Ardeshir Mehrdad: Shall we turn to one of the key slogans of the February 1979 revolution, namely “independence”. How do you understand this slogan today and how do you define “national sovereignty”?
Abolhassan Bani Sadr: I have studied independence from a variety of angles for four decades: a). Viewed from inside outwards, the product of which is the theory of domination. b). From the perspective of the relation of the state with its people through its relation with an outside power. This led to the definition of independence, first, from the point of view of internal policy, second the proposal for a global policy and third in respect to people-sovereignty and fourth in relation to being an Iranian (iraniat).
Even if we confine ourselves to answering the first three perspectives it will still be a huge tome. I have no choice other than resorting to simple definitions. If you require me to expand on any point, let me know. I will start from the third approach.
1. Popular sovereignty is the freedom and equality of all the people in the right of exercising velayat [= rulership see note 1]. In other words no person or rank possesses the velayat over the people. “Velayat belongs to the republic of the people”. Independence therefore means that no foreign power owns, or even shares the velayat or rulership with the people of a country. In other words, both the Brezhnev and the Eisenhower doctrines regarding “limited sovereignty violate the two principles that guide” people-sovereignty. These two tenets of freedom and independence are inseparable.
2. As to the relation between the state and people, as well as the relations of political organisations and foundations (or institutions) of society with the national society, I would define independence as: neither directly or indirectly making use of the policies of an external power for internal politics. Also not making the outside power and its goals pivotal to the peoples rights or to internal politics. This is independence, one that was accepted during the revolution by Mr Khomeini and violated after he ascended to power. This was also one of the three principles of the Covenant upon which the National Resistance Council [2] was set up and was violated by a section of that Council once they went to Iraq.
Therefore, in contrast to the principle of intervention in the name of human rights etc. which the West is using as an excuse, according to this definition no power can intervene from outside, nor can an internal power use friendship or enmity with a foreign power (as was done by both the Shah and the mullah regimes) as a pivot for internal policy making. Neither can a political group use the excuse of fighting for this or that aim to turn to a foreign power, or even appeal to them in order to gain “international legitimacy”.
I recently published the principles that should guide foreign policy in the Islamic Revolution newspaper (number 530) using this definition, which is the real translation of negative equilibrium. Accordingly people-sovereign governments can bring into being a global policy that reigns in the trans-nationals and uses the forces for transformation that will appear in the world to serve co-ordinated global growth.
In a university seminar I was asked what on earth local independence can mean in the face of trans-nationals and globalisation? In reply I asked what route can political globalisation take? If a global policy appears through the domination of weak by the strong this is nothing but the repeat, or persistence, of the history of empires. If we want the genuine participation of nations, we need another guiding principle. One that enables societies to exist free from relations of domination-dominated and encourages cooperation between these peoples in containing trans-nationals, and bringing economics to serve humankind. This principle is the principle of negative equilibrium. That seminar was published in two volumes in French.
3. From the point of view of supremacy, and the relations of dominating-dominated, neither the dominator or the dominated are independent. Can one find in our world today a single country which is neither one or the other? The answer is negative. But today the state of he world is unhealthy. The world is a state where a large part of its forces for transformation are transformed into forces for ruin and used to destroy nature and devastate the life of human beings and all other living things. Even to find practical solutions we need to acknowledge healthy states and conditions.
Through four decades I have critically studied theories of domination and have come to criticise and develop, in the light of experiences – including the experience of Iran since the revolution – and to propose a theory which if I can encapsulate in a few words consists of:
a. In order for two social orders to come into a relation of forces where one is dominant and the other dominated, one of these two needs to export the forces of transformation while the other, again in order to safeguard its social order, needs to import these forces of transformation. Thus if one cannot export and the other import and use these forces of transformation then both systems are forced to change.
For example Iran towards the end of the Safavid dynasty (1501-1732) found itself in conditions that in order to safeguard its political-social order it needed to export and destroy the forces of transformation. The population of the country, which constitutes one of the forces of transformation, was reduced to 9 –10 million by the beginning of the Qajar dynasty (1797-1925) through wars and destructions. Since then there has been a drain from Iran to the West of brains, capital and oil (all three massive forces of transformation). Just one example – the wealth of Iranians living in the US is, in one estimate, 400 and in another 660 billion US dollars.
At the beginning of the revolution, the era of the source of the revolution, to execute a programme which was the rendition of the principle of independence, it had to aim at a change of the social order, a vigorous social justice and to allow the forces of transformation to grow. And this is what they did.
Looking from these perspectives at the coup of June 1981, the concerns of the custodians of social order with structures that are compatible with despotism and the concerns of Mr Henry Kissinger of the emergence of a second Japan in Asia are real. Because as the experience of the former Soviet Union showed, if America cannot import and utilise a greater proportion of the global forces for transformation it will face the danger of extinction as a “super-power”. From this angle the “sole super-power” ca be seen to face annihilation. This is because in order to save “liberal capitalism”, the forces for transformation, which it created, or absorbed from the rest of the world, are either removed from the process of production (and made to work in a casino that has become stock exchanges), or self-alienates them into a force for destruction. The level of ruinous violence that has enveloped American society and nature in this part and other parts of the globe grows by the day. The myth of becoming the “sole super-power” and remaining such has prevented the politicians and a large section of US intellectuals from seeing reality as it is. To maintain at any price the social order that is the support base for global capitalism speeds up the process of downfall.
I have sought over time the dynamics of the dominator-dominated relations and have identified to date twelve dynamics.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: The concept of “outside power” or “foreign power” plays a central role in your definition of independence. Your definition, however, detaches the “outside power” from its identity, from the system from which it evolves and the position and role occupied by it in that system. The definition is also neutral towards the content of “policies” and “goals”. It seems not to matter whose interests they are to serve nor in what direction they are being pursued. Surely in the world today the outside power (in its general sense) is not confined to state power, whether imperialist or not. It also includes national, international and trans-national non-governmental institutions and organisations as well as social and political movements, both national and trans-national. We also know that in the process of global restructuring of the geography of power the realm of sovereignty and control of the national state is increasingly being squeezed. The border between the “inside” and “outside” is continuously falling and being redefined. Do you think, considering these changed circumstances, such concepts as “foreign” and “outsider” are an adequately clear and expressive definitions of the realities of domination in the contemporary world?
Bani Sadr: In any relationship of domination both sides of the relationship are foreign to each other. This is because the relationship is a uni-pivotal duality when the dominator is the active pivot and the dominated the passive. And is a bi-pivotal duality where both pivots are reciprocally active and passive. With the difference that the dominated becomes dominated through its forces of transformation being exported and its leadership becoming foreign.
Thus the most suitable definitions are “foreign” and “outsider”. I draw your attention to the important fact that even where an outside power, is not dominant as a collective, the country that is being dominated, often makes a small collective into a centre of dominance, so that it can prevent the forces of transformation from bringing about a change in the socio-political system. History has seen many examples of such centres. In the 20th Century Europe Switzerland became a major financial and monetary centre. The Far Eastern Tigers and tax havens came to being in the same way. In the present time, the state in Iran is an outsider in relation to our national society. This despite the fact that the Iranian revolution was, and is, the beginning of our country’s departure from a situation of dependency. The current regime is not compatible with the situation of Iran today and will no doubt give way to a regime that will replace the process of externalising the state with one that internalises it. That is one that makes the social order changeable such that it activates the forces for transformation in Iranian society.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: You say that to turn
to a “foreign power” by any political group, regardless of for what aims, is an
act contrary to the “independence” of a country. I am in total agreement that if
turning to a “foreign power” is at the cost of becoming a lever for the
interference of that foreign power in one’s own country, or it being turned
into a functionary for the interests of that power then this goes against the
principle of independence for a political group. In this case the social and
national base of that political group will undoubtedly dry up. But can one
condemn the existence of a relationship between a political group and a foreign
power regardless of what obligation that relationship has produced for our
hypothetical group, or whatever consequences it may have had, and to see this
necessarily as dependence on the foreigner?
Even when a political group is seeking backing and help can one always talk of betrayal of the independence of the country? For example the national liberation struggle in Vietnam relied on help form China and Soviet governments in its battle against the domination of the United States on its country. Did such a reliance contradict the independence and freedom of the Vietnamese people? Similarly was not the appeal for outside help by the anti-fascistic movements in Europe not part of their struggle to be freed from the slavery of the occupying army?
And coming to the now, rather than two decades ago, can you find a single popular movement that relies on “internal” resources in its struggle for justice and freedom or sees itself not in need of “outside” solidarity
Finally in the battle against global capitalism, is it imaginable that the nations of this world can be victorious without turning to each other, and without laying the foundations of trans-national and international links to end their slavery and captivity and become free and independent? Moreover you and I belong to a nation where accusation of allegiance to the foreigner and “alien worship” has for years been the stock method of suppressing and purging political opponents. The number of those who were sent to their execution on this accusation are not few: Arab, Kurd, Baluch, Azeri, Turkemen have never been able to create a link with their compatriots across the border without being branded as a traitor to their country. The Amir Entezams of Iran have never been able to escape such fabrication and had to bear long prison sentences in order to clear their honour and name [3]. In the ruling political culture of Iran to be a Bahai’ is to be a CIA agent, communist and “Tudeh” are selling their country and a Jew is an Israeli fifth columnist. Don’t you think, particularly in a country such as ours, the discourse on independence and national sovereignty requires more earthy concepts, more accurate definitions, and more transparent criteria. Don’t you think that in order to answer these necessities we need a more deep-rooted re-evaluation of some of our views?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: your second question, which is also a defence, opens up the ambiguities in your way of thinking.
a. The most crucial ambiguity comes from your inattention to the difference between “outside power” and nations. I have struggled for 40 years to influence world public-opinion in ways which is compatible with popular sovereignty, freedom and growth in all the countries of the world. Such an effort is not opposed to independence. It is opposed to domination. It is the liberation from the dominating-dominated relationship. I have explained at length that freedom and independence is indeed the process of freedom and independence seeking by the collective of humanity. For those who wants to learn from experience, examining the experience of countries which have relied on outside powers to combat foreign domination, illuminates how important the method of becoming free and independent is. There are societies which are determined to become free, have popular sovereignty and are which also growing. Others who did not go the road of becoming free, replaced one despotism with another and remained in a position of being dominated.
b. It was again I who proposed a global policy for reining in the forces for transformation on a global scale. But this very global policy will not become realised if nations do not follow the path to freedom and independence. That is if they do not make their social orders transformable in ways that allows their forces for transformation to become active within society. Therefore we should differentiate fundamentally between relations with outside power (governments, trans-nationals, Mafias, etc) and that with nations with whom relationships cannot, and must not, be that of domination. I must add that even with nations one must not have a stationary, but a creative view. That is help them in their quest for development so that a world free from relations of domination can be realised.
Therefore that view which insists that in the western societies the states represent society is highly deceptive. Because it reneges on the effort to inform people that the price of living in a country engaged in a dominating condition is heavy, and they are the ones who will pay the price. Seeing that views represented by the likes of Bush and Berlusconi are gaining ground two efforts are crucial: the one where the dominated struggle to be free and the other to free the dominators of the beliefs and ways of domination.
c. But to ask for an outside power for help is never justified. The conditions of Iran and Afghanistan, which lie on the crossroads of global relations, are instructive. You ask which country has been able to become free and independent without supra-national and other links. I re-emphasise that the process of becoming free and independent is an inner process. Even if only one human being becomes free, no force on earth can dominate them.
The Iranian revolution was such a process. Compare that revolution with the clerical despotism which return the country to a position of being dominated, with both open and secret relations with the dominant power, shows the difference, to the extent of frank opposition, between the two processes. The Iranian revolution had the support of a large section of world public opinion. This was the result of unwavering efforts by Iranians all over the world for over a quarter of a century.
You ask what if it is done without any reciprocal undertakings? Do you know any neutral power? If you think that power can be neutral you are mistaken. Therefore if a power is asked to intervene, particularly if the request comes from the inside, is the that group become the agency for the intervention of that foreign power. You say the accusation of loving the “alien” is common in Iran. I reply that the deposed Shah, who was the instrument of the British and the Americans, called Mossadeq a foreign agent. The Mullahs secretly colluded with the Americans and claimed Bani Sadr is the “hope” of America!
The situation of Iran, which is at the centre of conflict on the global scale, calls on us to have a particular sensitivity to independence. If the bazaar of accusations is rife it is because of the position of Iran and the importance of independence, in the survival of the country. Moreover it has always been the dominated who by turning to outsiders give it the tool to make its entry into the country possible. It was thus that the mullahs brought in the foreigner so as to establish its own despotic reign: hostage taking. the 8 year war and the terror inevitably led to oil concessions. Please refer back to the to the warnings I gave on June 12 1981. What transpired afterwards was in my warnings, one by one. Therefore to take recourse to a foreign power is under no excuse permissible. In contrast one should never overlook public opinion, and to participate in the big struggle in all eras, because everywhere, people can regain their freedoms and to join the global front for struggle against the domination of global capital and the various shapes of power that go with it.
Please beware! With reference to today’s conditions, one must never through recourse to foreign powers, give license to traitors.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: Before going to a different question it might be useful to pause on the negative meaning of “independence” and “national sovereignty”. In the political dimension, where do you draw the line between “independence” and the “absence of independence”: in the establishment of the relations of domination? In dependence of a government on power or an outside power? Or in any dependence, including reciprocal dependence? Indeed, in your view in our world today to what extent can independence be viewed as an absolute concept? We are in a situation where no country, no matter how powerful, can remain outside the field of influence and magnetic field of other world powers. To what extent can one imagine that in instituting a foreign policy, or even domestic policy, that the interests of other powers are totally unaccounted? If not, then to what extent are existing states able to stay independent?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: Firstly: there is a difference between reciprocal solidarity and reciprocal dependence. One great difficulty is the ambiguities in the political literature of Iran. There are ambiguities in other places too, but not as great. That is because the language of power is intensely ambiguous.
Yes there is not a single independent country in our world. Because they are either in a position of dominating or being dominated. Americans talk of mutual-dependency, even through in this “reciprocal dependence” they are the dominating partner and take away the forces for transformation – brains, oil and other natural resources …. And the dependencies have made America dependent on their forces for transformation by exporting these to the US!! We propose that mutual solidarity should replace reciprocal dependence. That means:
1. Social systems become transformable in the sense that the forces for transformation within them become mobilised.
2. Information, knowledge, science, and technology become global, in the way that they can facilitate the co-ordinated growth of the peoples of the planet.
3. Organise exchange among nations such as to help reciprocal growth, meaning: a) equality b) not to export the ability to work from one society to another (just as export of unrefined oil transfers the ability to work from Iran to the dominant pole). Instead to increase work capacities in every society.
4. Violence in all its forms loses its role in international relations.
5. All discriminations are eliminated.
6. Growth resulting from spontaneous activity of humans be accepted as part of the collective of aptitudes. And therefore be accepted as universal and timeless and become bound with the development of nature and pivotal to the global and domestic policies of all states.
7. Relations between nations, which today is the relations between power on a global scale, is fashioned.. Power is annihilated on the global scale and the reciprocal solidarity among nations created as described above. This development is not fundamental unless: a) humanity’s relation with nature changes from destructive to constructive. B) relations within and between societies should be a relation with reality alone. That is relations should be relations between humans and devoid of force, and between humans and nature also without force.
8. Developmental policies in all societies should take place generation after generation, and should focus on the growth of global society and on a nature that belongs to all species. From here arises the need to struggle for the reality of a global society and a global leadership by popular sovereignty with the equal participation of all nations that must found people-sovereign systems. This is a struggle in accordance with our time.
9. Just as developmental policy making should focus on increasing the capacity of every individual, on a global scale too it must not destroy resources, the environment itself, and the potentials of other societies or limit these facilities. The fact is that at present astronomical levels of capital is outside production and invested in the stock markets, in gambling. Two thirds of production and services are also destructive. The result is that the survival of nature is threatened and future generations – provided they are alive – will inherit an earth devoid of natural resources.
10. The measure both within and between societies is not the “interests” of states but human rights. If we accept this as the measure and call it justice and understand that justice is not an aim but a measure – that is a beginning, then out thoughts, statements, acts be measured by them. A model cane be discovered of relations between independent societies. In “foreign policy based on the principle of “negative equilibrium” I have expanded on these guidelines. I believe that the relations of power that create power-centred groupings between societies acts against the interests of the vast majority of people in the domineering societies as well as dominated societies.
If these relations have survived it is partly because a solution has not been proposed. Societies understand the expression of power but not that of freedom. They believe that whatever exists has a reality of its own. Hence relations of domination-dominated too is a reality. While in reality these relations are a destruction of reality. Today, if not all humans, the intellectuals have understood the importance of models. As to the principle of independence, models for relations between societies must be proposed and presented to people so that the great majority can come out of inactivity and ask for a different world.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: You referred to the National Resistance Council. Can you outline which action of the NRC you consider an abrogation of one the three principles of its founders? Was it the mere fact of moving to Iraq? Or the commitments which in your view were associated with moving into that country? Or is it their policies and changes in policy directions which followed their move there? Or finally was it a change over time of the NRC’s role and stance?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: Mr Rajavi’s behaviour and that of his group in relation to Saddam’s regime can leave no doubt that a neutral power does not exist:
a. Mr Rajavi signed the Covenant and thus was bound to its definition of independence. Accordingly to turn to an outside power in relation to internal affairs, was a negation of Iranian independence. Does anyone think that a despotic regime that wanted to end the existence of Iran, through occupying its western sector and dividing it into five republics was in love with the freedom of the Iranian people when it sends Mr Tariq Aziz to visit Mr Rajavi and for 5 hours gives him moth watering promises?
b. Iraq was at war with Iran. To accept Iraq as a host could not bring about anything other that co-operation with the aggressor. And …
Ardeshir Mehrdad: When talking of Mr Khomeini you said that during the revolution he accepted your definition of independence, and then dropped it after gaining power. I want to use this to make a small digression to a minor point. It is clear that this was not the only promise that Khomeini broke. It is also undeniable that he had openly expressed a number of his deeply held views years before and during the revolution to which he remained true when the revolution was over. Do you think that an intellectual on the side of freedom and people-sovereignty can see as proper, or even justify, support for Mr Khomeini and close collaboration with his government? Were those people wrong who, seeing other views expressed by Khomeini, or observing the directions his policies were taking, not only did not take seriously his promises, but saw the establishment of an Islamic government and the coming to power of the ulama as the defeat of the peoples’ revolution and their ideals for freedom and equality?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: your view is based on half the truth, which is the biggest lie. To explain:
a. The teaching of velayate faqih [see footnote 1] was merely a lesson in the Najaf seminary. But what Mr Khomeini expressed to the world in Paris was not a view, but an undertaking. A religious authority: first cannot make an undertaking, and that in full view of the world, unless he has made a change in his jurisprudencial view. Second, when he has made an undertaking, according to the Quran – “honour your promises” – he should have honoured his pledge. He emphasised in Paris that “velayat [rulership] is with the vote” [republic - jomhur]. There was no one at the time who would think that a marja’ taqlid [source of emulation, see 4] would abrogate their word, particularly as it was uttered in full view of the world.
Nevertheless I wrote to him, and said in his presence, that once you get into power, you may not be the person you are today and I want to be open with you then, as I am now. I tried many ideas, including going to left groups, that freedom must be established in this generation and that they should leave the social revolution to the next generation. But they, copying Lenin, were thinking of the second revolution. Let us leave this…
b. You spoke of people who knew what Mr Khomeini was up to. If you know anyone fitting this description you are duty bound to confront them with the evidence – their writings and words. But as to the “practical directions his policies were taking” after his installation at the command of power, I was the first to warn against “religious fascism”. It might be timely if you were to do an interview with Mr Houshang Keshavarz Sadr over this point.
c. I have already explained that during the revolution he did not speak even once speak of velayet faqih, he spoke many times of the velayat of popular vote [jomhur]. I will remind you that when the book “Velayet Faqih” reached Paris Mr Hassan Habini and I studied it and came to the conclusion that it has no substance. In my second trip to Najaf I spoke about it with Mr Khomeini. I asked was your purpose for teaching velayate faqih to make the Shah’s regime eternal? He asked why? I replied that Najaf is the centre of the ulama yet for over 1000 years you have not even been able to keep the town. Even the shrine of Ali. How do you expect a people to rise and take the power from the Shah and hand it to you?
He replied that my aim was to open the debate so that people like yourself and Mr Mottahari could bring together a correct view. I asked him to invite knowledgeable people to think on the subject and partake in its compilation. This he did and the invitation was published at the time.
Mr Khomeini did not believe in the velayate faqih. Previously he had given a jurisprudence opinion and rejected it. In addition to his book Bei, the memoirs of Mr Montazeri is clear on this point. But since he was ignorant of political science, when he was forced to express an opinion, he repeated the jurisprudence views of Molla Ahmad Naraghi. His son, the deceased Aqa Mostafa Khomeini, also wrote to me and asked me to send to Najaf the constitutions of European counties so that they can compile a view.
In view of these facts, which, not knowing them made you express a view based on half the truth would you concede that in those times we saw ourselves totally victorious. We had heard Islam as the expression of freedom from the mouth of a marja’ and in the process of a revolution with the participation of an entire nation, we believed in a gigantic revolution in the religious thinking of a people, whether clergy or non-clergy. There is no feeling more bitter than the feeling of betrayal of trust and hope. And our trust and hope was betrayed. This very bitter feeling has not left us to date.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: Can one in any political order can remain simultaneously faithful to “independence and national sovereignty” and “freedom and people-sovereignty” without deducing the first from the second and making it dependent on the latter? In systems such as the Islamic Republic, as was illustrated in the Constitution of 1979, could “freedom and people-sovereignty” have any other outcome than being sacrificed at the feet of “national security” and combating “foreign intrigues”? In this case was not the prominence given to such slogans as “independence” and “anti-imperialist struggle” by various politico-ideological currents that participated in the February 1979 revolution a sign of their general incapacity to understand the true function of these slogans in that period, particularly in the juncture during and following the overthrow of the Pahlavi regime?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: First, as I have already described, freedom (meaning the establishment of the velayat of popular republic [vote] and the irrevocable dissolution of the velayat of Shah and faqih and …) goes hand in hand with independence (meaning the end of the rule of the foreigner). The relation of freedom with independence is the relation of freedom with freedom.
Your question is proof of the sad reality that despite persistent efforts, there is no clear definition for independence. It would seem that “freedom and popular sovereignty” is being deduced from “independence and national sovereignty”. Because of the importance of the topic I will call to mind a slice of history:
In the early days of an “open political space” and trying to have understanding with America, the view appeared and was circulated that Iran has always– or at least for a large part of its history - had independence. But it is freedom that Iran never experienced. Thus it is freedom that has priority over independence. When Bazargan [5] came to Paris., I considered his views a negation of both freedom and independence. He queried the inseparability of the two. I convinced him. Sadly, in practice the issue of prioritisation made a comeback. What transpired to the revolution and country was caused by the priority given over to this principle over the other. For example if the two principles of freedom and independence or put another way of “velayat of the people” and “national sovereignty” had run together Iran would not have seen hostage taking, the 8-year war and the mullah’s despotic rule.
How can freedom, as the expression of the principle of equality of the people in ruling the country through exercising of the right to velayat (this term is more expressive than the “rulership” since the latter describes relations of power and hence accepting above and below in social groupings relative to one another) operate when the domination of an outside power deprives them of the right of rule over their forces for transformation inside the country, and stops them regulating their relations with the outside world on the basis of non-domination?
And what country is independent when its individuals do not enjoy a velayat that is equal? Looked at from this angle, any inequality in velayat inside is coupled with a relations of domination-dominated outside – and it is impossible to be otherwise. The popular sovereignties in the West are unhealthy because all of them are built and endure on dominant capitalism. Without the condition of dominance, they will either evolve towards equality, including the equality in velayat – or succumb to despotism. The tendency that has gripped the USA since September 11 is not new to America and Europe. It acquired power with Nazism and fascism. This despotic tendency, confronts social progress by upholding the dominant position – even at the expense of war and even atomic war. To escape this danger dominated societies cannot wait for change in the dominant section free of domination, but to see their freedom in freeing the world.
So, freedom and independence where it relates to velayat and rulership, is one move, one programme with one aim. They are not two separate entities with one reliant on the other or vice versa.
b. Systems like the Islamic Republic appeared through denying freedom and independence. I did warn beforehand that in the name of “American intrigue” or “war with the heathen Saddam” freedom and independence, as I defined earlier, will be violated. From the first I called the hostage taking a violation of independence and to make pivotal US power in the internal politics of the country. With the beginning of the Iran-Iraq war, I did not detach the resistance to the aggressor from the struggle against despotic-seeking tendencies. Surely if everyone had taken this position, what prospects had despotic structures to resist or pro-despotic groups to build absolutism? It is the same now and in the future. While there exists muddle in definitions of principles that should be guiding us, the alternative of popular sovereignty and the needed progress from despotism to popular sovereignty will not take place.
In any case the hostage taking, the 8-year war and despotism was compatible with that vague definition of “imperialism” and independence, which unaware of secret deals (the October surprise), called Mr Khomeini anti-imperialist and declared support for him a duty. In other words the problem was: firstly, false understanding of imperialism and therefore the “anti-imperialist struggle”. Second, inability (or deliberate obfuscation) to have a clear definition on freedom and independence The two were separated even placed in opposition. Third, and in consequence, a return to the game and the gamble of priorities where everything is left for grabs: the prioritisation of freedom on independence, the prioritisation of the “anti-imperialist struggle on freedom” and the prioritisation of “social justice” on freedom and the prioritisation of Islam on all ….
The problem is therefore in the definition, or more accurately, on deliberate ambiguity for the purpose of trampling freedom and independence and human rights to gain power. The problem is making power the aim of the struggle. And it was in this prioritisation that freedom and independence obtained definitions that are compatible with power-seeking.
In that tumult my insistence on accurate definitions of freedom and independence entering the Constitution and that all its principles should be written in this light was unsuccessful. The notion of the inseparable nature of freedom and independence was negated in the name of the exigencies of war. This was the exact opposite of what I would have done on the same principle.
c. So it is essential to study without prejudice the views and actions of political groupings of those periods – and since – so that the new generation can learn from the experience. Their views are guides and their actions show to what extent they believe in force or in freedom. Clarity of definitions is of paramount importance and ambiguity is one of the principal guilty parties.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: I think I need to clarify a misunderstanding. In my question there was no implicit belief that you can make freedom and people-sovereignty a dependency of independence and national sovereignty or vice versa. On the contrary the question is that if the principle of independence and national sovereignty is not deducible from the principle freedom and people-sovereignty, ie it does not define its general will (and here I will add that even if the two are seen as the same) can one be hopeful that in the real world (and not in philosophical abstraction) those who have government power in their hands will not define independence and national sovereignty in such a fashion that it will deny the people freedom and the right to self rule? Will not a historical analysis of countries like Iran (and even Western democracies) give an affirmative answer to this question?
The emphasis that freedom and independence are together, and should not be counter-posed is understandable. But to assume they are inseparable, and especially to equate them, can also be misleading. Clearly if we accept that independence is not a self-existent phenomenon, then wherever one talks of a “nation” or a “nation-state”, this meaning is witness to a definition of “self” and the “other” and to drawing boundaries between “inside” and “outside”. And also to define the nature of the relations between them. It is also clear that neither is the nation a natural and eternal entity, nor the definition of the relationship between the “self” and the “other” eternal or divine. The nation is a historic entity. An entity which is created and recreated. The definition and redefinition of it is also a function of the will of the forces that make and shape it. A group of people can separate themselves from others and define themselves as a separate nation and with this act redefine today’s “inside” and “insider” as “foreign” and “outsider” the next day. On the contrary groups of people who saw themselves as a nation can combine with a nation or nations and become a part of a larger entity where yesterdays foreigner and stranger becomes today’s insider and native.
It is clear that the mere presence of
something shared or of differences (whether cultural, historic, land etc)
neither create nations nor defines their independence from one another. The
birth and development of a nation is dependent on the existence of a political
will. It is this will that defines and redefines independence and moulds its
relation with freedom and individual and social rights.
With this introduction can I pose a question? What political will can name a group of people a nation, and define the independence of that nation without endangering freedom and the right of those people to self rule and deciding their own destiny. Is it the general will of that people or the will of political elite that speak in their name. Or groups who through capturing power present themselves as the embodiment of “independence and national sovereignty”?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: in your introduction there is an ambiguity. I draw your attention to the fact that the relative priority of one principle over another, is a repeating of the uni-axial duality and hence is power-centred. The prioritisation of freedom over independence or vice versa has its use if you want to downgrade in the name of one principle another and render it fit for overriding. In the history of Iran both views have been tried and caused disasters. The deceased Bazargan [5] in Neuffel le Chataux would say: freedom has priority. That Iran always – right up to present times – has had independence but not freedom. So we need to establish freedoms first and then go after independence. I replied if you separate the two, they will both become hollow slogans. He asked me to prove this and he accepted my logic. But in practice freedom took priority and the result was that the vacuum of independence was filled by hostage taking and its consequences, among which was the loss of freedom.
I assure you that the two are inseparable because independence is nothing but the freedom from domination, the freedom of a society from domination. To separate independence from freedom is the separation of freedom from freedom. In your introduction you assumed that freedom and the sovereignty of the people are synonymous and distinct from independence and national sovereignty. In fact freedom is not synonymous with sovereignty of the people nor independence with national sovereignty. What is national sovereignty if not popular sovereignty? Was it your belief that national sovereignty is the charge of the state that made you separate it from popular sovereignty which is what people take charge of?
If in Western popular rulerships, the separation of national sovereignty from people-sovereignty occurs to anyone, no one will consider them people-sovereign, which is nothing other than the transfer of rulership to the people and it’s the establishment of rulership in the people. Popular sovereignty, which is the same as national sovereignty (and for this reason they consider parliamentary democracy incomplete since the majority rules in the name of all the people), is the consequence of freedom and independence. From the view of people-sovereignty, freedom means that within national borders, no person, office or organisation shares sovereignty with the people and independence means that no foreign power – I will remind you of the limited sovereignty of Brezhnev – shares in the sovereignty of a nation.
Therefore to relieve your anxiety:
1. It is precisely this duality of national sovereignty and popular sovereignty that has to be expunged. Sovereignty is one and it belongs to the people.
2. Prioritisation of freedom and independence that must be expunged.
3. The lie that freedom and independence are separable must be exposed.
4. One must specifically not accept the duality of expediency and rights. The political history that you alluded to is the game between expediency and rights: expediency external to rights is always decided by power and tramples those rights its name.
Recently a 10 point proposal was handed to me. The authors thought they had given it a polished appearance, seemingly unaware that the power-centred intelligence begins by destruction and self-destruction. In these 10 points one was the tenet and the rest window dressing. The tenet was the priority of national interests over ideologies! They had leaked their dictatorial thinking. The axis of the state must be rights without any right to go for expediency outside rights.
I must highlight another point. The longstanding dispute in the west between those who believe in a priority for collective freedom and rights versus those who place individual freedoms and rights in front is resulted currently in deadlock. According to the principle of duality they cannot escape this dead end. But through the principle of negative equilibrium one can put an end to the primacy of one freedom over another. I have already published the views discussed in the west and my method and suggestions in a book. Here it is important to emphasise that before everything these concepts need to be clarified. For example if you want to use the definition of freedom that liberalism uses, it is impossible for individual freedom not to interfere with collective freedom, for the letter to even be imaginable. Perhaps the proponents of social justice have not paid enough attention to the importance of clarifying the definition of freedom and have been unable to free themselves from the trap of liberalism. We must leave this debate to another time.
Your understanding is that a nation is created by political will. And using this judgement you ask me: what political will can call a group of people a nation and … But what is political will? Among the mistakes that power-centredness has turned into a fixed principle is the separation of the political and the economic, social and cultural aspects and to separate all four from the concept of homeland. If they ask you how is the family made? Does one aspect come to mind or all the aspects? Do you forget the house the family occupies? In the formation of the family how do you separate the share of spontaneity and will? Now if we declare that political will has no outside existence, nor does society come into being by will alone, you might well ask how society does come into being?
Let us begin by stating that power does have a role in the creation of a nation. But since the nation is realised in the process of history and through activity in the homeland, and in all the four dimensions of social existence (political, social, economic, and cultural dimensions or aspects). With these activities inside the homeland the foundations for the long-lasting life of a nation is prepared. Obviously the relations of human communities with one another, are part of the elements that create and consolidate a nation. But historic experience tells us that the survival of national communities are directly related to the existence of elements favourable to a free and independent life and for growth. In other words “Iranianness” – if we use the example of Iran – is a collection of specifics which give every Iranian, in a homeland that is Iran, to find difference with life. That is to say a spontaneous belief in his or her permanent existence, through generations, as an individual possessing rights, living an unfettered, free, independent and developing existence. Through a study of history of the four dimensions and nature of Iran I have identified 14 particularities. Time permitting, I, and if not, others will complete the study.
Anyway if we imagine the political will as power, the answer is that such a will, if it were to form, can cause a collective to cease. However, if a will is the expression of the activities of a society, in its elements, it will appear through a process of time and slowly sheds whatever is not spontaneous. This is the expression of collective living in the homeland with an identity that we can, for example, call “Iranianness”.
The more the people are equal participants in administering society, the greater the survival of national life. Were national society become realised in this way, then if they are separated from it by force and through a foreign power, the separated ultimately will return to the collective. Our Iran has seen this separation and return to the national collective on many occasions. In the West, Germany refound its unity after the fall of the Berlin wall. It is worth asking that if it wasn’t for the general movement of the people, and if the German people were not prepared to pay the heavy price of unity, which “political will” could realise the unity of the two Germanys? The collective movement is the rendition of the collective historic and scientific consciousness of societies.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: The motto that guided the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic from the start was “neither East nor West: Islamic Republic”. What was at the core of this slogan? In practice was it anything more that a weapon to suppress those who thought differently, in particular liberals and communists. What did you think of this slogan in those years you held high office in the Islamic Republic?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: For Modarres [6] a just balance and for Mossadeq negative balance were the principles guiding foreign policy. When the Tudeh Party [7] demanded oil concession for the former “Soviet Union” Mossadeq retorted: this is like a person who has lost an arm being asked to lose the other to get the balance right. The correct method is to save our one hand and try to get the other hand back and join it back. Thus “neither East nor West” did not appear during the revolution. It has a tradition since the Constitutional Revolution of 1905, if not the tobacco crisis [8]. In the process of revolution the use of the slogan “not East (Russia) and nor West (America)” came in vogue as a ruse to give legitimacy to the content of “Islamic Republic”. In those times I don’t think the intention was to suppress liberal and communist tendencies. The mullahs were preparing for their power and needed to come up with an acceptable doctrine that they could present as something other than the doctrines of East and West.
I drew attention to the danger that the slogan can rationalise the idea of velayate faqih from two angles:
a. This slogan is only compatible with the doctrine of freedom. In other words it is in compatible with any power that is erected in the name of Islam, because it ends up with “both East and West”.
b. To make Islam a doctrine of power is both a betrayal of Islam and the independence of Iran.
The countrywide clarification of these points and the reminder that the Islamic revolution means a revolution in Islam and a return to the expression of freedom and independence on the basis of social justice, and the opening up of the horizon for a new spirituality for humans, was effective and found its way into the draft Constitution. The reaction of the despots – as documents later proved – reveals that the issue of the “share of ulama” which was ignored in the draft, was later realised. According to documents (from the house of Dr Mozaffar Baghai’) the suggestion of velayate faqih was first proposed by Mr Hassan Ayat [9]. One of the reasons I opposed the velayate faqih in the Assembly of Experts [10] was for the reasons I described above .
But the proposal of velayate faqih by such people as Baghai’ and Ayat, considering the former’s role in the 1953 coup (against Mossadeq - tr) shows the accuracy of the warning that I gave then, and which has not received sufficient attention. The content of any doctrine – and that includes Islam – when it becomes power, make inevitable the inevitable the dependence on “East” and “West” and those who do this will one day “hear the voice of t he revolution” or “drink the poisoned chalice” [11].
Ardeshir Mehrdad: Which Draft
Constitution do you mean? In the draft that you allude to, what other than
ignoring the “share of ulama” is different from the text that was
finally ratified? For example did the draft insist on the need to separate
“Iranianness” and “Islamness” (which many of the theoreticians of the Islamic
Republic insisted are inseparable) and also on freeing civil law from the sharia’?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: Firstly one cannot reduce the establishment of the velayate of the people to a mere “dispensing with the share of the ulama”. According to that draft, for the first time in Iranian history the velayat of popular republic would have been established. I will never forgiven myself for being greedy and not accepting a referendum. In reality, we did not see the draft as a complete expression of freedom and hoped that the Consitutional Assembly would improve on it. The result was a Constitution which in addition to a difference in fundamentals (the velayat of the people - republic - gave way to velayate faqih) has another fundamental difference. The draft, to the extent possible, did not fail to pay attention to freedom.
But Iranianness is the common chapter of beliefs that last and any belief that becomes alien to it dies. The Pahlavis justified their being a stooge and despotism by prioritising “Iranianness” to “Islamness” and the mullahs achieved the same by doing the opposite. To repeat: firstly putting one thing before or after another is the rendition of despotic thought. Second it is impossible. I’ll explain.
Iranianness is made up of specifics that must be in every belief of Iranians otherwise it will not become collective and will not last. The doctrines that came from the west became neither collective nor lasted because instead of trying to become compatible with the specifics of Iranianness, they made the doctrine a priority and tried to make Iranianness compatible with it. The beliefs make up Iranianness and have shown their historic durability are attuned to the specifics of Iranianness. Thus Judaism, Christianity and Zoroastrianism etc are also inseparable form Iranianness.
It sometimes happens that a belief in the process of time becomes alien to itself in expressing power, to the extent that it becomes incompatible with Iranianness. People will abandon those beliefs if it cannot accept revolution and become an expression of freedom. And if Iranianness loses its specifics the danger of the extinction of the national society is serious. Therefore, before and after the revolution, I have fought against the deception of the prioritisation of either Islam or being an Iranian over one another. What should be done is to make the doctrine that of freedom.
As to the “freeing civil laws” from sharia’ – the Pahlavis tried this and faced nothing but defeat. This has also created duality in the West – church law and state law . The revolutionary solution is in religious expression and returning the latter to an expression of freedom. This is that fundamental work that need the brave efforts of free thought that should be taken up generation after generation. We need s society to appear whose ways of thinking is not around power but of freedom. More accurately the principle guiding thought is not duality but negative equilibrium.
A comparison of the makeup of the Council of Guardians and its duties in the two constitutions – the draft and the one passed by the Assembly of Experts – will show you important differences.
Ardeshir Mehrdad:in the Assembly of
Experts you opposed the article on velayate faqih. But Mr Sheikh Ali
Tehrani has claimed that you and him ultimately did not vote against this
article. Can you confirm this?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: Sheikh Ali Tehrani was one of the staunch defenders of this article in that Assembly. He was spoken to on many occasions and the dangers spelled out to him. To no avail. If he did not agree and two or three people followed him by not voting for it, the article would not have gone through. Now that the fraud of velayate faqih has become clear his words are post hoc . If that is what he has said it is untrue. Including for this reason that the minutes of the Assembly of Experts have been published in 3 volumes. His name is there as a signatory. Mine is not. Although some of the deliberations, particularly of the morning meetings, have been omitted this still is an interesting document. I did not vote for article 5 or 110 even though the latter was partly due to my efforts: I had reduced to a supervisory role for the faqih the 16 powers proposed by Mr Ayat.
Ardeshir Mehrdad: Has the concept of “negative equilibrium ” not lost its relevance as a guide to foreign policy with the collapse of the Soviet Union?
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr: I have already explained that this balance is not confined to “neither the West nor the Soviets”. I would add that, considering conditions today, negative equilibrium more than ever should be the guiding light for foreign policy. Accordingly relations are based on rights (rather than interests) and not accepting the relations of dominance-dominated. Therefore negative equilibrium and the non-ceding of “interests” to a foreign power, must be even more a guide to foreign policy since the fall of the Soviet Union. Through this principle the nations of this world can better reign in the unbridled domineering that the US has become in these times, and speed up the liberation of American society from the shackles of dominance.
Winter 2002
Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr was the first elected president of Iran in the post revolutionary regime. The interview was carried out by fax and first published in Rahe Kargar (Farsi) no 169, 2002.
1. Crudely translated as rule or rulership. In the Constitution of the Islamic Republic under the term velayate faqih this “rule” is exercised by a just and knowledgeable religious jurisprudence (faqih)
2. Set up in 1981 after Bani Sadr left the country with Masoud Rajavi, leader of the Peoples Mujahedin of Iran. in addition to the Mujahedin it included the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran and a number of smaller groups and individuals. Bani-Sadr as well as the KDP-I later left the NRC.
3. A minister in the first post-revolutionary government imprisoned accused of treason. The longest political prisoner in Iran, he refuses to be released without being exonerated of the allegation.
4. Source of emulation: a senior Shi’ite cleric whom people follow.
5. The first post-revolutionary prime minister.
6. Seyyed Hassan Moddarres was an influential cleric-politician in the first quarter of the 20th Century. Murdered on the orders of Reza Shah in 1927.
7. Pro-Moscow Communist Party. Supported Khomeini until it was outlawed in 1983. For its relations with Dr Mossadeq’s government see Abrahamian, A. Iran between two revolutions. Princton 1982.
8. ibid pp73-4.
9. Academic and one of the founders of the Islamic Republic Party.
10. An elected organ almost entirely of clerics who wrote the constitution. The Assembly is elected every 8 years and is the highest organ of the state – choosing the supreme leader – vali faqih - (or Leadership Council).
11. On the eve of the revolution the Shah broadcast that he had “heard the voice of the revolution” and Khomeini described the signing of the cease fire agreement with Iraq as “drinking the poisoned chalice”