Political Theology in Post-revolutionary Iran ― Disenchantment, Reform and the Death of Utopia

Political Theology in Post-Revolutionary Iran follows the transformation of Iran’s post-revolutionary religious intellectuals, as their outlook has evolved from regime support to dissent. Throughout the revolution’s second decade, these intellectuals began to re-enivsage the political order and its theological foundations.

This book focuses particularly on the intellectual background and theoreticians of the reform movement of the late 1990s and administration of President Hojjat al-Islam Mohammad Khatami, concluding in an analysis of the Green movement of 2009 and the ongoing struggle for political and ideological transformation within and without the institutions and power structures of the post-revolutionary Islamic state. It occupies a key place in the debates surrounding Islamic political reform in both Iran and the broader Muslim world.

This book is of interest to students and scholars of Middle Eastern Studies, particularly Middle Eastern history, politics and theology.

Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi is Associate Editor of the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies & Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Exeter.

He was formerly adjunct lecturer at the University of Exeter teaching Modern Middle Eastern History. He obtained his DPhil in Modern Middle Eastern Studies at Queen's College, University of Oxford under the supervision of Dr Homa Katouzian, focusing on post-revolutionary Iranian intellectual and political history. He was formerly editor of Al-Monitor’s Iran Pulse, Iran researcher for the Oxford Research Group and a teaching fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.