Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-9q27g Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-18T09:24:09.489Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Neither Dowlati nor Khosusi: Islam, Education and Civil Society in Contemporary Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Zep Kalb
Zep Kalb*
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Private universities are a rapidly expanding form of education in Iran, and increasingly include Islam and the social sciences alongside the hard sciences too. What implications does the privatization of religious and social scientific knowledge have for the Islamic Republic? Scholarship has so far responded by looking at the ways in which the Iranian authoritarian state has monopolized religion, repressed the social sciences and hollowed out student activism. Complicating these arguments, this article provides a historical and institutional comparison of higher education in Iran in order to look at the evolving degree of autonomy of academic institutions and the ability of actors that operate within them to contribute to critical debate, social activism and novel discourse. The article proposes that while state universities and Islamic Azad suffer from politicization and control, a small set of privately owned “Islamic” universities is using its elite connections, financial independence and socio-pedagogical ties to the seminary and modern academia to secure enhanced levels of free debate and independent thinking.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 4 , July 2017 , pp. 575 - 600
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2017

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

He would like to thank in particular the professors and students of the University of Tehran and Mofid University for their insights and guidance, as well as the two anonymous reviewers who provided excellent comments on earlier drafts of this essay.

References

Abrahamian, Ervand. A History of Modern Iran. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abrahamian, Ervand. “Why the Islamic Republic has Survived.” Middle East Report 250 (2009). Accessed March 16, 2017. http://www.merip.org/mer/mer250/why-islamic-republic-has-survivedGoogle Scholar
Akhavi, Shahrough. Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: Clergy–State Relations in the Pahlavi Period. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1980.Google Scholar
Al-e Aqa, Faridih, Kishavarz, Mohsin, and Rahimi, Mohsin. “Ravand Rushd Kami-i Āmuzesh ʿĀli-i Khosusi va Dowlati dar Jomhuri-ye Eslāmi-ye Irān” [Quantitative growth in the Islamic Republic of Iran’s private and state-owned tertiary education]. Danish va Pazhuhesh dar Olum-e Tarbiyati 5, no. 20 (1387/2009): 73–110.Google Scholar
Arjomand, Said Amir. Turban for the Crown: The Islamic Revolution in Iran. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Arjomand, Said Amir. After Khomeini: Iran Under his Successors. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.Google Scholar
Arjomand, Said Amir. “The Law, Agency, and Policy in Medieval Islamic Society: Development of the Institutions of Learning from the Tenth to the Fifteenth Century.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 41, no. 2 (1991): 263–293. doi: 10.1017/S001041759900208XCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arjomand, Said Amir. Constitutionalism and Political Reconstruction. Leiden: Brill, 2007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Banani, Amin. The Modernization of Iran: 1921–41. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1961.Google Scholar
Bano, Masooda, and Sakurai, Keiko, eds. Shaping Global Islamic Discourses: The Role of al-Azhar, al-Medina and al-Mustafa. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Birask, Ahmad. “Education XI: Private Schools and Educational Groups.” Encyclopeadia Iranica VIII, no. 2 (1997). Accessed February 3, 2017. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/education-xi-private-schools-and-educational-groupsGoogle Scholar
Boroujerdi, Mehrzad. Iranian Intellectuals and the West: The Tormented Triumph of Nativism. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1996.Google Scholar
Burawoy, Michael. The Extended Case Method: Four Countries, Four Decades, Four Great Transformations, and One Theoretical Tradition. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chehabi, Housang, and Linz, Juan J., eds. Sultanistic Regimes. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998.Google Scholar
Corboz, Elvire. Guardians of Shi'ism: Sacred Authority and Transnational Family Networks. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2015.Google Scholar
Curtis, Edward E. IV, ed. Encyclopaedia of Muslim-American History. Ann Arbor: Facts on File, 2010.Google Scholar
Eickelman, Dale F. Knowledge and Power in Morocco: The Education of a Twentieth-Century Notable. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985.Google Scholar
Eickelman, Dale F. “Mass Higher Education and the Religious Imagination in Contemporary Arab Societies.” American Ethnologist 19, no. 4 (1992): 643–655. doi: 10.1525/ae.1992.19.4.02a00010CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischer, Michael. Iran: From Religious Dispute to Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980.Google Scholar
Ghiyasi, Gholam Reza. Ta’lim va Tarbiyat dar Islam va Howzeh-ye Elmiyyeh [Education and pedagogy in Islam and the seminary]. Qom: Bayan Al-Haq, 1383.Google Scholar
Habibi, Nader. “Iran’s Overeducation Crisis: Causes and Ramifications.” Middle East Brief 85 (2015): 1–7.Google Scholar
Halliday, Fred. Iran: Dictatorship and Development. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979.Google Scholar
Hann, Chris. “Introduction: Political Society and Civil Anthropology.” In Civil Society Challenging Western Models, edited by Hann, Chris and Dunn, Elisabeth, 1–26. London: Routledge, 1996.Google Scholar
Hooglund, Eric. “The Islamic Republic at War and Peace.” Middle East Report 156 (1989): 4–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hovsepian-Bearce, Yvette. The Political Ideology of Ayatollah Khamenei: Out of the Mouth of the Supreme Leader of Iran. London: Routledge, 2016.Google Scholar
Keshavarzian, Arang. “Contestation Without Democracy: Elite Fragmentation in Iran.” In Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Regimes and Resistance, edited by Marsha Pripstein Posusney, and Michele Penner Angrist, . Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2005.Google Scholar
Khalaji, Mehdi. “Iran’s Regime of Religion.” Journal of International Affairs 65, no. 1 (2011): 131–147.Google Scholar
Khosrokhavar, Farhad, and Nikpey, Amir. Avoir Vingt Ans au Pays des Ayatollahs: Vivre dans le Ville Sainte de Qom [Being Twenty-Years-Old in the Land of the Ayatollah: Life in the Holy City of Qom]. Paris: Robert Laffont, 2009.Google Scholar
Malekzadeh, Shervin. “Education as Public Good or Private Resource: Accommodation and Demobilization in Iran’s University System.” In Power and Change in Iran: The Politics of Contention and Conciliation, edited by Brumberg, Daniel and Farhi, Farideh, 101–134. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2016.Google Scholar
Mallat, Chibli. The Renewal of Islamic Law: Muhammad Baqer as-Sadr, Najaf and the Shi’i International. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Matin-Asgari, Afshin. Iranian Student Opposition to the Shah. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 2002.Google Scholar
Mehran, Golnar. “Ideology and Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Compare 20, no. 1 (1990): 53–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Menashri, David. “Education XVII. Higher Education.” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol VIII, no. 2 (2011). Accessed March 16, 2017. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/education-xvii-higher-education.Google Scholar
Mir-Hosseini, Ziba, and Tapper, Richard. Islam and Democracy in Iran: Eshkavari and the Quest for Reform. London: I. B. Tauris, 2006.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mohsenpour, Bahram. “Philosophy of Education in Postrevolutionary Iran.” Comparative Education Review, 32, no. 1 (1988): 76–86. doi: 10.1086/446738CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Momen, Moojan. An Introduction to Shi’i Islam. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985.Google Scholar
Motahhari, Morteza. Dah Goftar [Ten speeches]. Tehran: Entesharat-e Sadra, 1382/2003/4.Google Scholar
Mottahedeh, Roy. The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran. Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 1985.Google Scholar
Ardebili, Mousavi, Karim, Abdul. “Zendigi Nameh” [Autobiography]. Accessed November 12, 2016. http://www.ardebili.com/fa/Biography/View/Google Scholar
Inc, Overseas Consultants. Report on Seven-Year Development Plan for the Plan Organization of the Imperial Government of Iran. New York: Overseas Consultants Inc., 1949.Google Scholar
Peivandi, Saeed. Islam et éducation en Iran. Echec de l’islamisation de l’école en Iran. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2006.Google Scholar
Peivandi, Saeed. “Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran and Perspectives on Democratic Reforms.” Working Paper, Legatum Institute, 2012.Google Scholar
Pesaran, Evaleila. Iran’s Struggle for Economic Independence: Reform and Counter-Reform in the Post-Revolutionary Era. London: Routledge, 2011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rafsanjani, Akbar Hashemi. Khāterāt [Memories, various years]. Accessed January 13, 2017. http://www.hashemirafsanjani.ir/Google Scholar
Rahnema, Ali. An Islamic Utopian: A Political Biography of Ali Shariati. London: I. B. Tauris, 1998.Google Scholar
Roy, Olivier. The Failure of Political Islam. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994.Google Scholar
Sakurai, Keiko, and Adelkhah, Fariba. The Moral Economy of the Madrasa: Islam and Education Today. New York: Routledge, 2011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shariati, Ali. Ma va Eqbal [We and Eqbal]. Tehran: Entesharat-e Elham, 1384/2005–6.Google Scholar
Shirkhani, Ali, and Zari, Abbas’. Tahavvolāt-e Howzeh-ye ʿElmiyyeh-ye Qom pas az Piruzi-ye Enqelāb-e Eslāmi [Changes in the Qom Seminary after the victory of the Islamic Revolution]. Tehran: Markaz-e Asnād-e Enqelāb-e Eslāmi, 1384/2005–6.Google Scholar
Ṭayyeb, Mohammad Taghi, ed. Arzyābi-ye Gostāresh-e Āmuzesh-e ʿĀli-ye Irān [Evaluating the expansion of tertiary education in Iran]. Royal Organization for the Inspection of Higher Education and Scientific Research Tehran, 1353/1975.Google Scholar
Walbridge, Linda S., ed. The Most Learned of the Shi’a: The Institution of the Marja’ Taqlid. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.Google Scholar