Anthropologists and Issues of Public Concern: The Iran Crisis

Abstract

Recent crises in Iranian-U.S. affairs, highlighted by the Islamic Revolution and the hostage incident, provided an unusual opportunity for the relevance of anthropological knowledge and perspectives to be demonstrated. While some anthropologists took this opportunity to speak and/or write for the general public, and a few were consulted by government officials, neither their perspectives nor those of most Iran scholars had a visible impact on U.S. government decision-making. An informal survey of anthropologists of Iran, supplemented by a review of their presentations for general audiences, indices to nonscholarly literature, accounts of government decision-making, and other public sources, reveals several factors which limit the contribution of anthropologists to the formation of foreign policy. Among these are insufficient training and experience in communicating with non-specialists; lack of professional rewards for such activities; and widespread ambivalence toward direct consultation with government ...