Dynamism and Transformation in Shi'ite Political Fiqh from the View of Political Law

The purpose of the present study is to review and explain development and dynamism of Shi'ite jurisprudential tradition from the view of political rights. The research method is descriptive-analytic and by using Alasdair Maclntyre's view about procedures of transformation in intellectual traditions, it has distinguished three stages of change in Shi'ite jurisprudential tradition in terms of public political rights: Most theories in Soltāni Fiqh emphasize on the guardianship of Mujtahedin or the authority of just kings and they do not pay much attention to public political rights. Upon the crisis in the royal system and constitutional movement, its theoretical backup needed epistemic reconstruction and therefore, constitutional Fiqh for solving this epistemic crisis, in addition to the authority of kings and canonical guardianship of Mojtahedin, emphasized on public political rights and people's participation in power. The third transformation in Shi'ite political Fiqh is related to contemporary theories which negate the legitimacy of royal systems and emphasize on "people'' and their political rights and freedom. Therefore, the results show that jurisprudential-political tradition of Shi'ites in terms of public political rights has changed from authoritarianism to democracy.