fast we
are able to overthrow a regime but is about the plans we have come up with for
the future (10)
But Iran having been the cradle of the first major reactionary revolution of our
times, means that freeing Iran from this nightmare and moving towards the future
will be the best example for the world as to how to go towards a post-industrial
society. It will be in its most pure form in Iran in contrast to the countries
like the U.S. that are gradually taking this step. I think Iranian experience
will have the central role in formulating the way as to how future
post-industrial society will develop. The same way that American and French
Revolutions were so central in the way the intellectuals in all other countries
searched for solutions to pass the Medieval Times and to go for an industrial
society in the 18th Century.
What is very disappointing is that the Futurists have mainly ignored the
developments of Iran and have only seen the Iranian situation as the issue of
US-Iran relations whether at the time of the Shah or at the time of IRI and
hostage-taking. If one looks at the publications of World Future Society (www.wfs.org)
in the last 20 years, there is hardly any article about Iran. Among the
futurists, only Daniel Bell has made a reference to Islamists of Iran and the
Salman Rushdie issue (11).
I think Iranians and those who understand the Iranian situation will be the ones
who can bring that awareness to the world before the futurists can get a grasp
of the magnitude of this upheaval and how important it is to understand it to
see how the post-industrial development will be challenged by pre-industrial
alternatives and retrogressive structures of the past, such as the Islamic
fundamentalism. I think the Iranian people forming a futurist party and
spearheading such an epochal event to lead Iran to a post-industrial society,
can become an example for the world, in making this new paradigm shift from the
industrial to the post-industrial world. And there is not much more I can add to
what I have written as to why the solution for Iran is a secular democratic
futurist republic (12).
In short Iran and Iranians will have a leading role in formulating the proper
solutions for building the post-industrial society, which can help others in
other parts of the world by setting a new path. I think for secular and
democratic forces in Iran to provide proper leadership for this future
development of Iran, they need to form a futurist party that can lead such a
change, or else we may end up with another retrogression, and we all know how
the 1979 retrogression cost us all so dearly in the last few decades. A proposed
Futurist Party (13) details the ideals I think a futurist party for Iran can be
formed around and more related documents are available at a website entitled "Iran's
Secular Democratic and Futurist Republican Party" (14).
Hoping for a democratic and secular
futurist
republic in Iran,
Sam Ghandchi
IRANSCOPE
http://www.ghandchi.com/index2.html
Aug 7, 2002
Footnotes:
1. Dr. Morteza Anvari
2. Chartles McDaniel: Islam and the Global Society: A Religous Approach to Modernity, 5/31/2003
http://digitalcommons.law.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2157&context=lawreview
https://www.olir.it/areetematiche/pagine/documents/News_1186_MCDaniel.pdf
3. FUTURIST IRAN: Futurism vs
Terrorism, Online Book
http://www.ghandchi.com/500-FuturistIranEng.htm
ایران آینده نگر: آینده نگری در برابر تروریسم، کتاب الکترونیک
http://www.ghandchi.com/500-FuturistIran.htm
4. Iranian Students-Tale of Two
Regimes
http://www.ghandchi.com/339-IranStudentsEng.htm
دانشجويان ايران-داستان دو رژيم
http://www.ghandchi.com/339-IranStudents.htm
5. What is Secularism?
http://www.ghandchi.com/302-SecularismEng.htm
سکولاریسم چیست؟
http://www.ghandchi.com/302-Secularism.htm
6. Democracy is Not People's
Rule, It is People's Judgment
http://www.ghandchi.com/313-JudgmentEng.htm
دموکراسی حکومت مردم نیست، قضاوت مردم است
http://www.ghandchi.com/313-Judgment.htm
*Rule of Law* and *Judgement by
the People*
http://www.ghandchi.com/135-RuleOfLaw.htm
7. From Salman Rushdie to WTC
http://www.ghandchi.com/87-aboutWTC.htm
8. What is Modern Democracy
http://www.ghandchi.com/92-democracy.htm
9. Progressiveness in the
Present Epoch-Second Edition
http://www.ghandchi.com/352-taraghikhahiEng.htm
Preface and Full Text of the Paper in Persian
http://www.ghandchi.com/352-taraghikhahi.htm
10. One Lesson of 1979
http://www.ghandchi.com/08-One_Lesson_of_1979.htm
11. Daniel Bell - A Quotation
about Religion
http://iranscope.ghandchi.com/Anthology/Bell-Religion.htm
12. Iran-Futurist Republic-Third
Edition
http://www.ghandchi.com/411-FuturistRepublicEng.htm
ایران-جمهوری آینده نگر-ویرایش سوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/411-FuturistRepublic.htm
13. Futurist Party Platform
http://www.ghandchi.com/348-HezbeAyandehnegarEng.htm
پلاتفرم حزب آينده نگر
http://www.ghandchi.com/348-HezbeAyandehnegar.htm
14. Iran's Secular Democratic
and Futurist Republican Party
حزب جمهوریخواهان سکولار دموکرات و آینده نگر ایران
https://sites.google.com/site/futuristparty/
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