Paradox as Decolonization: Ali Shariati’s Islamic Lawgiver

AuthorArash Davari
Published date01 October 2021
Date01 October 2021
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1177/0090591720977804
Subject MatterArticles
https://doi.org/10.1177/0090591720977804
Political Theory
2021, Vol. 49(5) 743 –773
© The Author(s) 2020
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0090591720977804
journals.sagepub.com/home/ptx
Article
Paradox as Decolonization:
Ali Shariati’s Islamic
Lawgiver
Arash Davari1
Abstract
This article reevaluates the Iranian polymath Ali Shariati’s most controversial
lectures. Scholarly consensus reads 1969’s Ummat va Imāmat as derivative,
comprising an imitation of Sukarno’s guided democracy and hence an
apology for postcolonial authoritarian rule. Shariati’s rhetorical performance
suggests otherwise. The lectures address a postcolonial iteration of Jean-
Jacques Rousseau’s paradox of founding—a call for self-determination
alongside the external intervention needed to prepare for it in the wake
of moral dispositions accrued during colonization. Shariati proposes to
resolve the problem of enduring colonial domination by citing a fabricated
French professor, a foreigner, as an authoritative source. He practices a
noble lie, believable because it draws from colonized sensibilities but laden
with hints encouraging audiences to see past it. If audiences develop the
requisite ability to decipher the lie, Shariati wagers, they at once develop
the autonomy implied by self-determination. On these grounds, Shariati
theorizes the paradox of politics as decolonization.
Keywords
paradox of politics, decolonization, lawgiver, Islamic political thought, self-
determination, Ali Shariati
1Department of Politics, Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA, USA
Corresponding Author:
Arash Davari, Department of Politics, Whitman College, 345 Boyer Ave., Maxey Hall,
Walla Walla, WA 99362-2067, USA.
Email: davaria@whitman.edu
977804PTXXXX10.1177/0090591720977804Political TheoryDavari
research-article2020
744 Political Theory 49(5)
Following its declaration of independence from Dutch colonial rule, the
newly established Indonesian nation-state struggled to secure the gains of
self-determination. Postcolonial tumult peaked in 1955 when the country’s
first exercise in popular sovereignty resulted in inconclusive elections. For
Sukarno, the anticolonial movement’s leader and the postindependence
state’s founding president for over two decades, this messy episode in demo-
cratic politics threatened to undermine Indonesian unity. He crafted a concept
called “guided democracy” in response.
Guided democracy does not emphasize “one person—one vote” so that political
parties that were a kind of “coolie recruiter” during the Dutch period now are
only solicitors of votes. Guided democracy emphasizes:
1. every individual has the obligation of serving the public interest, serving
society, serving the Nation, serving the State;
2. every individual has the right to a proper living in Society, the Nation and
the State.1
Sukarno considered active participation in political life and the provision
of social rights both fundamental. Where parliamentary procedure hit an
impasse, guided democracy sanctioned extra-parliamentary force to secure
national autonomy. On the one hand, Sukarno impressed upon audiences the
exigencies of Indonesia’s revolutionary break from colonial rule. Revolution
was here and now, not a matter of “slow but sure” reform.2 Indonesians were
no longer relegated to the “waiting room of history.”3 On the other, he
described an indefinite process of training. Once initiated, revolutionary exi-
gencies were said to continue for an unspecified period of time, a precept
Sukarno invoked to suspend elections. The strategy backfired; the Indonesian
military in collaboration with United States intelligence employed the same
reasoning a decade later to remove Sukarno from power.4 Guided democracy,
doomed by its internal contradictions, appeared a resolute failure.
Earlier in 1955, twenty-nine Asian and African heads of state met in
Bandung, Indonesia for a conference scholars have since anointed as the gen-
esis of the Non-Aligned Movement. Disparate and conflicting ideological
persuasions notwithstanding, many of the states in attendance shared the
dilemma that Sukarno’s guided democracy intended to address. The institu-
tion of Western liberal democracy, if premature, could leave decolonized
states susceptible to undue influence by former colonial masters. What is to
be done, some anticolonial nationalists asked, if a newly liberated people
were to vote themselves back into subjugation? For democratic activists,
theorists, and hostile governments, top-down rule designed to guard the
state’s independence fared no better. Who is to judge when the members of a

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT