Chapter Seven - Religious Modernity in Iran: Dilemmas of Islamic Democracy in the Discourse of Mohammad Khatami

Summary

During the first few years after the election of Mohammad Khatami to the Presidency of the Islamic Republic in 1997, pro-democracy groups and individuals experienced an episode of euphoria and enthusiasm, which soon turned into despair and apathy. As early as the first term of his tenure, Khatami's promises of freedom, civil society and the rule of law were frustrated and blocked from being implemented by the conservative groups within Iran's ruling establishment. Khatami himself proved unwilling to take necessary risks to implement his project of civil society, and his inactions and capitulations resulted in further frustration of many, but not all, of his promises. This chapter attempts to analyze the failures, achievements and some of the possible political ramifications of the presidency of Mohammad Khatami by focusing on his discourse in the context of the intellectual trajectory of the Islamic thought from the revolutionary period to the postrevolutionary reformist phase.

The case of Khatami is of particular interest, because he is not only an intellectual, but also a political practitioner who served two terms as the president of the republic. To be sure, his intellectual caliber is not on the same level as that of Soroush and Shabestari; yet, because of his direct involvement in the political fray at the highest level of electoral politics in Iran his discourse and its practical ramifications, as well as the outcome of his political maneuverings, are very much significant.

Khatami: The Philosopher President

Seyyid Mohammad Khatami was born in Ardakan in the central province of Yazd in 1943. He is the son of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khatami who founded the seminary in Ardakan. Khatami finished his primary and secondary schools in Ardakan and then attended Qom Seminary in 1961. It is noteworthy that before finishing his seminary studies he received a bachelor's degree in philosophy from the secular University of Isfahan, a relatively rare experience among the Shii clergy at the time. In 1969 Khatami entered another secular institution of higher education, the University of Tehran, from which he earned a master's degree. Later he returned to Qom seminary to attend philosophical classes of some renowned religious scholars such as Ayatollah Motahhari. Khatami was a political activist in the Islamic movement before and during the revolution of 1979. After the revolution he replaced Ayatollah Beheshti as the head of Hamburg Islamic Center in West Germany for a short period of time.