The Journal of Political Thought in Islam

The Journal of Political Thought in Islam

The Relationship Between Political Discourses and Cultural-Artistic Policymaking in the Islamic Republic of Iran (Case Study of Cinematic Policies)

Document Type : Original Article

Author
محمد کمالی زاده
Assistant Professor of Political Science, Institute for Humanities and Social Science( Jahad Daneshgahi(, Tehran, Iran.
10.22034/jpti.2025.524431.1428
Abstract
In this research, using the Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) method, we analyze and interpret the discursive framework of the country’s cinematic policies based on high-level documents in this field, identifying and analyzing the most dominant discourses governing the Islamic Republic of Iran’s cinematic policies over the past 44 years. To achieve this goal, we divided Iran’s cinematic eras post-Islamic Revolution into four decades and evaluated and analyzed the cinematic approaches, programs, and policies, along with their dominant discourses, separately using the Discourse Analysis approach.A review of four decades of cinematic policymaking and its dominant discourses shows that the field of Iranian cinema policymaking, much like the country’s political and managerial sphere, has always been an arena of struggle between two currents: those in favor of, and those opposed to, the cinematic policies of the time. Similar to what we have witnessed in the arena of macro political-discursive conflicts in the country, in the arena of cinematic policy-discursive conflicts, the current opposing the government and the ruling political discourse has always called for a change in the discourse and the policy track for cinema; a current whose opposition has consistently challenged cinema policymakers and cultural officials of the time, and has even sometimes endangered the interests of filmmakers.
Keywords
Cultural policymaking
critical discourse analysis
political discourses
artistic policies
Islamic Republic of Iran

Subjects