The Baha'i Faith in America as Panopticon, 1963-1997

Abstract

This empirical study details the history of control mechanisms employed by leaders of the Baha'i faith in the United States to shape the discourse and behavior of adherents. It covers the use of prepublication censorship, other restrictions on free publication, informing, revocation of administrative rights, electoral restrictions, revocation of membership, threats of shunning, and shunning. It asks why the Baha'i leadership might wish to project a more liberal image of the religion than is warranted by its actual governance techniques. It concludes that this contradiction derives from conflicts within the Baha'i power elite, from concerns about image, from a desire to attract liberal converts, and from contradictions between the liberalism of the nineteenth-century scriptures and the authoritarian administrative ethos of the twentieth century. The article is based on two decades of participant observation, study of official literature and decision making, diaries and memoirs, participation on Baha'i electronic discussion forums in the 1990s, and private correspondence with adherents.