Khatami Like Soroush: No to "Unconditional Liberalism"

Khatami is not the first well-known figure considered liberal to openly criticize some foundations of liberalism. Earlier, Dr. Soroush stated explicitly in the 44th session of the Heart Reading of the Quran seminar series: "We have no liberal Islam." This distinction may be influenced by Trumpism wearing the mask of liberalism.

Ambassador Arjan; Mehrdad Khadir- Tuesday afternoon, 21 Mehr 1405, Seyyed Mohammad Khatami went to the National Library of Iran with a broken leg and crutches to listen to the words of Abbas Akhundi on the topic: global transitions, value chain and the architecture of Iran's development.

On the day when a birthday cake was cut for him, because the former president (and still popular in Iran because of his past memories) was born on Mehr 21, 1322, that is, he turned 83 years old yesterday, and at the same speed, years passed on his life as well as many who had their hopes and hearts attached to June 2, 1976.

The place of the ceremony was also memorable for him. Because after 10 years in the Ministry of Culture (from 1961 to 1971), he became the adviser of the then president - Hashemi Rafsanjani - and the head of the National Library of Iran, although this building was not yet completed and it was located in the current office of Africa / Jordan / Nelson Mandela Street.

Abbas Akhundi, although he is famous as the Minister of Housing of the Rouhani government, and in terms of his family relationship is Bajnaq Natiq Nouri and son-in-law of the late Rasouli Mahalati (the same cleric who revealed that some of what we know as Imam Khomeini's handwriting is actually in his handwriting and with the seal and approval of the late leader of the revolution), but in recent years he has been known as a development theorist and an Iranianist, and teaches at the School of World Studies of Tehran University, and later the disciples of Seyyed Javad Tabatabaei Since his death, they have surrounded him to introduce the theory of "Iranshahr" to the society. A theory that, in the eyes of critics, follows the model of the Safavid government and hastily preferred development over democracy.

If Hossein Marashi, the Secretary General of Iran's Construction Agents Party, once said that we are Muslim and liberal, and he did not repeat it again, Abbas Akhundi clearly defends liberal Islam and the liberal order, and believes that the way to save Iran from the current situation is to accept the liberal order.

It was predictable that Khatami would defend his identity and origin (traditional left) and clarify that he does not agree with parts of Akhundi's words, or if such an interpretation is made, he would not agree and not hesitate to praise him this time instead of cursing and cursing! (The issue of tomorrow is Mod Natr not yet!)

Khatami wants to say that Iranism is not necessarily about accepting the liberal order or at least all of it in a closed manner:

"- It may be considered that the acceptance of the liberal world order is the way to save countries and even humanity. We must be careful not to create the impression that our way of salvation is to accept the liberal order and move according to it, and there is no other way before us. My argument is that we must distinguish between presence and cooperation within the framework of the world order and accepting it without reason.

- At one time, accepting the liberal order means accepting all its foundations and relationships, and at the same time, we cooperate within the framework of existing international relations and institutions so that we can solve our country's problems and provide our needs and resources. These two issues are different from each other.

- I don't want to say that all the discussions about the liberal order are wrong or that everything that is said in this context should be abandoned. The issue is that we must examine the existing world order with a critical eye and distinguish between the realities governing the world and the acceptance of those realities as a desirable and final model.

- It should be seen what the purpose of investment is and with what motivation a country uses its resources in a field. Sometimes investments are made that are later stopped or not continued because priorities and economic and political calculations change. We have a facility in Isfahan that was completely destroyed during the last two wars. The main work of this facility was fuel production for atomic energy factories. When we went to fix this issue. We realize that there is half-finished work there and we need to complete it. The first investment was made by the Chinese, and according to the information I have, they invested about 500 million dollars there.

It had almost stopped. Mr. Jiang Zemin, President of China, I met him three times, one in Beijing, one in Tehran, and the other in one of the international gatherings. In all three of these meetings, I suggested that you come and help this program, which is also peaceful, is related to atomic energy and has nothing to do with the atomic bomb. In response, he told us to stop this issue. If I want to come and cooperate with you, America will stand in front of my work and I will not achieve the plan I have for China's economic future in the world. Finally, American and Israeli criminals came and destroyed it.

- Today, there are different views about the political and social order, and even among contemporary thinkers, various criticisms of the foundations of the modern and liberal order have been raised. We should also be able to examine these views and not be afraid to criticize and question the existing order.

- Should we accept the existing world order and believe that this is the way to save us?

Sometimes cooperation with the liberal world order is presented as if its complete acceptance is necessary. If this means accepting all the foundations of the liberal order, I do not agree with such a view, but if it is meant to interact within the framework of existing international relations and institutions and try to secure the interests of our country, this is a different matter.

Khatami is not the first famous liberal figure who openly criticizes some fundamentals of liberalism. Before this, Dr. Soroush had clearly said in the 44th meeting of the series of Quran recitation meetings: We do not have liberal Islam. A prominent theorist who was known as an exponent of Karl Popper's thoughts in the 70s and 80s. After the effort of Dr. Ezzatullah Foladvand in the translation of the book "Open Society and its Enemies", Dr. Soroush undoubtedly had the biggest role in introducing Popper.

However, he no longer defends liberalism as before. Liberal Muslims such as Mohammad Quchani believe that Trumpism should not be confused with liberalism.

Dr. Soroush was enraged by the liberal world's support for Israel, and he is also against consumerism in the capitalist world, and he is content in his personal life and clearly distanced himself from liberalism, although he still defends human rights as one of the modern values and believes in political secularism, which means neutrality of governments towards religions and beliefs, as before.

However, it is not surprising that when Dr. Soroush does not believe in closed-minded liberalism, Khatami, who comes from the left, is worried that Iranism will be perceived as a liberal Islamic mullahs or at least surrendering to the liberal order.

Let's not forget that in 1959 Seyyed Mohammad Khatami replaced the liberal Dr. Yazdi in Kahan and although he managed Kahan with free thinking, Kahan did not become liberal and at that time this trait was only blamed on Engineer Bazargan and his associates like Dr. Yazdi in the Iranian freedom movement.

Khatami's criticism of the liberal interpretation of Akhundi's words is reminiscent of Saeed Hajjarian's accurate description 20 years ago, who said that the accompaniment of various currents with reforms is because of their own interpretations, but what Khatami and the reformers of the participation front mean by reforms is democratization.

The freedom movement supports the meaning of liberalization, the agents consider the modernization project, and the traditional intellectuals consider secularization.

Later, in 1992, when Hassan Rouhani came to office, Mr. Hajjarian said: "Now, instead of democratization, liberalization, modernization, and secularization, we should give in to normalization, that is, normalization, and Rouhani is looking for normalization and exit from the extraordinary situation."

I didn't make these statements for this train to be boastful because a journalist should speak in a clear language. Rather, it was for a better transfer of content. With this view:

First: Khatami was never a liberal, but his defense of freedom was due to the concern of weakening the position of religion, so much so that he said in Tehran University on the second anniversary of Khordad: "If religion is opposed to freedom, it will fail."

Secondly, with the emergence of Trumpism and the tragedies that have befallen the people of the world, especially the Middle East, in the name of the Western world and capitalism, and with the deviation of democracy into populism and Trumpism, liberalism itself has come under criticism.

Thirdly, although the Reform Front as a sub-group of Khatami had three candidates for the 1403 election and announced that it would not accept a proxy candidate and would not be under the burden of another candidate as before, and the government decided to approve one of the three in order to increase the participation rate, but now it is clear that if that one person was Abbas Akhundi and he won, perhaps both Khatami and the government would have had problems with him, while Masoud Mezikian does not claim to be an intellectual and more He is concerned about social justice and is not involved in Iranshahi and liberal ideas, and his Islam is simple and to the point of not bothering the citizens and life is better, and he is pragmatic and in this respect, like Gholamhossein Karbaschi, who is not liberal in the sense of agents, but is more pragmatic and expedient, and from this point of view, if Akhundi was nominated, Karbaschi would not support him.

The similarity of Seyyed Mohammad Khatami and Abdul Karim Soroush's late views in criticizing liberalism to the current concept shows that the very friendly tone of these two in their message of condolence and thanks after the death of Dr. Soroush's brother was not a compliment. What, Khatami uses the word "master" for few people, and Soroush is a friend of Khatami despite his previous frank criticisms, even though the names of Soroush and Khatami come together, everyone remembers that famous critical letter during the presidency and more than 20 years ago with soothing prose: "Mr. Khatami! It is too late, the child of waiting has grown old, the heart of patience is fed up with this way."

The only current criticism of Khatami on Soroush is perhaps one on Dr. Reza Daru Ardakani, whom Soroush considers as a representative of Heidegger's thought, and the other is his sharp tone in recent confrontations with figures such as Mohsen Kadivar, Musa Ghannejad, and Garne Khatami, like Soroush, they do not accept the liberal order in a closed manner and are not liberal like Akhundi.

The presence of Seyyed Mohammad Khatami, but with a cane and at the age of 83, was also symbolic. Both old age and birthday cake and cane! Symbolic in the sense that it showed that with the decline of the subversive movement due to the losses of the 40-day war after the events of January 18 and the actions of the authoritarians and the fear of another war, the hope for reforms has sprouted again, and Khatami does not want to lose this opportunity by stigmatizing the liberal order in a time when another era has begun.

The reality is that today Iran needs pragmatism versus fundamentalism more than philosophical thoughts, and I wish the management of radio and television would change and we could witness these discussions in the radio and television freed from the current of 15% with crude, rhetorical and emotional pseudo-experts.

Imagine that instead of the likes of Mustafa Khoshcham and Javad Ardeshir Larijani and four young people of the revolution and never seen war, academician theorists and broken bones politicians come and discuss. For example, Zarif and Akhundi are stable with the same congregation, or why not Khatami and Soroush?