Investigating the Effect of Pilgrimage on Regional Policies and Foreign Relations of IRI with Modern Iraq

The present article has tried to investigate the effect of pilgrimage of Iranian Shiites to Iraq on regional policies and the relations of Iran and Iraq based on a combination of Fiedler's leadership criteria and Mitrany's theory of functional compulsion for cooperation as well as constructivist theory relating to the effect of norms on political behavior of practitioners. The present article uses a descriptive-analytical method to arise the following question: "what is the effect of religious tourism on regional policy and foreign relation of Iran with modern Iraq?"
The hypothesis of article is based on the fact that considering the effect of religious identity on political behavior of IRI in the region, especially the effect of the Shiite identity on policy-making of Iran in relation to modern Iraq, the pilgrimage trips have led to a functional compulsion for cooperation between the two countries and would lead to the strengthening of relationship between Iran and Iraq, preparing the ground for realization of the policy of Islamic union in Middle East through deepening relations with Iraq.
The findings show that the most important functions of pilgrimage trips for regional policies and relationship of Iran and Iraq are as follows: preparing the ground for Islamic unity, redefinition of Islamic identity and enjoying the function of removing land-centrism of spiritual trips, turning the borders of war into the borders of peace, preventing revival of political disagreements, IRI's reliance on soft power in modern Iraq, and the effect of the pilgrim's spiritualism on removing violence and creating peace in the region as well as Iran's participating in reconstruction of Iraq with an emphasis on rebuilding the holy shrines. In this article's view and with a constructive analysis of the topic, one may infer that due to religious demands for visiting holy shrines in Iraq, and due to a strong norm called "pilgrimage", the policy of Iran towards modern Iraq has been formulated based on priority of this norm over interests.