Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM has been a major factor in preventing rapprochement between the US and Iran. There are two major factions within the foreign policy establishment of the Islamic Republic representing “reconciliation discourse” and “resistance discourse”. These two can be seen as sub-discourses within the Islamic Revolution discourse engaged in a struggle over its “correct” interpretation. The reconciliation discourse emphasizes on “prudence”, while the resistance discourse emphasizes upon “conscientiousness”, both signifiers within the Islamic Revolution discourse. Both movements agree that these signifiers exist within the discourse, but they disagree about the primacy and centrality of one over the other. The “reconciliation discourse” seeks development as the main goal of Iran’s foreign policy, and, hence, considers reconciliation with the US to be a precondition to that goal. Its arguments imply that Iran is not an exceptional country. The resistance discourse, on the other hand, is deeply exceptionalist and deems resistance against the US and maximalist independence to be the main objectives of Iran’s foreign policy. This discourse strongly opposes mending ties with the US because such a move would be understood as a threat to Iran’s EXCEPTIONALISM. These sub-discourses also perceive the US differently; the reconciliation discourse considers US to be dynamic and heterogenous, while the resistance discourse considers US to be unchanging and monolithic, and this disagreement also contributes to their policy toward the US, and this understanding is also closely intertwined with EXCEPTIONALISM. Overall, the dispute over Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM has made relationship with the US the main issue of contention within Iranian foreign policy discourses.

Iran is a unique actor with specific behaviors in the international system. The paper's main question is what are the main elements of Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM and what are its effects on Iran’s foreign relations? To answer the question, mixed methodology, a combination of interpretive method and directed qualitative content analysis, has been utilized to interpret Iran's outstanding political and thought figures throughout history. Besides, a conceptual framework has been adopted based on the late Morteza Motahari’s viewpoint on Worldview. The findings of the paper demonstrate that crucial principles of Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM are: the “Centrality of Iran in the World”, “Representing the God on earth”, “Ideal king/leader idea”, and “ Believing in the eternal triumph of the Good (Iran) against the Evil (Its enemies)”, “Necessity of Empowerment”, and “ Heavenly mission to lead other nations”. These specific characteristics, combined together, turn International relations realms into a scene of sacred political actions, in which Iran has the mission and transcendental duty to fight the Evils, till the final triumph. What mainstream theories find odd and somehow irrational Iranian behavior, is completely rational, understandable, and predictable via this conceptual framework.

How should one read Syed Hussein Alata's’ The Myth of the Lazy Native in Iran? What are its possible contributions towards theorizing an ideological concept that has kept Iranian dynamics of progress in suspense for a long time? This article attempts to expand on the idea of Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM, observe and explain the discourse around it. The author employs Alatas’s writings, particularly those from his book The Myth of the Lazy Native, in order to argue that Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM is a mentality created and empowered by internal despotism as well as external semi-colonialism in modern Iran. Borrowing ideas from Alates's analysis of postcolonial Malaysia, the author suggests that Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM locates at the intersection of gender, religious, and national ideologies - it refers to a being and condition of contradiction. It is what makes the nation’s image of itself both inferior and superior towards the other at the same time. It is indeed what makes imagining future change impossible – and therefore ideological.

Iranian EXCEPTIONALISM has been a major factor in preventing rapprochement between the US and Iran. There are two major factions within the foreign policy establishment of the Islamic Republic representing “ reconciliation discourse” and “ resistance discourse” . These two can be seen as sub-discourses within the Islamic Revolution discourse engaged in a struggle over its “ correct” interpretation. The “ reconciliation discourse” seeks development as the main goal of Iran’ s foreign policy, and, hence, considers reconciliation with the US to be a precondition to that goal. Its arguments imply that Iran is not an exceptional country. The resistance discourse, on the other hand, is deeply exceptionalist and deems resistance against the US and maximalist independence to be the main objectives of Iran’ s foreign policy. This discourse strongly opposes mending ties with the US because such a move would be understood as a threat to Iran’ s EXCEPTIONALISM.

After Barack Obama became president in 2008, Washington presented a new strong inclination to fix the damaged relations with Russia. In the early years of pursuing this new policy, their relations seemed right,contrarily to this optimism, and before finishing the first term of Obama’, s presidency, their relations began to deteriorate. Various reasons could be attributed to that issue,however, without falling into the trap of a single cause explanation, this study seeks to identify how the latent ideas of EXCEPTIONALISM in American political society and Obama’, s national security doctrine as well, affected relations, particularly on the reset policy. This study, by gathering documents that narrate the existence of a political-cultural pressure on the Obama administration, reflected that American EXCEPTIONALISM, as a force of strategic culture has played a remarkable role in preventing the advancing of reset policy between the USA and Russia.

Political discourse usually tends to diffuse itself in other discursive fields. Computer games are one of the most considerable products of cultural area in which the political discourse can be reproduced through them. This article is concerned with the representation politics of computer games as well as its inter-textual relevance to the discourse of political domains. The study examines the political discourse of " Command & Conquer: Generals " game as well as its relationship with the US political discourse through using a non-probability (purposive) sampling. The main question addressed is what can be the relationship between the game discourse and US foreign politics. Thus, this computer game is analyzed at three levels of description, interpretation, and explanation through Fairclough’ s analysis discourse which suggests that within the framework of dominant discursive order of Western media on “ Islam” , and “ Middle East” i. e. “ Islamophobia” , unfortunately “ false and other” image of Islam is portrayed. Also, the discourse is categorized as a broader social action which is consistent with themes of new orientalism logic, the clash of civilization and in particular, American EXCEPTIONALISM as well as is reproduced through the language of (the US) soft power of cultural products.

This article examines the interplay between structural power imperatives, contested global order, and ideational self-conceptions in shaping United States foreign policy, with particular attention to the nexus of militarism, American EXCEPTIONALISM, and recurrent violations of international legal norms. Integrating three complementary theoretical perspectives including American EXCEPTIONALISM, offensive realism, and the critical variant of hegemonic stability theory, the study offers a multidimensional analytical framework that captures normative, structural, and systemic dimensions of U.S. conduct. The article applies this tripartite framework to empirical cases involving U.S. military interventions, nuclear modernisation, and its selective adherence to, and reinterpretation of, binding legal obligations. It argues that these behaviours reflect a durable fusion of systemic compulsion, hegemonic maintenance, and identity-based legitimation. In so doing, the study contributes to debates in international relations and international law by demonstrating that the United States’ exceptionalist posture is both a cause and a consequence of its hegemonic role. The analysis offers insights into the persistence of militarised EXCEPTIONALISM and the structural and normative constraints or lack thereof that shape the prospects for a more equitable and law-bound global order.