Abstract
The Iranian model of a Shia Islamist state was made possible only through the convergence of unique circumstances that do not exist in the Arab Shia milieu. For example, Iran has an overwhelming majority Shia population (slightly over 90 percent) and its 1979 revolution completely dismantled the monarchical order and established the Islamic republic. Moreover, the proponents of velayat e-faqih were the most coherent and organized revolutionary faction. As the only fully Shia state, Iran became the de facto leader of the global Shia community. The geopolitical context of countries with significant religious and ethnic diversity has set Arab Shia Islamists apart from their Iranian counterparts. This chapter focuses on Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Iraq’s Hizb al-Dawah, the al-Sadrite movement, and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI) Islamists. A third group, Bahrain’s Jamiyat al-Wefaq al-Watani al-Islamiyah, is less consequential and only discussed in a cursory manner.1 Each is based on the acceptor model of Islamism regarding the state and is predominantly participatory Islamist in regards to democracy. Clerics have played a major role in their development but, for the most part, do not seek a theocratic state. In fact, without the velayat-e-faqih, Arab Shia Islamism is more acceptor and participatory in nature than the Iranian incarnation.
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Notes
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© 2013 Kamran Bokhari and Farid Senzai
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Bokhari, K., Senzai, F. (2013). Arab Shia Islamism: Iraqi Shia Islamists and Hezbollah. In: Political Islam in the Age of Democratization. Middle East Today. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137313492_9
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