Gender, religion, geopolitics: Iran is often trapped within this three-fold and narrow framework. Three dimensions, such as the feminine, the religious, the political often enclose the whole debate about the country and flatten out the multidimensional complexities of its society.
When it comes to the news, from local daily facts to geopolitics, Iranians are almost always either overlapped or juxtaposed to the Iranian government discourses and acts. The result is often a partial and stereotypic picture.
Why not to start deconstructing these narratives, then, avoiding not to speak on an entire population’s behalf?
In two exemplificative but very different cases, religion is recurrently (mis)interpreted: 1) women and the veil, and 2) Iran-Saudi Arabia acrimony.
Gender/religion and the veil
Gender is more socially constructed and culturally acquired than given by birth. We learn how to behave as women according to the (un)written rules of the society we live in. Not every aspect of Iranian society, even privately, is religiously gendered as some Western observers can easily assume using those conventional canons that produce many “others” and often stigmatize hijab. Likewise, Islam does not always represent the crucial factor to understand Iranian women. It is time tostart trekking other paths, rather than focusing just on the government level and looking through a top-down lens, in order to explore and understand a whole country. Imposing a “Western-centric” approach to feminism and women’s rights battles, as well as spreading a univocal way of “liberation”against the rules of the Islamic Republic, does not represent Iranian women at all (but Others). Furthermore, this attitude ignores the processes that are developing within and outside the country and among local women, such as feminist activism which is gaining importance, particularly in the cyber space. Importing a pattern from abroad is not a feasible strategy. On the one hand, it is because different contexts respond to different needs. On the other hand, because impetus and motivations are changing throughout time and space.
Conversely, in the abovementioned narratives, one speaks on other women’s behalf. Therefore, within these channels, Iranians women have no names, in the sense that their individualities are squeezed by what they represent or they have to represent. Their identity is often presented as function of their role or their relationship to religion, within a narrow framework that includes only dichotomous categories, such as rich/poor, conservative/liberal, secular/religious. This is evident in certain portraits of Iranian rich girls of some areas, opposed to those of others wearing chadors and presented as ignorant or bigot. Moreover, women are often categorized as mothers, sisters or wives:they cannot speak just “as women”. Then, as anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod points out, the woman as part of the family becomes a field for the production of discourses. This happens both in the local context and in the mainstream media narrative.
Every time one focuses on the veil as the main terrain of struggle within the Iranian society, he/she reproducescode conventions as habits of visual language that carry specific meanings. The objection to this line of reasoning is often as follows: the veil is a fact. Yes, but – as Gayatri Spivak argues – facts are “discursively constructed”, and hence, their “mode of production” is shown as a narrative.
Therefore, the hijab as a religious symbol is often manipulated (and not only by the Iranian political apparatus), in the sense that it is taken as a relevant or the main relevant aspect of women’s identity. Islam, even detached from the politicization carried out by the State, is portrayed most of the times as a rigid system.
What happens when it comes to geopolitics? What role does religion play? How is Iran represented in this case?
Geopolitics/religion and the example of Saudi-Iranian uneasy détente
The road to peace in the Persian Gulf and within the wider Middle East runs via Riyadh and Tehran. Bridging the rift between Saudi Arabia and Iran is a necessary condition for the stability of the region, in terms of security, mutual cooperation and legitimacy. According to some observers, the time seems to be ripe for a rapprochement between the two rival countries. Without entering the debate about this acrimony, it is interesting to analyze how the antagonism has been represented.
If there is consensus among scholars about the positive effects of a Saudi-Iranian relations détente to the region, experts do not agree on the relevance of sources of discord. Indeed, tensions in the Gulf and in the Middle East have been problematized from different angles: religion, ethnicity, national identity, ideology, security necessities. How do these variables interact? In what order of priority? Why does Saudi Arabia and Iran’s acrimony has not subsided yet?First, both countries understood their national interest and the other’s behavior in different ways;[i] second, mutual perceptions have changed over time. Religious or ethnic dichotomies cannot be exhaustive to understand the ongoing proxy war in the Gulf.
Saudi Arabia and Iran are both hegemons and they have to be considered “natural rivals”, but not permanent enemies, according to the analyst and blogger Sarah Masry. Why are they “natural” antagonists? If one takes religion as a lens of interpretation, Riyadh’s government is Sunni-Wahhabi and Tehran’s is Shia. While Saudi authorities do not miss the chance to portray the country as a leader of the Muslim world and a victim of the Iranian-Shi’a hatred, especially in recent years Iran has rarely placed emphasis on the religious-sectarian factor. Since the foundation of the Islamic Republic, Khomeini and other political leaders stressed on an Islamic universalist dimension with Iran as a leading power, rather than focusing on Shi’a particularism. Nevertheless, religious sectarianismbecame more and more crucial in the Iranian-Saudi relations, starting from the 1979 Iranian revolution and the institution of the Islamic Republic: it began to be politicized.
Furthermore, Iran has a “Sunni foreign policy”. Indeed, it concentrates on issues which are important for the whole Muslim world, such as the Palestinian cause and anti-American strategies of the region. Yet, it can be argued that Iran is more concerned about the protection of its regional allies, such as Assad in Syria or Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the reason does not lie in any religious shared identity. Rather, it depends on a shared need of “resistance” among trans-national groups against foreign and internal threats, despite a terrible war for civilians. Nonetheless, over and above overlapping Islam with Shi’a, it is important to underline that the Iranian rhetoric utilizes religion once it has to delegitimize its antagonists in the international arena: for instance, by making the equation Sunni-allies with ISIS.
The ground of contention, especially after the revolts of Arab Spring, has become the perception of common threats that can affect domestic affairs as well as stability in the region. In this sense security necessities take a crucial role. First, Saudi Arabia becomes the pillar of security for other GCC countries. Second, Iran carries out its policy of “containment of US” and its allies, always for security reason and to maintain its political legitimacy. Consequently, Saudi Arabia fears US-Iran détente.Moreover, foreign policy’s decisions are connected to domestic policy, regime security and perceptions of vulnerability in and out of the borders. Finally, beyond sectarianism, the economic rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran, as suppliers of oil and natural gas within the region and the world, hinders détente.
The analysis and the deconstruction of these narratives allow to conclude that the religious factor becomes important only when it is being politicized. Therefore, blaming religion as the source of all evils in Iran and in the Middle Eastis very dangerous and deeply shallow.
SOURCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS
- Abu-Lughod, Lila, “Feminist Longings and Postcolonial Conditions,” in Remaking Women. Feminism and Modernity in the Middle East, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998).
- Spivak, Gayatri. “Can the Subaltern Speak,” in Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, ed. C Nelson and L. Grossberg, (Basingstoke: Macmillan Education, 1988).
- Spivak, Gayatri. In Other Words, (New York: Routledge, 1988), 242, cited in Kapoor, Ilan, “Capitalism, culture, agency: dependency versus postcolonial theory,” Third World Quarterly, 23-4 (2002).
- Warnaar, Zaccara and Aarts eds. GCC-Iran Relations: Prospects for Change, (Gerlach Press, 2016).
Gender, religion, geopolitics: Iran is often trapped within this three-fold and narrow framework. Three dimensions, such as the feminine, the religious, the political often enclose the whole debate about the country and flatten out the multidimensional complexities of its society.
