Social Problems of Iran

From Problematization to Governmentality: A Critical Re-reading of the Academic Literature on Ethnicity in Iran

Document Type : Literature Review

Authors

Pezhman Barkhordari 1
Reza Safari Shali 2
Karam Habibpour Gatabi 2
Arash Heydari 3

1 PhD Student in Sociology, Social Problems of Iran, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran

2 Associate Professor of Sociology, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran

3 Assistant Professor of Sociology, Department of Cultural Studies, University of Science and Culture, Tehran, Iran

10.22034/jspi.2026.11702
Abstract
Over the past two decades, the academic literature on ethnicity in Iran has become a major field of inquiry across sociology, political science, history, and cultural studies. Despite this growing body of scholarship, little attention has been paid to the literature itself as an object of critical inquiry or to how ethnicity has been constituted as an object of knowledge within Iranian academic literature. Adopting a critical paradigm, this study employs a critical qualitative literature review to examine 52 Persian-language scholarly articles on ethnicity published between 2001 and 2025. The analysis draws on Michel Foucault’s conceptual framework, as developed through Mitchell Dean’s interpretation, and is organized around three analytical dimensions: problematization, governmentality, and the history of the present. The findings show that, most studies operate within a shared regime of problematization in which ethnicity is primarily understood through the lenses of national security, development, national cohesion, and the management of social difference. Furthermore, the literature mobilizes security, developmental, and integrative governmental rationalities and employs technologies of knowledge—including identity measurement, population classification, and policy-oriented analysis—to transform ethnicity into an object of knowledge, regulation, and intervention. Although many studies draw upon historical materials, they largely remain confined within a presentist horizon and pay limited attention to the historical conditions that made ethnicity possible as a category of knowledge and governance. The article argues that the Iranian academic literature on ethnicity is not merely a reflection of ethnic realities but also an active participant in producing and stabilizing regimes of knowledge and governmentality surrounding ethnicity.

Keywords

Ethnicity
Problematization
Governmentality
History of the Present
Iran
Subjects
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  • Receive Date 23 May 2026
  • Revise Date 31 July 2026
  • Accept Date 12 August 2026
  • First Publish Date 12 August 2026