روشنفکران و جنبش‌های اجتماعی در ایران قرن چهاردهم: روایت یک قرن فراز و فرود

Abstract

This article focuses on the place of intellectuals in the main social movements over the course of a century in Iran. Four social movements have been chosen according to their importance during this period: the post-World War II nationalist movement that gathered around the nationalist government of Mossadegh; the anti-monarchy social movement (1978-79) associated with the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty and the advent of the Islamic Republic in Iran; the Green movement, which organized around electoral integrity in 2009, and the popular revolts of 2017 and 2019, which addressed governmental corruption, democracy, and the future of the country. The article analyzes how the role of intellectuals has evolved through contemporary history in Iran. As such it traces the course from a nationalist social movement (1950-53), in which intellectuals had a significant role, up to more recent popular revolts (2017-19) against poverty, unemployment, and state corruption, in which the effective participation of intellectuals was minimal. The article proposes the following tripartite typology of modern Iranian social movements in relation to intellectuals: the category of social movements with "prophetic" intellectuals; the category of social movements which give birth to their own intellectuals on the spot; the category of social movements which are devoid of intellectuals. The article focuses on the crisis of intellectuals in recent social movements in Iran.