The Discourse Analysis of the Concepts of Political Identity and Citizenship In Reformist and Fundamentalist Discourses (in 1370s-1380s SH)

Abstract

Investigating the effect of globalization on political spheres is among the most important concerns for the scholars in that discipline. One of the most important subjects pertaining to globalization is the reaction of the political discourse to this unique phenomenon in human life. The issue dealt with in this study is focused on comparing the reaction of the reformist and fundamentalist political discourses (in 1370s-1380s in Iran) to the evolutions in the political identity and citizenship under the influence of globalization. The reason for choosing that period is the spread of objective manifestations of globalization with a dominance of western and liberal versions in that period. To do so, we have attempted to use the logic of equivalence and difference in discourse analysis of Laclau and Mouffe to analyze such a reaction. The most important achievement of the present study is that the reformist discourse – with Sayyid Muhammad Khatami, Iranian president of that time, as its representative – had more consonance and conformity with the spread of globalization. As a result, attracting the signifiers and the signs of globalization of the liberal discourse into the reformist discourse has accelerated in that discourse. On the contrary, the fundamentalist discourse – with Allamah Muhammad Taqi Mesbah as its intellectual representative – treated the globalized western discourse with a resisting identity approach to the logic of difference and distinction, defining and reconstructing its own signifiers and signs through a confrontation with globalization.

Keywords

• globalization
• political identity
• citizenship
• islamic republic of iran
• logic of equivalence
• logic of difference