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

6 Introduction
Iranian women in the problematic stances toward gender in his better-known
writings, while in chapters 3 and 4, we discuss Foucault's response to attacks
by Iranian and French feminists on his Iran writings themselves.
Third, an examination of Foucault's writings provides more support for
the frequently articulated criticism that his one-sided critique of modernity
needs to be seriously reconsidered, especially from the vantage point of many
non-Western societies. Indeed, there are some indications that Foucault himself
was moving in such a direction. In his 1984 essay "What Is Enlightenment?"
he put forth a position on the Enlightenment that was more nuanced
than before, also moving from a two-pronged philosophy concerned with
knowledge and power to a three-pronged one that included ethics . However,
the limits of his ethics of moderation with regard to gender and sexuality
need to be explored, and this is the subject of the last chapter of this book.
As against Foucault, some French leftists were very critical of the Iranian
Revolution early on. Beginning in December 1978 with a series of articles that
appeared on the front page of Le Monde, the noted Middle East scholar and
leftist commentator Maxime Rodinson, known for his classic biography of
Muhammad, published some hard-hitting critiques ofIslamism in Iran as "a
type of archaic fascism" ("Islam Resurgent?" app., 233). As Rodinson later revealed,
he was specifically targeting Foucault in these articles, which drew on
Max Weber's notion of charisma, Marx's concepts of class and ideology, and
a range of scholarship on Iran and Islam. In March 1979, Foucault's writings
on Iran came under increasing attack in the wake of the new regime's executions
of homosexual men and especially the large demonstrations by Iranian
women on the streets of Tehran against Khomeini's directives for compulsory
veiling. In addition, France's best-known feminist, the existentialist philosopher
Simone de Beauvoir, protested the Khomeini regime's suppression of
women's rights and sent a message of solidarity to Iranian women ("Speech
by Simone de Beauvoir," app., 246-47). Foucault refused to respond to the
new attacks, issuing only a mild criticism of human rights in Iran that refrained
from any mention of women's rights or gay rights, and he soon lapsed
into silence on Iran.
In France, the controversy over Foucault's writings on Iran is well known
and continues to undercut his reputation. For example, during the debate
over the September 11, 200 1, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington,
a prominent French commentator referred polemically and without apparent
need for any further explanation to "Michel Foucault, advocate of Khomeinism
in Iran and therefore in theory of its exactions" in a front-page op-ed
article in Le Monde (Mine 2001).4 Even French commentators more sympathetic
to Foucault have acknowledged the extremely problematic nature of