Ethnic Divide and its Impact on the Formation of Iranian-Kurdish Political Discourse in the Pahlavi Period

Iran, when it comes to ethnicity and religion, is a diverse country. This diversity has brought along a number of structural characteristics that differentiate it in terms of social formation and the political aftermath of such heterogeneity. The political events of the past hundred years in Iran reveal occasional conflict and confrontation. This study traces the disputes partly to ethnic division as one of the most defining, yet unsettled, aspects of social identity. So important were these rifts that deepened by the nationalism of the centralist government of Pahlavi, they paved the way for the establishment of political parties in Kurdistan and eventually the emergence of Kurdish political discourse at that point. In fact, the advent of Iran's new age and manifestation of the modernity façade along with the Pahlavi concept of backwardness had led Iran falls into a type of ethnic nationalism that stirred the ethnic conflict in different areas of Iran including in Kurdistan. Actually, finding the grounds of the Kurdistan conflict and a realistic understanding of how the Kurdish political discourses came to form greatly helps conceive one of the most historic political conflicts of Iran in the contemporary era and find an appropriate solution to address that.    

Based on "state formation, nation building" project, Stien Rokkan defines four main social cleavages in Europe, similar to what is witnessed during the first Pahlavi period in Iran. In fact, Stein regards the important historical events as the genesis of social cleavage. The national Revolution during the Reformation and the Industrial Revolution of the eighteenth century both created significant social gaps in the west. This classification besides the formation of identical social cleavage in the era of national revolutions, based on "State formation, Nation Building", is the cornerstones of the present study of Pahlavi Period. Ironically, insisting on building a national state in Iran spawned deeper a rift amongst the Iranian ethnic groups in a way that Pahlavi's "State Formation, Nation Building" resulted in the Kurdistan conflicts.In regard to analysis background about the social cleavage, there are a number of leading works to be mentioned: Political Man by Symour Martin Lipset, identifying the social roots of fascism, communism, democracy, and political parties; Party Systems and Voter Alignments, co-edited by Lipset and Stien Rokkan, which deals with the effects of social gap on the political behavior of the citizens; Political Sociology of Social Cleavayes(case studies)by Nikki R. Keddie and Pippa Norris. Mohamad Reza Jalaiipor, Hamid Ahmadi, Nader Entesar, Chris Kutschera, David Macdowall, William Eagleton JR and Abdolrahman Qasemlo have studied issues of Kurdistan from a historical point of view, most of whom Jlaiipoor has focused on formation of Kurdish political current in the context of political sociology.

Theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chental Muffe about discourse is one of the most practical theories in this realm. They believe all social phenomena can be analyzed using analytical tools discourse. In fact, what makes their theory outstanding is extending discourse from culture and philosophy to society and politics. They made an attempt to explain the evolution of discourse putting forward such concepts as ideology, identity, otherness, antagonism, etc. Since discourse analysis is not only a theory but can also be used as a research method and given that the present study focuses on the formation of the political discourse of Kurds and its changes over time, it can serve as a suitable method.   

This paper studies the Kurdish political discourse and its modifications from September 1942 to the Islamic Revolution in 1979. In fact, with the foundation of "Kurdistan Democratic Party " and the announcement of The Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad by them for the first time the Kurdish political discourse took a systematic form, which considering the developing conditions and policies went through four distinct stages of modification; first, the Kurdish “political discourse of ethnic identitism” whose nodal point is "Kurdish Language"; second, “the participationism of Kurdish political discourse” with  participation in political processes in Iran" as its nodal point; third, “the ethnicist, identity seeking political discourse” of Kurds having "militia operation" as its nodal point; fourth, “the participatory identitist political discourse” that “kurdayati”( Kurdish Identity ) is the nodal point of that. In actual fact, these changes were under the influence of and antagonistic towards the political discourse of the center and its aimed nationalism in these periods. At any given point, where there is a more ethnical attitude towards Kurds, a more radicalized political discourse is adopted with them.     

During the Pahlavi period, social cleavage consistently and actively existed in reaction to the policies of the Pahlavi and their desired nationalism, and the political discourse of the Kurds in "Kurdistan Democratic Party", as the only political process in Kurdistan, underwent changes accordingly. During the period from the foundation of the "Kurdistan Democratic Party" to the Islamic Revolution of Iran, the Kurdish political discourse experienced four stages in reaction to political circumstances and the government's attitude towards Kurdistan. In each one of the four points, the Kurdish political discourse revolved around a different nodal point. The nodal point in each period is articulated by floating signifiers and creates a distinct discursive. In general, the Kurdish discourses are antagonist to the discourse of the center and have a reactionary form. Briefly put, the Kurdish discourse during this analyzed period is antagonistic and a reaction against the existing conditions in the center and the attitude of those in power towards Kurdistan and their favorable nationalism in each time.