CONSTRUCTION OF NATIONAL IDENTITY AND SECURITY POLICIES OF IRAN IN THE 20TH CENTURY (original) (raw)

Iran security policies went through accommodation and adjustment during the Shah regime to a reactive policy off late under the Islamic Republic. And the security of the state is closely linked to the perception of threat. But how an objective material condition is perceived as threat or non-threat is a function of identity. The phenomenal change in the security policies of Iran is correlated with the construction of national identity in Iran. But identity is a fluid concept which doesn't take a concrete shape for all eons but it is moulded and reshape from time to time. In course of time, at certain historical political junctures we find that either the ethno Persian identity or the Islamic identity gets legitimated as the state identity of Iran. And as the identity of the state changes, it had ramifications in the security policies. This paper attempts to engage with the linkages between identity construction and the perception of threat.