علی کریمی (مله)

This article provides a theoretical analytical framework for understanding the corruptive functioning of political systems in the form of the idea of prebendalism, which has received little attention at the local political science literature. The concept of prebendalism and prebendal government is closely linked to the political corruption which itself has various dimensions and specific roots and consequences both at the community and the state level. Based on Joseph's views, the present paper provides a theoretical framework for understanding the issue of political corruption. The Prebendal government describes how elites and brokers operate at the political system level, indicating that the elites, because of their historical-political role and their performance in political positions, enjoy additional special privileges beyond legal ones at the state level and their major goal is further access to economic and political resources. The main question of the article is, what are the characteristics, foundations, and components for the formation of the Prebendal State? Inspired by Joseph's views and use of library resources and applying a historical-descriptive approach, this paper has found that the Prebendal government incorporates a variety of factors such as patrimonialism, clientalism, perception of the state as a market, the lack of a legitimated ideology, leadership weakness, which ultimately lead to outcomes such as permanent conflict at the political system level and deep social inequalities.

The present theoretical- analytical article aimed at the study of the characteristics of wicked problems & the strategies applied for their management according to the ideas of Rittel and Weber. Based upon some statistical data and secondary analysis method, the article presents some manifestations of wicked problems in contemporary Iran. From the pathological standpoint, the main reason for the wickedness of policy problems is stemmed in the historical and continuous gap and persistent cleavage between state and society. Inspired by theoretical approaches presented in the conceptualization section, it sounds that the collaborative strategy is necessary for the wise and successful management of wicked problems. The strategic implication of this statement is the necessity for whole and profound revision of traditional patterns of state-society relations in Iran and its transformation to participatory, deliberative, collaborative, dialogue-based, non-hierarchical, decentralized and citizen-oriented relationships which its fulfillment in turn necessitates the transformation of state’s functions and the nature of the structure of power in one hand and the behavioral change of citizens in the other hand.

Ethnic conflict and its related factors is one of the social sciences’ main research areas, especially in the recent decades. Ethnic conflict revolutions’ parallelism with transition process to democratization, especially after 2th half of 20th century, make political sociology of ethnic conflicts focus on this scientific scope that what requirements and circumstances can be provided by transition of democracy for revolution of ethical conflicts. The main question is, whether democratization transition and its process, inevitably is concomitant with ethnical conflicts or transition process can provide an opportunity that prevents ethnical conflicts through the promotion of political negotiations in innovative democratic governments? Regarding lack of theoretical researches in this scope, using qualitative analysis, we studied the conditions through which, democratization transition provides a background both for ethnical conflicts’ moderation and also exacerbation. Institutional strategies that prevent ethnical conflicts, ethnic conflicts and democratic processes’ flourishing and authoritarian regimes’ typology across ethnic variation are the present study’s other interesting areas that have been investigated.

Reviewing Imam Khomeini’s leadership during the imposed war, this article in the incipient context of emotions sociology aimed at responding the question that how Imam coached the feelings of the masses of people and the armed forces to mobilize defensiveness during the war. Adopting a content qualitative analysis approach on Imam’s writings and words, the article made the assumption as the response to the question that based on approaches such as divine-based fledgling society, hoping to benefit from God’s help, positive fear-provoking , considering war as blessing, neglecting victory, seeking similarity with Ashura and early Islam period to release and consolidate the emotional energies into a sense of responsibility, having fame and reputation, being powerful, capable and conceited, having hope and confidence, seeking identity, commitment and collective solidarity, taking revenge, and showing anger and increased hatred, Imam led their collective defensive action against the Baathist regime and eventually brought them victory.

The power of the state that was constituted under the dominant Westphalia system, and characterized by the it’s supreme power according to Hegelian tenets, has changed and decreased due to the globalization process in one hand, and the postmodernism theory in the other hand, especially regarding to the citizenship concept and international law. Globalization is such a process that globalizes politics and makes it as a network in a global village and shapes a new public sphere. In this new sphere the citizens are free from the intervention of the power possessing the sole legitimate use of power. Additionally the postmodern theory, that considers the state as one of the actors in the international relations and tries to reshape the forgotten subsystems, form the new components of the new state. This new state is called globalized state because of the acceptance of deinstitutionalized norms in the international system and deconstruction of inflexible Westphalia system. Accordingly this article, s hypothesis is that, three lines of change, including the non-nationalized state, non stated state and politico-economic institutionalized regimes, all led to the transition of the state to the new form and content named as globalized state.

Delving into Imam Khomeini’s views and thoughts, the author analyzes Imam Khomeini’s epistemological foundations which are either consistent or inconsistent with the territory-based concept of national security and the cognitive relationship between those two foundations. That is because it is of the utmost importance to explore the relationship between national security and the concept of territoriality that seeks to preserve society, population, citizens, and the political regime governing a specific territory, and universal religions and the thoughts of religious authorities who claim the management, direction and improvement of the world. The author acknowledges that Imam Khomeini may not be simply regarded as a scholar of security studies, but he also believes that he still attracts the attention of political scientists, practitioners and intellectuals as a political leader as well as an intellectual reformer. Belief in his intellectual achievements and attachment to his political teachings continue to shine as an essential source in thinking and updated policy-making. Now the question raised here is what the place of territory-based concept of national security is in Imam Khomeini’s thought system. Furthermore, how can this concept be located in his viewpoints in a meaningful and justified way, and what are the epistemological bases of Ummah-centrist tendency and nationalism in his outlook?