Ayatollah Khamenei and The Theory of Political Progress

The present article analyzes the implications for replacing the term “progress” with “development” in the thought of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution of Iran. At the beginning of this study, the author emphasizes that choosing the term “progress” instead of “development” is not merely a change of a term or word, but it shows a change in a wise paradigm and attempt to establish a native and non-Western governance model. The main hypothesis of this study is that the discourse of progress is a civilizational response to the crises resulting from Western rebuilding models and its objective is not to imitate liberal models but to realize “the theory of religious” as a macro strategy of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The methodology of this study focuses on discourse analysis and comparison of the concepts which have been carried out through examination of the statements, speeches and written works of Ayatollah Khamenei in recent decades.
The findings of the study suggest that the distinction of progress can be realized through three foundational levels of worldview, ideology, and systems. In the worldview level, the Western development model is rooted in humanism (human-oriented) in which human is the axis of the creation and happiness is defined only in material welfare and personal enjoyment seeking. According to the leader of Iran, this is the situation that can lead to family collapse and lack of identity, despite economic growth. However, political progress in Islamic thought is based on monothetic worldview in which God is the axis and creator of the world and progress is a path in which material and spiritual growth will be realized simultaneously and harmoniously. At the level of ideology, the main difference is between “liberalism focusing on permissiveness” and “Islamic ideology focusing on servitude and obligation”. According to the Supreme leader of Iran, civilization building without having a school of thought is an impossible theological faith and harbor. In this regard, liberal democracy which is faced with serious criticism today, can not be the roadmap of Iran’s progress. Instead, the ideal progress model is based on Shia dynamic thought and resorts to Wilayah as a captain that guides society towards transcendent goals.
The author then explains the cultural, economic, and political systems in this paradigm.  In the cultural system, the concept of “culture engineering” for protecting national identity is highlighted against the soft invasion of the West. In the economic system, progress emphasizes on “democratic economy” and “resistance-based economy” whose goal is social justice and decreasing dependency on foreign resources, not accumulation of capital for a special class of people. Nevertheless, the most important part of the research findings is the manifestation of political progress in the form of “the theory of religious democracy”. This theory has two founding and analytical dimensions. The founding dimension highlights people’s participation in elections and choosing political appointments. However, the analytical dimension is different from this model and seeks to create a spiritual and emotional relationship between the people and governance in a way that the people consider system’s agents as the realizers their transcendent ideals. This model is based on four principles of “People’s satisfaction”, “Value-orientation”, “Right-orientation”, and “law-orientation” and opens a third path against the duality of dictatorship and Western secular democracy.
In the final section of the article, the author refers to the novel institutions in the progress paradigm. The institutions such as Assembly of Experts, Guardian Council, Expediency Discernment Council are defined as bridges of communication between divine legitimacy and people’s acceptability that are in charge of guaranteeing the religiousness and democracy of the system simultaneously. In this model, the method of acquiring power is as important as the power itself and politics shouldn’t be turned into an arena for negating ethics and values. The final results of this research suggest that in Ayatollah Khamenei’s perspective, political progress is a continuous “civilizational project” which seeks to present an inspiring model for other Islamic countries through negating ideological dependency on the West. The theory tries to illustrate a path between tradition and modernity based on national dignity and comprehensive progress, through integrating the maximum participation of people and institutional stability in the form of revelational values in order to meet the needs of the contemporary society of Iran.