The application of causal layered analysis to understand the present conditions and possible futures of media and politics in Iran

Abstract

Abstract The relationship between media and politics in Iran is significantly complicated and multidimensional. Although the so-called independent press and news media are being published in a regular basis, the entire media sphere is being shaped by the state regime, and most of media platforms reflect the state’s will. The main goals of this article are to explain the present conditions and characteristics of the relationship between media and politics and to explore the social and cultural causes, discourses, and myths which have allegedly justified the strong governmental interventions and influences in the Iranian media sphere. We consider causal layered analysis (CLA), as a critical futures studies method, to be an appropriate method to deconstruct the present status and envision the future of the relationship between media and politics in Iran. We utilize four different layers of analysis. First, we determine different aspects of litany level, including the role of media in promoting enmity in discourse about Iran’s enemies, real and fictitious. Second, we specify different systemic causes for the current relationship between media and politics, including the continuous attempts of Iran’s state regime to control and dominate the entire media sphere. Third, we review the two main discourses involved in the 1978–1979 Revolution in Iran. Each discourse is focused on constructing alternative responses to the controversy between tradition and modernity in the contemporary history of Iran. Fourth, in the entitled level of metaphor or myth, we identify the narrative of “Educating the Populace” as the deepest myth behind the relationship between media and politics in Iran. At the next stage of this study, we construct the possible scenarios for the future of the relationship between media and politics in Iran based on the dominance of competitive root discourses. Finally, we argue that one should go beyond the discursive layer to find the alternative futures of the relationship between media and politics in Iran. These alternative futures are associated with the emancipation from the competition between the traditionalism and modernism discourses and changing the deepest myths behind the relationship between media and politics.

Keywords

• Causal layered analysis (CLA)
• Futures studies
• Futures methods
• Media and politics in Iran