Iran’s foreign policy should go beyond survivalism
By Hossein Salimi
Professor of international relations
In the history of Iran’s foreign relations, following the emergence of modern diplomacy, the country’s foreign policy was initially shaped around survival. From almost the era of the Iran-Russia wars onward, external policies were crafted primarily to preserve the state’s existence. Over time, that approach shifted toward a strategy of development and later toward expansionism. Yet today, Iran’s foreign policy appears to have once again reverted to a phase defined solely by survival.
The shift toward a survival-centered doctrine stems from a serious theoretical fallacy in how foreign policy is understood by key actors in the field.
A review of the prevailing discourse in Iran’s foreign policy suggests that the theoretical framework guiding decision-makers and principal actors rests on four main pillars that lie at the heart of this misreading.
1. Classical realism: A view of foreign policy that reduces security exclusively to its military dimension, subordinating all other considerations to a particular understanding of security — one attainable only through military power.
2. Marxism: A perspective that portrays the world as a realm of domination, holding that the capitalist system is controlled by specific capitalists, particularly Jewish ones, who in turn use states as instruments of control.
3. The duality of good and evil: An outlook rooted in Manichaean culture, depicting the world as an arena of an endless struggle between good and evil, not grounded in monotheism, but in a perpetual conflict between opposing moral forces.
4. Dependency theory: A theory asserting that the more extensive a country’s ties with the global capitalist system, the less development it will achieve, thereby emphasizing inward-looking policies and self-sufficiency.
The convergence of these four elements has made it difficult for the country to grasp the realities of today’s international system. Some of the pillars underpinning this framework have outlived their historical relevance, while others are internally inconsistent. The very concept of security, for instance, has undergone a profound transformation. It is no longer defined solely by military capabilities or nuclear energy.
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