Negative Campaigns in Iran's Presidential Elections,Causes and Context

The aim of the article is to understand the political, social and legal causes of Mudslinging and the negative struggle in the presidential elections of Iran from the political elite viewpoint. The increase in the amount of negative campaigns in the recent presidential elections is one of the issues facing Iran, which has been less studied. The main question is why the negative struggle in the presidential election debates and propaganda has increased in recent years? Theoretical foundations of research are based on theories of Iranian culture and political psychology, electoral campaigns, and structural-institutional theories. Survey method as well as a semi-structured interview technique applied to collect field data. Using a "network" sampling method to select the statistical community, as we could interviewed with 16 political elites including political science professors and some representatives of the parties. Findings of the research showed that the priority of group interests against national interests, the weakness of civil society and civil behavior, the weakness of political parties, the weakness of the laws and the bias of election observational and executive institutions are among the most important causes of electoral negative competition.