Document Type : Original Article
Author
Assistant Professor of Political Science, Department of Political Science, Faculty of Law and Political Science, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Khuzestan, Iran
10.22034/irsj.2026.243509
Abstract
Late modernity has intertwined mechanisms of meaning production with systems for reproducing domination, stabilizing over recent centuries a hegemonic image of the “liberal–modern utopia” as the inevitable culmination of human history. At the declarative level, this image invokes concepts such as human dignity, pluralism, human rights, and public welfare; yet at its latent layer, it reproduces the logic of liberal ontological homogenization and the exclusion of the Other. This process has manifested not only in practice but also in the historical memory of the past three centuries as the expansion of war machinery, structural terror, and the engineering of perception. The paradox between “emancipatory promises” and “domination-oriented functions” has enabled critical currents within the West—from radical postmodernism to postcolonial discourse—to challenge modernity by exposing its internal contradictions and its linkages to the Zionist-capitalist order. Within this discursive rupture, space emerged for alternative civilizational interventions. Ayatollah Khamenei, as the architect of a “theological politics” approach, through strategic correspondence addressed to the youth of Europe and North America, sought not merely communicative outreach but a paradigmatic intervention in the global narrative sphere. Grounded in the logic of Islamic political governance and oriented toward the project of a new Islamic civilization, this intervention aims to restore the ontological dignity of religion and to reconstruct a justice-centered lifeworld. The central research question thus becomes: Through what process can these letters—understood as speech acts rooted in revelatory rationality—deconstruct the existential duality of “the real” and “the presumed” within the Western media–capitalist order, while simultaneously presenting a non-liberal civilizational alternative to public consciousness? To address this question, the study adopts Quentin Skinner’s critical hermeneutics, employing conceptual genealogy and multi-layered thematic analysis. Based on documentary data, 90 foundational themes were extracted and organized into 10 intermediary themes and four overarching categories: identity–civilizational securitization; perception engineering; critique of the system of domination and Zionism; and articulation of Islamic governance. The findings indicate that the letters, through the deliberate selection of Western youth as subjects capable of rupture from official narratives and through the construction of an alternative conceptual network, not only advance a structural critique of the existing order but also shift epistemic and identity boundaries, opening a new horizon for rethinking the essence and telos of human civilization. Accordingly, these letters are interpreted as a discursive–civilizational intervention that removes the “veil of truth” from the epistemic and normative foundations of modernity. Ultimately, the study concludes that “theological politics,” articulated through strategic correspondence, possesses the capacity to function as a “knowledge–action,” operating not merely as a theoretical model but as a practical method within the public diplomacy of the Islamic world—simultaneously challenging the ontological and hegemonic foundations of the Western order at both theoretical and empirical levels, and facilitating transition toward a plural, justice-oriented, and theologically grounded order.
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