Iran’s soft power in Azerbaijan: shifting cultural dynamics in the post-Soviet era

ABSTRACT

This article explores Iran’s soft power appeal in Azerbaijan following Azerbaijan’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. It first reviews the state of the field and situates Iran’s overall soft power strategies in relation to that context and then focuses on the relationship between Iran and post-independence Azerbaijan. Drawing on a rich array of material, including the latest publications in Persian, the article explores Tehran’s exercise of soft power in Azerbaijan in three key spheres: education, culture, and religion. The article argues that although Iran has invested significant resources in the promotion of its soft power in Azerbaijan, it has encountered significant hurdles in exercising that influence. These hurdles are the result of the history between the two countries as well as their divergent state ideologies in the present. Azerbaijan resists such influence and, at times, pursues certain anti-Iranian policies including, at times, supporting separatist groups. Thus, the divide between the two countries, despite all historical and cultural commonalities remains firmly in place.

KEYWORDS:

• Cultural diplomacy
• soft power
• West Asia
• Iran (the Islamic Republic of)
• the Republic of Azerbaijan

Acknowledgements

Authors wish to acknowledge Professor Shahram Akbarzadeh’s helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper and thank Dr Andrew Stapleton for reading the paper. Usual caveats apply.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. In addition to his influential academic theories, Nye served in the State Department, Pentagon, and the US National Intelligence Council.

2. The term soft power is also associated with “cultural diplomacy”, a type of public diplomacy which includes the “exchange of ideas, information, art and other aspects of culture among nations and their peoples in order to foster mutual understanding” (Waller 2009, 74). Nye himself argues that “cultural diplomacy reveals the soul of a nation”, and has a significant potential to create influence (Nye 2004a).

3. Iran has nevertheless overreached and faced increasing challenges in Iraq. See Watkins (2019).

4. For a list of religious and charity organisations see https://bit.ly/3KWmxcm.

5. See http://en.icro.ir/About-Us-National.

6. According to their website, their offices operate through cultural attachés in Lagos (Africa), Belorussia, Belgrade, Dushanbe (Tajikistan) and Canberra (Australia) among other places. See: (Saadi Foundation 2022).

7. Reyshahri was the first Minister of Intelligence or the Islamic Republic (1984–1989), then Prosecutor-General (1989–1991) and then Member of the Assembly of Experts (2016–2022).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Australian Research Council [DE170100104].

Notes on contributors

Ali Mozaffari

Ali Mozaffari, PhD, is Australian Research Council (DECRA) Fellow and Senior Fellow with the Alfred Deakin Institute, Deakin University, Australia. His current research interests include geopolitics of the past, culture and the built environment with a specific focus on West Asia. His publications include Heritage Movements in Asia: Cultural Heritage Activism, Politics, and Identity (edited volume with Tod Jones, Berghahn 2020), Development, architecture and the formation of heritage in late-twentieth century Iran: A vital past (Manchester University Press 2020), World Heritage in Iran; Perspectives on Pasargadae (Routledge 2016), and Forming National Identity in Iran: The Idea of Homeland Derived from Ancient Persian and Islamic Imaginations of Place (IB Tauris 2014). Mozaffari is the founding co-editor of Berghahn’s series Explorations in Heritage Studies.

Ali Akbar

Ali Akbar is a Research Fellow with the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University and Fellow at the University of Melbourne, where he received his PhD in Islamic Studies. He is an expert in the fields of Islamic studies and Middle Eastern politics as well as Iranian politics. He is the author of Contemporary Perspectives on Revelation and Qur’anic Hermeneutics (Edinburgh University Press, 2020) and Contemporary Approaches to the Qur’an and Its Interpretation in Iran (co-authored with Abdullah Saeed, Routledge, 2020). He has also published extensively in journals including Iranian Studies, British Journal of Middle East Studies, Oxford Journal of Law and Religion, Mediterranean Politics, and Political Theology.