An Analysis of the Chinese Source's Approach to the Islamic Revolution of Iran

As a turning point in contemporary Iranian history, the Islamic Revolution has had massive influence on the course of developments in the country if not to mention the situation of international politics. A proper study and understanding of this revolution is an imperative introduction to the understanding of the domestic and foreign policies of today Iran. Unlike this important necessity, research about Islamic Revolution does not have a bright history in China and there are only a few sources on this revolution. This paper is an attempt to study these sources through textual analysis and content analysis. The findings of the paper show that three factors have been influential in developing research works by the Chinese researchers about Islamic Revolution of Iran: Marxism-Maoism ideology; impact of Western approaches to and analyses of Islamic Revolution of Iran; and political, economic and cultural developments along with Chinese foreign policy strategies vis-à-vis Iran.