foucault-and-the-iranian-revolution-janet-afary

90 Foucault's Writings on the Iranian Revolution
In his own defense, in later debates Foucault would stress that he had also
mentioned in this article that some of the above pronouncements were "not
too reassuring." It is important, however, to specify the nature of his doubts,
to wit: "The definitions of an Islamic government . .. seemed to me to have
a familiar but, I must say, not too reassuring clarity. 'These are basic formulas
for democracy, whether bourgeois or revolutionary,' I said. 'Since the eighteenth
century now, we have not ceased to repeat them, and you know where
they have led' " ("Iranians Dreaming," app., 206). Thus, Foucault's problem
with the Islamist vision he had evoked above was not centered on women's
rights or on the danger of a clerical authoritarianism. Instead, the danger he
saw lurking underneath the Iranian upheaval was that of a liberal democracy.
Apparently, his doubts flowed from his two decad ' es of theoretical work
exposing the confining and oppressive features of modern fo rms of political
and social power that had grown up alongside liberal democracy.
Foucault also alluded to the Islamist movement as "a form of 'political
will'" and to its spiritualization of politics: "I do not feel comfortable speaking
of Islamic government as an 'idea' or even as an 'ideal.' Rather, it impressed
me as a form of 'political will.' It impressed me in its effort to politicize
structures that are inseparably social and religious in response to current
problems. It also impressed me in its attempt to open a spiritual dimension
in politics" ("Iranians Dreaming," app., 208). It was this element, "a spiritual
dimension in politics, " that was at the center of Foucault's interest in the Iranian
Revolution. Also crucial here was another notion, that of the "political
will" of the Iranian people, which he would soon describe as perfectly unified.
He concluded the article by referring to the crucial place of "political spirituality"
in Iran and the loss of such spirituality in early modern Europe. This was
something, he wrote, "whose possibility we have forgotten ever since the Renaissance
and the great crises of Christianity." Poised for the sharp responses
he knew such views would receive in the highly charged world of Parisian intellectual
debate, he said he could " already hear the French laughing" at such
a formulation. But, he retorted, "I know that they are wrong" (ibid., 209).
This evocation of "political spirituality" was surely intended to provoke controversy
in France, a country whose political and intellectual culture was the
most determinedly secular of any Western country. 16 What's more, Foucault
had not limited his remarks to Iran, which would have been controversial
enough to French readers, but also suggested that France itself had important
lessons to learn from Iranian political spirituality.
The lack anywhere in the article of a sustained critique or even a questioning
of Khomeinism was most striking. Even in this early period, when
the repressive and obscurantist character of Khomeinism had not come out