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This digital document is an article from APS Diplomat Recorder, published by Arab Press Service on January 2, 2010. The length of the article is 455 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

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Title: IRAN - Dec 23 - Iran Strips Moussavi Of Government Job.(Mir-Hossein Moussavi )
Author: Unavailable
Publication: APS Diplomat Recorder (Newsletter)
Date: January 2, 2010
Publisher: Arab Press Service
Volume: 73Issue: 26

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Chapters: Government of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Government of Mohammad Khatami, Government of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Ministry of Petroleum, Ministers of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Government of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Ministry of Intelligence and National Security of Iran, Cabinet of Iran, Ministry of Health and Medical Education, Government of Mohammad-Javad Bahonar, Ministers of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Government of Mohammad-Ali Rajai, Ministries of Iran, Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Interior. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 110. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Government of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the 9th and 10th government of Iran after Iranian Revolution.At this time, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the president. Ahmadinejad was not widely known when he entered the presidential election campaign, although he had already made his mark in Tehran for rolling back earlier reforms. He is a member of the Central Council of the Islamic Society of Engineers, but his key political support is inside the Alliance of Builders of Islamic Iran (Abadgaran or Developers). Ahmadinejad generally sent mixed signals about his plans for his presidency, perhaps to attract both religious conservatives and the lower economic classes. His campaign slogan was: "It's possible and we can do it". In the campaign, he took a populist approach. He emphasized his own modest life, and compared himself with Mohammad Ali Rajai, Iran's second president. Ahmadinejad said he planned to create an "exemplary government for the people of the world" in Iran. He was a "principlist", acting politically based on Islamic and revolutionary principles. One of his goals was "putting the petroleum income on people's t...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=26079001 ... Read more

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--Journal of Palestine Studies

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Not your father's Iran anymore
I like it when an author takes a broad, difficult subject and 1.) gives a good generalization, with some proof 2.)penetrates very deep into a very few specific examples. Adelkhah does that quite well.

First, he touches on the broad view of an emerging civil culture in Iran, without which Iran cannot become a "modern" republic and certainly not a democratic one. He tells of the amazing changes to the city of Teheran as mayor Kharabashi challenged everyone to bring their (formerly private and exclusive) gardens out to the front of the street. If you have toured the traditional Middle East, you will have doubtless noticed that houses are built much like fortresses in the city-- emblematic of a culture that displays a seemingly congenital xenophobia.

He also traces the origins of the sports craze in Iran, and the explosion of public parks and spaces. One cannot walk away from the book without a genuine sense that the Islamic Republic of Iran is actually undergoing tectonic changes from within that threaten to cast aside the clerical domination of the country in favor of something entirely new to the world: a Muslim democracy, whatever that turns out to be. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs, published by Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs on April 1, 2010. The length of the article is 728 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

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Title: Political history.(Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses)
Author: Kenneth Katzman
Publication: Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs (Report)
Date: April 1, 2010
Publisher: Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs
Page: NA

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When Christopher de Bellaigue first visited Iran in 1999, he found it irresistably alive: under the leadership of President Mohammad Khatami, Islamic revolutionary rule was loosening and the prospects for democratic pluralism seemed bright. But over the remaining six years of Khatami's presidency, de Bellaigue watched as the conservative religious establishment reasserted its power and the hopes of reform slowly died. The country seemed to turn its back on all that Khatami stood for when it elected an unsophisticated Islamist ideologue, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to succeed him in 2005.

As the optimism of the reform movement was fading, international tensions over Iran's nuclear program were rising. George W. Bush included Iran in the "axis of evil," depicting it as a malign theocracy determined to acquire nuclear weapons and threaten Israel. Yet de Bellaigue's accounts of the nuclear negotiations make clear that the West's opposition to Iranian nuclear ambitions has helped both to empower those who oppose democratic reform and perhaps even to convince Iran it needs nuclear weapons for self-defense.

Beyond the high political drama, de Bellaigue, a long-term resident of Tehran and a fluent Persian speaker, gives a sense of the complexities of Iranian culture and society through striking portraits of Iranians going about their daily lives—reading the poetry of Rumi, looking at modern art, making films under the threat of censorship, trying to get by despite domestic turmoil and military threats. His keen analyses of Iran's politics and its people offer fascinating insights into a often misunderstood nation that poses some of the most challenging problems facing the world today. ... Read more

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To Learn About Contemporary Iran, Skip the TV News and Read This Book
Though it sounds a truism, it simply must be stated that Iran is a terribly important country.Unfortunately, Americans, who are ostensibly the ultimate arbiters of power in this most powerful entity on the globe, know frightfully little about the history and vibrant political, social and creative dynamics of this ancient civilization.If one watches the television news or reads one of the many lackluster dailies in this country, one is liable to get a rather one-sided impression of a nation of backward thinking Islamic thugs dying to get their hands on a couple of nukes to lob at Israel and the United States.Certainly there are such individuals in positions of power in Iran, but the fact is that Iran boasts one of the more highly educated and politically dynamic populations in the Middle East.Bearing all of this in mind, Christopher de Bellaigue's intimidatingly astute collection of essays could not have come at a better geo-political moment.In pieces dating from November 1999 to October 2006, Bellaigue presents us with a surprisingly comprehensive overview of the complex political forces at play in Iran and underscores the need for a new direction in U.S. policy with respect to Iran.Bellaigue's essays provide an insightful view at the reform movement within Iran, originally championed by Mohammed Khatami which aimed at forging a uniquely Iranian reconciliation between Western-style democratic institutions and the Shia Islam that shapes Iranian society.Moreover, in pieces covering the emerging issue of Iran's development of nuclear technology and Washington's rigidly bellicose response thereto, it becomes clear that the more intransigent the U.S. behaves toward Iran, the more firmly entrenched becomes the hardline conservative establishment.In another essay, Bellaigue shows how British policy during their mandate in Iraq led to the emergence of Qom as the heart of Shi'i Islamic learning and practice.This development eventually greatly influenced the rise of the Ayatollah Khomeini and continues to play an important role in the emerging Shi'i domination of Iraq.The bottom line is that Iran is at a critical moment in its history and is simply too imporant a country to ignore.The U.S. government has an opporunity to to influence Iran's development in a way that will prove beneficial to the entire world--not to mention its all important regional allies, Israel and Iraq.Sadly, the current administration seems to have chosen the worst possible policy in terms of dealing with this emerging situation.The best thing Americans can do is educate themselves on the matter and a good place to start is with Bellaigue's new collection. ... Read more

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The recollections of the head of Truman's Point 4 Program in Iran (1952-1955) which became a focal point of the Mosaddegh government. Many important future Iranian politicians were involved in the program. ... Read more

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Among the many political systems in the Middle East, the regime in the Islamic Republic of Iran stands out as one of the most peculiar. There, the formal government--president, parliament, and other official governing components--is paralleled by more powerful revolutionary institutions that help shape regime policy. But a third influential strand in Iran's volatile political dynamic is more unfamiliar to many, namely, the vigilante groups used by hardliners to intimidate reformers with raw violence.

In this Washington Institute for Near East Policy book, historian Michael Rubin presents an incisive and comprehensive survey of Iran's vigilantes, or "pressure groups," along with an exploration of the deep roots these groups have in modern Iranian history. Drawing on both a wide array of Persian language sources and his own research conducted in Iran, Dr. Rubin concludes that--despite the inevitability of political change suggested by demographic and economic realities in the Khatami era--the prospects for real reform in Iran within the existing system of rule are weakened by vigilante activism.

The strategic use of vigilantes to frustrate reform also raises important policy issues for the U.S. government. The United States, Dr. Rubin argues, should not tolerate a shell game in which vigilantes--sponsored by those in power--carry out hostile actions for which the regime then conveniently denies responsibility. If the Iranian president cannot effectively suppress vigilante groups, then he may be too weak a figure upon which America and the West can rely to implement meaningful changes in foreign or domestic policy.

Understanding the threat these vigilante groups pose can only improve America's ability to formulate effective policy toward Iran. This valuable book, incredibly rich in detail, brings vital scholarship to bear on that understanding. ... Read more

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terrific analysis
Succinct explanation and summary of forces at play in modern Iran. Particularly timely in light of modern events. This should be required reading for the people who set US foreign policy. ... Read more

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Common Iranians and their crude reality.
This is a solid book, supported by local research and self contrasted with relevant authors on the field (Abrahamian, Afary, Maziar, Hiro, Parsa...)
The book is divided in two parts, the first one deals with the iranian common citizen and its fate through revolution and islamic regime up to 2.006, that's after Ahmadineyad's rise to presidency (and good insights on this event indeed).
The second part deals with the current international crisis with Iran, and clearly shows why the common iranian, although has very little to gain from his own regime, won't have any other choice but to support it. Sadly, that's the conclusion.

Leftoid Account of Important Matters
As Patrick Clawson stated in the Middle East Quarterly, the dramatic polarization of American politics has led leftist critics of the Bush administration to assume that Iran's Islamic Republic cannot be all that bad if President George W. Bush describes it as part of an "axis of evil." Feeding this attitude are suspicions that the crisis over Iran's nuclear program is a tawdry rehash of the dubious intelligence about weapons of mass destruction that helped instigate the Iraq war, or the belief that displaying any concern for the Iranian people plays into the hands of Bush administration warmongers. This narrative leaves little room for concern about what is happening to the people of Iran--even the left-wing Iranian workers' movements that should be natural objects of leftist sympathy.

As reporters for the Swedish left-wing weekly Arbetaren (The worker), Malm and Esmailian approach Iran from a position of traditional left-wing concern about workers, human rights, and despotism. They spent much of 2004 traveling around Iran, meeting with those facing the growing repression to which the reform movement was subjected as it was being shut down. Their focus is on ordinary Iranian workers, not on the Westernized intellectuals who usually win foreigners' attention. Malm and Esmailian provide graphic accounts of those workers' suffering under the cruel tyranny of the Islamic Republic and of the vicious repression to which they are subject.

Make no mistake: This book is situated firmly in the camp of the hard Left, which sees Israel's evil hand everywhere and cannot imagine Bush ever doing anything good. Malm and Esmailian's discussion of nuclear issues is a mélange of conspiracy theories, ill-informed speculation, and plain error. Iran on the Brink can hardly be recommended as a guide to Iran and the challenges it poses to the region and to world peace. That said, it is nice to see some leftists who are willing to highlight the Islamic Republic's brutal treatment of the poor people of Iran.

Malm and Esmailian spend a great deal of time on Iranian history, primarily to highlight the evils inflicted on the country by Western imperialism--disregarding that the development of the country's oil resources is what allowed Iran to modernize under the shah. However, their historical account also brings out in detail what the Islamic Republic works so hard to suppress--namely, that the 1978-79 anti-shah revolution was a broad social movement that was hijacked by Islamists who were distinctly in the minority among the revolutionaries.

Why the world focuses on Iran
Andreas Malm and Shora Esmailian provide a thorough if leftist history of the fall of the Shah of Iran and the rise of the ayatollahs. Their political perspective weights this complex story as they delve into the political parties, conflicts, motives and factional disputes that brought the ayatollahs to power. Today, Iran has a very complicated political environment as Communist and U.S. ideologies confront radical Islam. The authors reach a few odd conclusions, fall into hackneyed rhetoric about the bourgeoisie, and present very tainted views of Israel, though, if you must quote Ahmadinejad to meet your book's purpose, it's hard to avoid rhetoric straight from the source's mouth. The authors know Iran and analyze its politics in depth. They provide background on the leftist labor parties, their interactions with Islamic radicals, and Iran's controversial nuclear and oil policies. getAbstract thinks that those who read this with an awareness of its filters will find a telling, alternative perspective on a dangerous problem. ... Read more

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From the 1978-79 Islamic Revolution to the present struggle for democratic reform, Iran has transformed dramatically in the past 25 years.In addition to providing an overview of the debates fueling Iran's current domestic crisis, this book offers the reader an appraisal of the various concerns that place Iran at the center of international attention. ... Read more

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An excellent starting point for trying to understand Iran
Although this book is to be found in the children's section I highly recommend it for adults who would like an overview. It's easy to read and although it is brief it doesn't lack content. The author gives historical timelines and historical background along with maps and photos. He also includes a variety of viewpoints from right-wing Americans to Islamic extremists. This book is a few years old so it was written before Iran's president announced his intentions to nuke Israel and then turned around and turned around and claimed that Iran needs nuclear energy, even though it is an oil rich nation. One thing to keep in mind when considering Iran's volatility is that 70% of its population is under the age of 30. In other words more than 70% of its population has virtually no memory of anything other than living in a Shi'ite dictatorship.
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This study focuses on Iranian tales as a medium for the transmission of mode of thought, behaviour, and social values in the process of socialization, and in the social reproduction of the superstructure. Comparisons with Turkey, China and Arab countries isolate a complex of motifs that occur only in Iranian tales, and then treat the relation of these pertinent motifs with Iran's sociohistorical reality. The historical development of Chess, one of the oldest games popular among Iranians, and its impact on their socialization process is also discussed. The inquiry concludes by comparing the historical process of social rise and the social ambitions of the Iranian political elite on the basis of the games and tales they are brought up with. ... Read more

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"In his case study of the 1979 Islamic revolution, Salehi discusses the role of culture and religion in a modern society. The author examines Shi'ism as a vehicle of political activism and dissent and provides an insider's view of events leading to the 1979 Iranian revolution. . . . The author suggests that modernization theory and single-factor causes of revolution be examined in a holistic manner. . . . Salehi explains that this approach neither ignores nor discounts the significance of facts. The book provides an interesting perspective on the psychological undercurrents of life in an oppressive society. A rich source of information on the Islamic revolution." Choice ... Read more

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Discusses the origins, events, conclusion, and aftermath of the conflict in Iran after Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile to lead the 1979 revolution. ... Read more

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Racism Iranian style
Iran and the Challenge of Diversity: Islamic Fundamentalism, Aryanist Racism, and Democratic Struggles by Alireza Asgharzadeh (Palgrave Macmillan) interrogates the racist construction of Arya/Aria and Aryanism in an Iranian context, arguing that a racialized interpretation of these concepts has given the Indo-European speaking Persian ethnic group an advantage over Iran's non-Persian nationalities and communities.Based on multidisciplinary research drawing on history, sociology, literature, politics, anthropology and cultural studies, Alireza Asgharzadeh critiques the privileged place of Farsi and the Persian ethnic group in contemporary Iran. The book highlights difference and diversity as major socio-political issues that will determine the future course of social, cultural, and political developments in Iran. Pointing to the increasing inadequacy of Islamic fundamentalism in functioning as a grand narrative, Asgharzadeh explores the racist approach of the current Islamic government to issues of difference and diversity in the country, and shows how these issues are challenging the very existence of the Islamic regime in Iran.
This study is a multidisciplinary work that draws on fields of history, sociology, literature, politics, anthropology, and cultural studies to explore the origina-tion, development, and continuation of racist ideas in Iran. It analyzes the relationships among European racist ideas, the creation of the Indo-European language family, and the emergence of modern racism in Iran, interrogating the construction of notions such as Aria, Aryan race, and Aryanism in an Iranian context. By situating Iran within the Orientalist dis-course and by exploring its cultural, linguistic, and ethnic developments in light of Orientalist/Aryanist reconstruction of Iran's history, the study exam-ines various levels of nation building, identity construction, and aggressive nationalism in Iran. It shows the way in which nationalism and racism worked to place the Indo-European-speaking Persian ethnic group in a position of advantage vis-a-vis Iran's non-Persian nationalities, ethnic groups, and com-munities. In so doing, it challenges conventional notions about Iran's history, culture, and language by privileging the multinational, multicultural, and multilingual character of Iranian society.
Employing multiple perspectives and theoretical frameworks, the study analyzes issues of ethnic inequality, exclusion, and oppression in Iran from antiracist and anticolonial standpoints. It establishes the existence of racism in Iran as a salient determining factor in creating social inequality, oppression, and unequal power relations. Surveying select works of history, literature, religion, politics, and various official and nonofficial publications, the research examines how the dominant group uses sites such as literature, history, language, and the education system as strategic spaces from which to justify its privileged position in society. Through a critical exploration of the dominant discourse, the study suggests the possibility that the minoritized can also use their own discursive sites to resist acts of racism, colonialism, and oppression. To this end, it offers an analysis of a "counterhegemonic" dis-course created by the marginalized to resist and combat racism. The study points to obvious limitations of these sites for the colonized and offers ways to improve their effectiveness. By way of a conclusion, the study highlights future directions for research and possibilities for democratic transformations in an Iranian as well as a Middle Eastern context.
In completing this study, in addition to benefiting from other experiences in the form of existing narratives on the topic, Asgharzadeh also draws on his own personal experience and knowledge. As a member of the minoritized Azerbaijani ethnic group in Iran, from early childhood Asgharzadeh learned the pain and agony of not being able to communicate, read, and write in my own mother tongue. Shortly after the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty in 1925, all non-Persian ethnic groups and nationalities in Iran were denied the right to education in our own languages. Notwithstanding the fact thatAzeris, Kurds, Arabs, Baluchs, Turkmens, and others constituted the numerical majority in the country, the government sought to supplant our languages, cultures, and histories with those of the Persian minority. As non-Persian citizens of Iran, we were subjected to open and shameful acts of linguicide, cultural annihilation, and forced assimilation.
Asgharzadeh completed his primary and secondary education in a schooling system where he was not allowed to read, write, and even speak his own mother tongue. The education system in Iran promoted and enforced a superficial sense of nationalism based on Persian language and identity. The richly multicultural, multiethnic, and multilingual character of Iranian society was explicitly denied. The school environment, textbooks, curricula, extracurricular activities, teachers, and school administrative personnel all subscribed to and served the view that saw Iran as one nation with one language and one identity. In essence, monoculturalism and monolingualism became the official doctrine of nation-building processes in the country. As a result, the Iranian education system itself came to function as a huge engine for linguicide, deculturation, and assimilation.
Like millions of non-Farsi-speaking Iranians, Asgharzadeh grew up longing for an education system where difference and diversity were valued, where students were encouraged and felt proud to talk in their own language, to read their history along with other histories, to see that their people's contributions were registered in textbooks alongside other contributions, to feel proud of who they were and where they came from. However, achievement of these aims and goals in his birthplace remained an ideal for me and millions of other students, teachers, and educators. Asgharzadeh left Iran in his early twenties with a vision of aspiring to live in a society where difference and diversity were respected. Later on when Asgharzadeh finally found his way into Canadian learning centers, he was really impressed to see the level of attention, discussion, and analysis that went into conceptualization, theorization, and realization of difference and diversity in these institutions of learning and education.
It was in Canada where Asgharzadeh learned to read and write in his own mother tongue. For a period of three years he closely worked with a bilingual magazine published by the Azeri-Canadian Community Center in Toronto. Shortly after, he became the editor of another Azerbijani-Persian journal titled Qurtulush. Working with these journals opened up new ways of learning about issues of power, cultural hegemony, and linguistic repression. The mere fact that these journals were partly written in the Azeri language was reason enough for members of the dominant language to brand him and his colleagues as traitors, secessionists, and separatists. Without even reading the journal and knowing its content, former friends and acquaintances began to isolate him, considering Asgharzadeh a dangerous, radical element disloyal to Iran's territorial integrity. It was due to this painful experience that he came to realize the degree of shortsightedness and narrow-mindedness that a reactionary sense of nation, nationalism, national boundaries, and nation-statism can generate. Experiencing the oppressive conduct of members of the dominant group made me conscious of the degree to which being positioned in a place of privilege due to one's language and ethnicity can blind one to the viciousness of injustice and oppression. The repressive actions and behaviors of some members of the dominant group resulted in his deeper understanding and appreciation of such basic rights and freedoms as the freedom of expression, democratic rights, and the right for self-determination at both individual and collective levels.
The experience of writing for, and running, a minority-language journal placed me at the center of various nationalistic, ethnic, and linguistic encounters. More and more Asgharzadeh came to an understanding that, given the history of Oriental despotism, arbitrary incriminations, persecutions, and marginalizations in an Iranian and Middle Eastern context, any notion of a democratic system in a society such as ours must be grounded in a clearly articulated principle of "the right for self-determination." What this means is that any democratic system for us should be based on a voluntary desire and willingness of various nationalities to come together and form a federal or a confederative political system. A most essential requirement of such a system is both the acknowledgment and realization of the individual and collective freedom of Iran's various nationalities and ethnic groups to choose and to determine in a democratic manner their own destiny.
For an antiracist and antioppression activist, working on issues of difference and diversity is not and cannot be an exclusively academic matter. It is, first and foremost, a matter of working toward the larger ideals of social justice, human rights, inclusivity, and democracy. Such ideals may have a chance of being realized in a Middle Eastern context, only if and when the right to be different is properly acknowledged and implemented. The time for denying difference and diversity, for ignoring ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and religious plurality in our Iranian society has long passed. It is high time to embrace an inclusively representative democracy in line with universal principles of human rights and freedoms.
The book is divided into four main interconnected parts: (1) theoretical and methodological issues; (2) Iranian diversity in historical contexts; (3) dominant discourse and counternarratives; (4) conclusions, implications, and future directions. Chapter 1 establishes the boundaries of the study, providing a comprehensive introduction to the book. This chapter also gives an overview of current state of difference and diversity in the Islamic Republic of Iran, the way the government deals with this phenomenon, and the way this phenomenon challenges the totalizing and totalitarian Islamic state.
Chapter 2 provides an overview of discursive/theoretical frameworks that inform and influence this study. They include the anticolonial discursive framework, antiracism theory, critical discourse analysis, and postcolonial theory. The chapter discusses the main tenets of these theories and outlines their relevance to the present work. The chapter also covers the literature review, methods of research, data analysis, and related research tools and issues that have been used throughout the study.
Chapter 3 contextualizes the construction of the "Iranian nation" in a historical setting. It interrogates the paradigm of "Aryan myth" and its implications for the current racism in Iranian society. The chapter surveys various methods and genres of historical investigation on and about Iran. In particu-lar, the chapter looks into the construction of images of Persia, Cyrus, and the Achaemenids through such sources as the Old Testament as well as in certain Greek and Islamic writings. A study of the construction of the image of Persia in ancient texts is important because of its relevance to issues of ethnic domination, cultural appropriation, and denial of diversity in the present. The chapter also investigates the Orientalist reconstruction of Iran's history which sought to find an original homeland for the white Nordic race. In order to establish the existence of such an origin, Orientalists had to fabricate various myths crafted by way of misinterpretations and misrepresen-tations, which culminated in, among other things, the elevation of the Persian minority to the status of a "superior race" with superior culture and language while excluding non-Persian ethnic groups from Iran's history. An interrogation of the Aryanist paradigm illustrates the extent to which Aria based racism is still relevant and functional in contemporary Iran.
Chapter 4 looks into the rise of Reza Khan to power, the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty, and the implications that it has had for Iran's non-Persian communities. Brought to power in 1921 through a British-engineered coup d'état, Reza Shah's regime gave birth to the infamous doctrine of "one nation, one language, one country." This doctrine was faithfully followed by his son, Mohammad Reza Shah and has had detrimental consequences for non-Persian ethnic groups. In essence, a main concern of the Pahlavi regime was to create a monolithic Iranian nation based on the Persian language and culture. The chapter explores the stiffing of diversity in this era and its implications for the present. The chapter also explores the current state of difference and diversity in Iran by exploring salient aspects of the politics and policies of the Islamic Republic toward minoritized communities. Deviating troni wnventional methods of research on the subject, the chapter highlights the historical conti-nuity of struggle for equal treatment and equal rights on the part of such major ethnic groups as Azeris, Kurds, Arabs, Baluchs, and Turlunens.
Chapters 5 and 6 focus on the role of the dominant literature and the mar-ginalized discourse, respectively. In addition to official documents produced by the governing bodies, the literature in these chapters also include works of elites as well as "ordinary" writers, poets, and intellectuals. Allocation of an independent space to explore this genre of work was necessary in that many dominant bodies contend that acts of racism and exclusion are committed only by the governing apparatuses and that ordinary intellectuals and writers are "innocent" in the oppression of minonnzed communities. An investigation of samples of the dominant literature in chapter 5 shows that the majority of writers, poets, and intellectuals producing work in the dominant language are not so "innocent" as we are led to believe that they are. For the most part, they are at least accomplices in perpetuating feelings of superiority complexes for the dominant, while inferiorizing the others.
When it comes to articulating various linguistic and ethnic/national demands, the dominant group promotes the position that the majority of members of non-Persian communities are quite happy with the subordinated status of their language and culture; and that it is only a few elite who raise the banner of ethnic equality and equal treatment. An exploration of works of various genres produced by the marginalized in chapter 6 shows that, con-trary to the dominant claims, the excluded communities indeed do want real-ize their ethnic, cultural, and human rights and that they do resist acts of racism and xenophobia directed against them. Moreover, the allocation of an independent space to the marginalized literature serves to decolonize the spaces traditionally considered as the exclusive domain of the dominant.
And finally, chapter 7 brings together the thrust of various arguments pursued throughout the book. It also elaborates on a number of democratic possibilities that may have a positive impact on the status of diversity and its management in contemporary Iran. This chapter highlights the importance of education in initiating change and transformation in society. Likewise, it explores the functioning of such democratic bodies as civil society, the need for transparency, and freedom of expression as significant stepping stones on the path to equal treatment and full inclusion. Moreover, the section high-lights the importance of acknowledging difference and diversity in dismantling such totalizing ideologies as Islamic fundamentalism in the Middle East generally, and in Iran in particular.
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The history of the Islamic movement in Jordan displays glaring contrasts with its counterparts like Egypt, Iran and Syria. In a marked departure from the frequent and bloody confrontations that have characterized Islamic opposition in these countries, the Jordanian Muslim Brothers have been nonviolent and often defended the state vis-à-vis the challenges of radical ideologies. This book explains the state-religion relationship in Jordan in terms of ideology, politics, class formation, and the relationship between the dominant classes and the Muslim Brothers. ... Read more

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"This splendid book offers an insight into why Iran, once assumed to have one of the most stable governments in the Middle East, crumbled so rapidly in 1979. Amjad's study attempts to answer that question by investigating the socioeconomic and political factors that led to the Iranian Revolution and to the transformation of the Iranian state from a royal dictatorship into a theocracy. The author concludes that a combination of factors such as economic mismanagement, failure of agriculture, inflation, decline in oil revenues, and political repression provided favorable conditions for the opposition to organize its forces against the Shah. Thereafter, within a few months after the overthrow of the monarchy, the religious hierarchy with the support of the traditional bourgeoisie and petit bourgeoisie was able to eliminate the liberal bourgeoisie and create a theocracy in Iran. Written in an easy-flowing narrative style, this book is finely produced and makes a valuable contribution for those interested in Iranian studies. Includes a useful glossary, an index, and an up-to-date bibliography." Choice ... Read more

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(Please see text embedded in front cover tiff file (bookcover.tif)). ... Read more

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Succinct Expository Writing
Juxtaposition/dichotomy of the ancien regime and the current regime in Iran. The American Peace Corps volunteers (numbering approximately 1,870) served in many remote locations in Iran, (1962-1976) viz., Zabol, Aliabad, Khoramabad, Sabzevar, Boojnoord, Bidokht, Birjand, Saveh, Tayebad, Varamin, Firuzkuh and Abadeh to name a few. ... Read more