Evolution of research on Siyasatnama in Iran

This article surveys the evolution of research on Siyasatnama from the beginning to the end of 2019 while analyzing their shortcomings to address these questions: 1. What approaches have been adopted in studies on Siyasatnama from the beginning (1963) until 2019? 2. Which approaches are more frequent and what is the reason behind this popularity? 3. What factors have prompted a shift in research approach to Siyasatnama at different periods? A total of 209 articles in this field were subjected to analysis to investigate their content, sources, approach, strengths and weaknesses. Also, the impact of previous sources and the inclusion of new and original points were taken into account. According to their frequency, they embraced political, comparative, religious, theoretical, descriptive, historical, critical, literary, biographical, and codicological approaches, respectively. Among the factors underlining the evolution of the approach in articles, Abbas Iqbal’s version of Siyasatnama in 1941, the book of Khajeh Nizam al-Mulk Tusi and the discussion of political ideas of Iranshahri in Siyasatnama’s in the 1990s as well as the sociopolitical atmosphere of Iran in the second half of the nineties could be mentioned. In the results section, the frequency of each approach and their analysis, the temporal distribution of approaches in various decades, and the factors associated with the evolution of approaches and their critique are discussed. In the final section, which is dedicated to an analysis of research flaws, the main criticisms leveled against research on Siyasatnama are proposed.