Islamic Revolutionary Guards Research Articles

On the Threshold of the Political

Protests erupted throughout Iran in 2009 after incumbent Mahmood Ahmadinejad was declared winner of a highly disputed presidential race. The so-called “Green Wave” of protest included violent clashes with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the jailing of protesters and journalists, as well as injuries and casualties. Few foreign journalists were granted visas to enter the country, resulting in an information vacuum filled by so-called “citizen journalists” who uploaded cell-phone videos of and tweeted about the violent clashes. Alongside this emerged video chronicles of nightly chants by residents of Iran's densely populated cities shouting “Allah-O-Akbar” from their rooftops. By tracing the roots of this protest tradition, not only in the Iranian revolution of 1979 but also in Shi'a rowzeh khani performance, this essay examines rooftop chanting as an enactment of a counter-politics through sonic performativity. The threshold space of the rooftop figures here as a space of political improvisation.

Shi'i Ideology, Iranian Secular Nationalism and the Iran‐Iraq War (1980–1988)

AbstractIn the wake of the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran and the ensuing Iraqi invasion of the southern province of Khuzestan, one of the most important initiations of Islamic institutions of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini was the creation of the Sepâh‐e Pâsdârân‐e Enqelâb‐e Eslâmî (The Islamic Revolutionary Guard) or SPEE (Rafiqdust 1382/2004:173‐4). This revolutionary organisation was Khomeini's answer to the regular standing Iranian army, trained and disciplined under the tight control of the deposed monarch Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to thwart any effort to destroy the much fought for Revolution and a possible coup d'état (Menashri 1999:218–219; Katzman 1993). The Ayatollah ordered its creation in the first week of his victory in February 1979 (Rafuqdust 1383/2004:174). ‘Whoever is armed,’ stated the call, ‘can join the Sepâh’ (Rafiqdust 1383/2004:184). The call was put out to start recruiting those who had taken up arms against the Pahlavi regime during the Revolution. Basîj‐e Enqelâb‐e Eslamî (Islamic Revolution's Mobilisation Force) or Basîj was the organisation born out of SPEE, which was filled with devout, motivated, and faithful Shi'i militants (Globalsecurity.org 2004)). By default, the Iran‐Iraq War (1980–1988) solidified the Islamic Revolution, and Basîj, as a key military body of the new regime, played a major role in this process. This study discusses how the Islamic government of Iran successfully promoted long‐learned religious traditions, in this case, the Karbala paradigm and the martyrdom of Imam Hussein in 680 AD to rally support and receive unconditional loyalty of the Basîji (a Basîj member) during the Iran‐Iraq War. It examines the following two points: first, the idea of self‐sacrifice as part of a religious belief, powerfully energised by the use of Shi'i ideology and history; second, the discussion of the amalgamation of secular and religious nationalism, which Ernest