Research in Theoretical Politics
Year:2009 | Volume:NEW | Issue:5|Papers Count:8

Firdausi’s attempt in Shahnameh to explore the causes of the rise and fall of powers in political history of Iran is based on a pathological explanation in the form of poetry. In the same way, he offers a criterion for maintenance and stability of political systems. Relying on ‘practical logic’ on the understanding of political thought. The present article reviews Firdausi’s political thought.

St Augustine’s Confessions is the first autobiography in western literature. It introduced first- person point of view to western thought. First- person point of view is an initiation to the concept of ‘self’. The City of God is the only work of St Augustine’s to episodically include his political philosophy, and therefore a good reference to understand his views on the subject. The present article is to examine the relation between ‘self’ and ‘political power’ in St Agustin’s thought, employing an intertextual approach. In doing so, we will start by discussing the process of formation of ‘self’ in his thought. Then will refer to the ontological and epistemological origins of political power in The City of God. At the end, it is shown that the sense of ‘self’ has an instrumental approach to ‘political power’.

Being normative, political thought suggests the best form of political system. In the history of thought, ‘friendship’ has been a vital concept among the others, functioning in the formation of ideal societies. However, changes in political thought in the modern time have lead to the marginalization of friendship. But in recent decades, the notion of friendship has been renewed in the form of such concepts as ‘solidarity’. Studying the thoughts of contemporary thinkers, we can find sciences like psychotherapy as a major contribution to this renewal. Due to Jurgen Habermas’ thoughts and Eric Fromm’s theory of ‘the Sane Society’, the insights of psychotherapy have been highly influential in bringing the concept of ‘friendship’ back to the center of attention of political thought.

Iranians and the Greek came to have contacts with each other very soon in line with expanding their territories. In spite of the dominance of politico-military aspects, the political and philosophical-religious mutual effects should not be neglected. As far as their early contact concerns, it should be noticed that it was the Greek who were most influenced by Iranians' teachings, and their political and philosophical-religious manners. In the first part of this article the Greek's main speculations, focusing on Athenians, and Iranians' political and philosophical-religious teachings is analysed.

Essential principle of Japan’s foreign relations with all countries used to be separation of political issues from economic considerations. The shift in the nature and structure of power within international system led this country to revise its outlook and base its economic relations on political relations with different countries. To serve their own longterm interests, today Japanese find it an undeniable necessity to accord with the global process of supporting western globalized models and values. Fearing that its strategic relations with the US be disturbed, could be considered one of the factors in changing Japan’s attitude towards Iran.

Presenting a ladder model for the process of regional convergence, and explaining its different phases, the present article studies the major differences between neo-regionalism and classical regionalism. Regarding five positions - regional space, regional assemblage, regional society, regional community, and regional institutionalized political assemblage - and considering the present situation, southwestern Asia stands in the second phase, i.e. regional assemblage,; and to provide it with negative peace rather than positive one is of priority.This is the main idea of the present article which surveys the main strategies of Iran’s foreign policy in this regard in order to find suitable solutions.

It is believed that as a result of increasing globalization, identities of ethnic minorities will inevitably dissolve into one global culture. Others believe that globalization not only will not dismiss ethnicities but also, providing them with appropriate requisites, will help to increase their ethnic consciousness and thereby strengthening ethnic movements. So, to study consequences of globalization, features of ethnic identity have to be taken into consideration. The present article studies cultures of ethnic identities, and proposes the hypothesis that globalization gives prominence to ethnic identities in short time, and may also lead to ethnic movements, but eventually it will result in assimilation of ethnic minorities with dominant cultures.