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Soviet Perceptions of the Iranian Revolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Shahrough Akhavi
Shahrough Akhavi*
Affiliation:
Government and International Studies at the University of South Carolina
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Extract

Since the Iranian Revolution, Soviet writers have evidenced two general perceptions of that phenomenon. On the one hand, they perceive it as an anti-imperialist movement motivated by desires for socioeconomic development free of capitalist fetters. On the other hand, they cannot easily fit this revolution into the general theory of social change that is to be found in writings dating from Lenin and Stalin to more contemporary doctrines of the National Democratic State and the Revolutionary Democratic State.

This paper assesses the Soviet image of the Iranian Revolution by comparing and contrasting the arguments adopted by such theoreticians as Primakov, Stepaniants, Demchenko, Ulianovskii, Zagvozdkina, Vasil'ev, Timofeev, Nikol'skii, Trubetskoi, and others. They have tried to clarify the differences between what they term Islamic “orthodoxy” (fundamentalism), Islamic “reformism,” and Islamic “modernism.” In their view, the classification scheme is based on two factors: (1) the linkage of the movement to Islamic dogma; (2) the class basis of the movement.

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Type
Articles
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Iranian Studies , Volume 19 , Issue 1 , Winter 1986 , pp. 3 - 29
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1986

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References

Notes

* The term “graduated lackies of clericalism,” is one Lenin borrowed from the German worker, Josef Dietzgen, who was referring to professors of philosophy in modern bourgeois societies.

* Virtually untranslatable, tawhidi here means integral or unitary, and refers to an economy in which the doctrine of tawhid, or strict monotheism, prevails.

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28. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 108.

29. Vasil'ev, "Tupiki," p. 94; Timofeev, "Rol' Islama," p. 63; Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 108.

30. Primakov, "Islam," p. 63.

31. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," pp. 108, 112-13.

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33. Primakov, "Iran," p. 60.

34. Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," pp. 21-22.

35. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 110; Timofeev, "Rol' Islama," pp. 53, 56.

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39. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 111.

40. Lenin, "Klassy i Partii," pp. 429-430.

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42. Vasil'ev, "Tupiki," p. 88. (Emphasis supplied.)

43. Primakov, "Islam," p. 65; but cf. the brief discussion of Khomeini by Timofeev, "Rol' Islama," pp. 54-55.

44. Primakov, "Islam," p. 68.

45. Zagvozdkina, "Razvitie Kapitalizma," p. 104; Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," pp. 109-110.

46. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 111.

47. Ibid., p. 112.

48. Ibid., pp. 110-111.

49. Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," pp. 23, 26.

50. Primakov, "Islam," p. 65; Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," pp. 26-27.

51. Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," p. 27; Primakov, "Islam," p. 65.

52. Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," p. 27; Primakov, "Islam," p. 64; Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 115.

53. Primakov, "Islam," p. 64.

54. Ibid, pp. 64-65; Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 113.

55. Ulianovskii, "Iranskaia Revoliutsiia," p. 114.

56. Ibid., p. 115.

57. Primakov, "Islam," pp. 65, 68.

58. Vasil'ev, "Tupiki," p. 95.

59. Also Timofeev, "Rol' Islama," pp. 53-63.

60. Primakov, "Islam," p. 68. (Emphasis supplied.)

61. Stepaniants, "Musulmanskoe Vozrozhdenchestvo," p. 28.