This thesis considers the transformation of Iranian-Israeli ties following the 1979 Iranian Revolution from a Western-allied relationship to a covert, scandalous relationship, specifically in the context of the Iran-Iraq War. I also look at the Iranian and Israeli narratives and compare the religious, historical, ideological and psycho-political underpinnings that reveal significant similarities between these two superficially diametrically opposed states, and ultimately shaped the complex and misunderstood relationship between the two countries. / text

Since the early days of 1979, the Islamic Revolution of Iran has been seen as a phenomenon unique in history, one which must be viewed as somehow separate from other political Islamic movements in the 20th century. In chapter 1, this thesis problematizes this interpretation of the Revolution by analyzing it through the lens of an earlier ideological movement, pan-Islamism, and applying methods from the study of conceptual history to draw linkages between this movement and the Islamic Revolution, rooting it more deeply in the region’s political and intellectual history, and casting light on the poorly-understood pan-Islamic aspects of Iran’s Revolutionary ideology. In chapter 2, it applies methodological innovations from the digital humanities, more specifically corpus linguistics, in carrying out a series of five case studies to examine the transformation of Iranian ideology over time, by analyzing a set of five text corpora comprised of individual leaders’ writings and speeches. It further illustrates how theoretical advances in discourse analysis and history seem to be moving towards the same point, and how the application of corpus linguistic methods advances these bodies of theory. Chapters 3 through 7 comprise the case studies, which are, in order: Ruhollah Khomeini and Ali Khamenei, the two Supreme Leaders; Ali Akbar Hashemi Rasfanjani, Mohammad Khatami, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the three Presidents since 1989. These chapters illustrate through analysis of the textual data how each political leader has adapted the received political discourse to the exigencies of their times, and how pan-Islamism itself has remained a consistent, albeit dynamic, linking thread running through the period 1979-2009. By studying pan-Islamism in the Iranian context, we can explain several features of Iranian political discourse which otherwise seem incomprehensible, and better situate the Islamic Republic within the political and discursive transformations taking place at the regional level of the Middle East, and the global level of the Muslim umma.

The thesis "Attempt at Democratic Transition in Iran 1997-2000" analyzes the developement of restricted liberalization and democratization, which was started in Iran in Spring 1997 by election of reformist presidential candidate Muhammad Khatami into office. The essay looks on theese events as a result of the longer cultural change which occured in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and as a consequence of the cleavages which split the Iranian political space into several different streams. The thesis uses a theoretical perspective based on the idea that Iran, in the course of 20th century, constantly evolved in the form of modern national state for which the Islamic revolution was but a regime change, which replaced one authoritarianism for another with a different ideology. Based on this perspective the events after the Khatami election are analyzed in terms of the transitologic theory through which the essay examines the specific dynamcis of political contest between the softliners who push for a democratization of the regime and the hardliners who take pains to preserve the authoritarian practice based on the theory of "The Rule of the Jurisconsult" articulated first by the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ruhollah Khomeini.

This thesis delineates the transformation of Iran’s so-called post-revolutionary ‘religious intellectuals’ (rowshanfekran-e dini) from ideological legitimators within the political class of the newly-established theocratic-populist regime to internal critics whose revised vision for the politico-religious order coalesced and converged with the growing disillusionment and frustration of the ‘Islamic left’, a constellation of political forces within the governing elite of the Islamic Republic, that following the death of Ayatollah Khomeini increasingly felt itself marginalised and on the outskirts of power. The historical evolution of this complex, quasi-institutionalised and routinized network, encompassing theologians, jurists, political strategists and journalists, which rose to prominence in the course of the 1990s, and its critical engagement with the ruling political theology of the ‘guardianship of the jurist’, the supremacy of Islamic jurisprudence, political Islamism and all forms of ‘revolutionary’ and ‘utopian’ political and social transformation, are scrutinised in detail. In this vein, the thesis examines the various issues provoked by the rowshanfekran-e dini’s strategic deployment and translation of the concepts and ideas of a number of Western thinkers, several of which played a pivotal role in the assault on the ideological foundations of Soviet-style communism in the 1950s and 1960s. It then moves to show how this network of intellectuals and politicos following the election of Mohammad Khatami to the presidency in May 1997 sought to disseminate their ideas at the popular level by means of the press and numerous party and political periodicals, and thereby achieve ideological and political hegemony. The thesis proceeds to demonstrate the intimate connection between the project of ‘religious intellectualism’ and elite-defined notions of ‘democracy’, ‘electoral participation’, ‘reform’ and ‘political development’ as part of an effort to accumulate symbolic capital and assert their intellectual and moral leadership of the polity.