Religion and Irans international relations

Abstract

A country’s self-perception in the international arena plays a huge role in the development of its foreign policy strategy. Not all international players can easily and quickly answer the question "who are we and how do we see others?" In particular, both the twentieth century and the first decades of the twenty-first century can be described as a time when Iran was searching for its foreign policy identity. This quest is not finished today. In spite of the many decades of active search of ‘self’ and discussion of their country’s place in global politics, the Iranian elite not only failed to identify a single definition of the country’s foreign policy identity, but over time produced several new formulas of state identity, often contradicting each other while coexisting simultaneously. The events of 1979 had a significant impact on Iran’s foreign policy. The revolutionary leadership announced the rejection of the traditions of the Shah's Iran and declared their intention to build a new "revolutionary" nation whose life would be based on religious principles. Interestingly, the "revolutionary experiment" did not lead to a break in the historical continuity of Iranian self-identification. Instead, today we can see an attempt by the country's leadership to combine Islamic, revolutionary and nationalist principles in determining the role of their country in the international arena.