Interpretive-Structural Modeling Challenges Affecting the Policy-making Process of Renewable Energy Technologies Development in Iran

Policy-making with the aim of technology development is the basic function of governments and their intervention process in order to achieve results and realize economic and social prospects. Policy studies seek to describe and explain the policy of governments and how to influence and change it. The field of energy, including renewable energy, as well as the development of renewable technologies, as one of the most important areas of public issues, is always affected by direct and indirect government interventions. In this regard, the purpose of this article is to investigate the challenges affecting the policy-making process of renewable technology development in Iran. For this purpose, the method of structural-interpretive modeling has been used to express the interrelationships between these challenges. In addition, MICMAC analysis has been used to identify the influence and dependence of each of the challenges. After analyzing the data, the challenges affecting the policy-making process of renewable technology development were classified into five different levels and according to the interrelationships between them, it was presented as a structural-interpretive model. Also, after MICMAC analysis, the variables were divided into three groups of dependent, independent, and autonomous variables, and no variables were included in the group of linked variables. The findings show that "supporting successful innovators", "capital raising capacity", "uncertain start-up costs" and "proving the effectiveness of policies" are among the main challenges affecting the policy-making process of renewable technology development in Iran.