Transformations of the Revolutionary in Reformist Discourse

This paper has been developed to study conceptual transformations of the revolutionary in reformist discourse. For meaningful clarification of the relationship between the revolutionary and reformist discourse, we have resorted to Laclau and Mouffe’s theoretical approach. After the demise of Imam Khomeini, Islamic Revolution’s discourse - which had been articulated with signifiers of Islam and republicanism - experienced a new chance for presentation of different understandings and interpretations resulting in the emergence of two political rival spectrums of “Reformist Camp” and “Principlist Camp”. The reformist discourse encompassed such revolutionary slogans as freedom, democracy, legal positivism, religious democracy, human rights, etc. The reformist discourse adopted a new approach, claiming that the Iranian society needed fair and free relations with the rest of the world. The discourse was formed around the central signifier of democracy and floating signifiers of civil society, political development, legal positivism, freedom and moderation. Constituting a system of meaning, the reformist discourse tried to break apart the principlist discourse. On the contrary, the principlists created a new articulation and added new signifiers such as justice, security, values, cultural invasion, etc. to constitute their system of meaning around the central signifier of Vilayat or Islamic guardianship to dismantle the structure of reformists’ central signifier and floating signifiers. Reformist discourse created many chances for change in the society but failed to overcome the erected obstacles. Some changes occurred in Islamic Revolution elements as a result of the reformist discourse but it did not mean the revolutionary was totally wiped off. Rather, it means that reformist discourse paid attention to such factors as democracy, freedom, political development, and legal positivism instead of emphasis on such factors as justice. Indeed, it can be argued that the revolutionary is a product of reformist discourse and creators of the reformist discourse have always played an influential role in the political structure of the Islamic Republic of Iran after the victory of Islamic Revolution in 1979.