Factional Studies in Iran: A Systematic Review

After the split in Jame-ye Rowhaniyate-Mobarez and formation of Majma-e Rowhaniyun-e Mobarez in 1988, two major Left and Right factions appeared in the political scene of Iran. Since then, these political factions have been noticed by many scholars in the field and a large body of research has been conducted which in the present study was referred to as "factional studies". Using a Systematic Review, this study sought to provide a detailed analysis of the scientific outputs on political factions. To do so, 81 relevant studies, conducted from 1988 to 2017, were extracted from four Iranian databases. Afterwards, 67 studies were selected and were analyzed descriptively in terms of form, methodology and content. Regarding the form of studies, the findings showed that most of the studies were conducted in the period of 2009-2013, and 36 of 67 selected studies (53.7percent) were MA and PhD theses. From the methodological aspect, 36 studies (53.7 percent) had no certain methodology. Additionally, as to the content of studies, 37 (55.2 percent) lacked a theoretical framework. The findings indicated that these studies suffer from dispersion, conceptual ambiguties and theoretical weaknesses. Eliminating these weaknesses requires the attention of professional scholars who are more familiar with research techniques and theoretical frameworks related to this field of study.