Papers by Mohammad Ali Tavana
Policy success or policy failure? Narrative analysis of the Islamic parliament of Iran’s debates on the FATF recommendations bill
British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies
Political Gnosis of Najmuddin Razi: Love-Intellect Link
سیاست متعالیه, 2017
There are two major viewpoints about gnosis and politics: One viewpoint absolutely distinguishes ... more There are two major viewpoints about gnosis and politics: One viewpoint absolutely distinguishes these two issues; another viewpoint rules over their relative overlapping. Accordingly, by viewing ideas of Najmuddin Razi, these questions can be posed: What relation does Najmuddin Razi make between gnosis and politics? Where is a good ruler placed in his political gnosis? For him, what characteristics should a good ruler have? Najmuddin Razi sees gnosis as a social phenomenon that attempts to change the masses neck-in-neck with the experts. In his idea, the masses use intellect to perceive existence and experts use love to perceive existence; therefore, only those who have achieved sublime power of intellect and love can lead the masses and the experts towards prosperity and happiness. From this perspective, the saint Imams govern people in absence of Prophets. In this way, Divine Kingdom Rule remains inseparable part of social gnosis. Divine King of Najmuddin must be attributed to ne...
The goal of this article is the analysis of Ahmadinejad government's foreign policy according... more The goal of this article is the analysis of Ahmadinejad government's foreign policy according to the critical theory of international relations. Whether it seems foreign policy of Mahmood Ahmadinejad, government is different from his before and after governments. Perhaps it could be provided more detailed and objective analysis from foreign policy of Islamic Republic of Iran during Ahmadinejad government, according to the critical theory of international relations. Accordingly, the main question of the article is: How can analyze foreign policy of Ahmadinejad, according to the critical theory of international relations. It is assumed the critical theory of international relations has the ability and feature for foreign policy of Ahmadinejad. It seems that foreign policy of Ahmadinejad government criticized unjust and hegemonic structure of international system. Therefore it can be said, in negative form (what should not be),foreign policy of Ahmadinejad government is so matched ...
Journal of Business & Financial Affairs, 2016
Objective: Evaluation of cultural policy-making process in Islamic Republic of Iran which is iden... more Objective: Evaluation of cultural policy-making process in Islamic Republic of Iran which is identified based on cultural identity-needs a native pattern according to the religious culture of the Iranian community, because transmission of non-native evaluative patterns of cultural policy cannot be the gateway to this field. This research aims at identifying and forming utility indexes on each stage of the cultural policy-making process in Islamic Republic of Iran. Methods: Research is conducted based on qualitative analysis of the three documents, cultural engineering map of the country, culture-related chapter of "the development prospects (1404)" and "Islamization of the country's universities", using theme analysis as a process for analyzing text data. Results: Utility indexes on the cultural policy-making process are as follows: The understanding and realization of the problem stage including awareness and cognition, social growth, identity and deepening of the principles and religious education; The formulation of solution stage including efficiency, innovation, need-based and rational scientific issues; The legitimation stage including persuading and legal support; The implementation stage including synchronizing the time and place, structuring, soft and hard supplying and succeeding in legitimacy; and The evaluation stage including multi-level monitoring, continuous monitoring and intelligent monitoring. Conclusion: Evaluative model in the cultural policy-making process helps policy makers and enforcers and stakeholders, at the first step, to prevent potential damage in decisions and cultural activities. In the next step, if it fails to reach cultural goals, by referring to the proposed model, they could identify the obstacles and problems and tend to solve them.
Review of History and Political Science, 2016
Two macro views exist about the connection of mysticism and politics. One, attached an absolute d... more Two macro views exist about the connection of mysticism and politics. One, attached an absolute distinguish between them, another adjudicate on the partial and sometimes absolute overlap of them. Based on this recent attitude, it could be review on the thoughts of Najm al-Din Razi, the sighted policy mystic and the thinker of sixth and seventh Hegira century, and design this question: What are the subjects of his political mysticism? It seems that Najm al-Din Razi tries to introduce politics as the part of human intellectual-spiritual evolution process, with removal of inherent contradiction between wise and love, Therefore to join these together. Also, it seems that his political mysticism is about the good ruler. So he enumerates positive features (such as, Divine charisma, justice, equity, beneficence, patience, toleration, consult vulnerability, anticorruption, pragmatism and moderation) and negative features (such as, separation from passion, arrogance, corruption, blasphemy, depravity, denier, rebellion, greed, anger and asthenia, extremes) for a good ruler which are underlie of change and intellectual-spiritual evolution of society.
Journal of Politics and Law, 2016
As a conservative philosopher, Leo Strauss reconsiders and criticizes modern political thought me... more As a conservative philosopher, Leo Strauss reconsiders and criticizes modern political thought methodologically and epistemologically, in that he believes it has faced crises leading history of philosophical thinking to deviate. To put simply, Strauss claims that the major part of critical thinking arisen in the West is the by-product of the modern political thought. According to this, the present paper reviews Strauss’s critique of modern political thought, putting the question “what kind of insights and enlightenments does Strauss’ critique of modern political thought encompass?” As a finding of the research, we can hold that Strauss attempted to show that methodology of historical and epistemology of relativism governing modern political thought disregard trans-spatial and timeless principles of natural law; as a result, it substitutes suspicion for real knowledge and certainty.Thus, it encourages nihilism; on the one hand, it introduces any form of autonomous agreement by human ...
Farabi’s Virtuous City has a special sociopolitical hierarchy, which at first glance, appears to ... more Farabi’s Virtuous City has a special sociopolitical hierarchy, which at first glance, appears to be original. Now, the following questions are raised: What was Farabi’s main criteria for creating this sociopolitical hierarchy? And to what extent did he drew on historical facts to establish this hierarchy? Findings of the present research indicate that the two components of knowledge and function have been Farabi’s most important criteria for establishing the sociopolitical hierarchy of his Virtuous City. Accordingly, he categorizes the classes of Virtuous City as follows: 1the ruling class; 2assistants to the ruler, including Al-Afazel (the nobles), Zuvei al-lasana (speakers), Al-Moqadderoun (specialists), Al-Mujahedun (the military), AlMaliyun (economic forces); 3the masses; and 4the opponents and adversaries, including Navabet and Bahimiyun. It seems that there are similarities between the function of some of these classes and the function of historical classes in the ancient Iran...
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Papers by Mohammad Ali Tavana