The Role of the Supreme National Security Council in the Governance of the National Security of the Islamic Republic of Iran

This paper attempts to study the challenges of national security governance, while answering the question "How does the National Security Supreme Council play its role in security governance?". The results are provided by using descriptive-analytical research method and interviewing twelve expert experts using the chain reference method and then preparing and adjusting the questionnaire (with Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.87) using the key points extracted from the interview and distribution among 30 experts and practitioners in the field of national security. Descriptive and inferential statistics methods were used to analyze the data and check hypotheses, and Friedman's test was used to rank the indicators. The results of the research indicate that the National Security Supreme Council can play its role in the security governance of the Islamic Republic of Iran through three special tasks of policy determination, coordination of actors in the field of governance and mobilization of resources. In fact, the nature of the Council governance is regulatory governance. Also, the findings show that 46 challenges can be identified in these three special tasks, and the most important challenges caused to the Council in these three areas are: the dimension of policy determination (with an average of 39.2 %), the dimension of actor coordination governance arena (with an average of 35.2 %) and resource mobilization dimension (with an average of 27.1 %).