Competing Civilisational Discourses in the Islamic Republic of Iran
Title: Competing Civilisational Discourses in the Islamic Republic of Iran
Speaker: Mehran Kamrava (Georgetown University Qatar)
Abstract: Over the course of the Islamic Republic’s existence, three distinct discourses regarding the ideal form of Iranian civilisation have emerged. Broadly speaking, these discourses can be categorised as religious conservative, religious reformist and secular modernist. The religious conservative discourse is most readily identified with the religio-political establishment that came to power following the success of the revolution. It seeks to explain the world – and, more specifically, its vision of the ideal social and political order – in terms which it claims most closely reflect the letter and spirit of the arguments put forward by the regime’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. A second strand of thought has been similarly steeped in religious precepts and continues to view religion as a key component of Iranian civilisation. However, it has a decidedly different conception of religion, seeking to reform and constantly update rather than to reify the original religious tenets of the 1978–79 revolution. There is a third civilisational discourse that has gained prominence amongst a growing number of Iranian thinkers in recent times—more accurately, it has regained the prominence it once had—and that is the secular modernist discourse. The modern world, the proponents of this discourse claim, is no place for politicised religion. It is, instead, a world in which religion needs to be privatised and politics needs to be secularised, where civil society and globalisation must become the norm rather than the exception, and where democracy needs to reign supreme. Whilst each of these discourses shapes ideas and ideals about Iranian civilisation amongst Iranian intellectuals, it is political dynamics that dictate the efficacy and pervasiveness of each in contemporary Iran.
Date and time: Wednesday 16 September 2026, 2.00 pm
Venue: Salle de Sacy – Inalco, Maison de la Recherche (2, rue de Lille – Paris 7th arrondissement)
Coordination of the Near and Middle East research area (WP6): Laetitia Bucaille (Inalco), Gilles Dorronsoro (University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne), Alia Gana (University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne), Valentina Napolitano (IRD) and Rima Sleiman (Inalco) with Jan-Markus Vömel, postdoctoral researcher, DÉCRIPT programme.
The sessions will be held in English.
Registration is open until 14 September at 4.00 pm :