Iran's National Roles and Foreign Policy: A Quantitative Analysis of Martyr Beheshti's Interviews and Lectures

The main question of the present study is what kind of national roles did martyr Beheshti consider for Iranian foreign policy? The research hypothesis refers to roles such as Islamic world leadership, supporter of the oppressed, and the struggle against arrogance and colonialism. To answer this question, we used K.J Holsti's theoretical framework and the roles of foreign policy that Holsti identified in his book applied with the views of the martyr Beheshti. For this purpose, two methods of quantitative analysis (frequency counting of indexes related to national roles) and qualitative analysis (interpretation of findings with descriptive-analytical method) were used. The findings showed that among the 16 national roles mentioned by Holsti, the national roles of the anti-imperialist State (131 frequency), the defender of Islam (53 frequency), and the revolution and liberation stronghold (48 frequency) had the highest reflection in martyr Beheshti's interviews and lectures. However, there were no mention of the roles such as regional leader and regional protector; instead, three roles have been assigned by martyr Beheshti for Iran's foreign policy that there was not in the roles mentioned by Holsti. These roles include the anti-Zionist state, the justice-seeking state and the peace-loving state.