Authoritarianism

The present Russian political system is tied up with Putin's name; and Putin is consi-dered as a full-fledged political reality. Today's powerful Russia, which has got a new life after the Cold War and the weak collapse period, and has a major impact on global developments including the Middle East, is not understandable except under this title. What inspired writers to analyze Putin's performance is to study the causes of the exis-tence of a personality such as him and the formation of Putinism in today's Russian so-ciety. Knowing the performance of Putin and Putinism requires a clear answer to some questions like, why the phenomenon of Putinism in the 21st century whit democratic structure has emerged and persisted, and what is Putinism at all? The hypothesis that will be presented to understand this issue is that the long-standing political culture of Russia and the geographical and historical imperative of Russian nation have led to the emergence and continuation of Putinism in today's Russian society, as well as the secu-rity and economic problems of the 1990s, humiliation, pressure, and blockade of the west against Russia is the mainstay of the emergence and continuation of Putinism. To investigate the hypothesis of research, firstly we examine the system of pseudo-democracy and then we will discuss Putin's functions and behaviors in the economic, political, and social spheres. Finally, we will discuss about the Russian domestic context and the external factors that led to the formation of Putinism.

This article attempts to explain democratization in Iran through an elite-oriented approach. According to this approach, the success and failure of democratization depends on the political elite strategy. My argument is that the fate of democratization is determined by elite strategies. If their strategy is considered suppressive, an authoritarian cycle will take place in the transition stage, but if the political elite strategy is considered non-suppressive, the index of democratic transition increases. In this study, the political elites are divided into two groups: conservatives and reformists. The analysis method is historical-narrative technique. The empirical findings indicate that whenever the hardliners inside the government are stronger than the opposition groups, they constrain the democratization by suppressing the opposition (moderates and reformists), which leads to a decrease in the index of democratic transition, as exemplified in the 13 th parliamentary in 1941. Whenever the reformers are stronger than the conservatives and they are allowed to participate in elections, the index of democratic transition tends to increase, as shown in the 17 th parliament under the rule of Mușaddiq and the 7 th presidential elections after the 1979 Revolution. The data demonstrates that democratization is still fragile in Iran and it’s the fate would be determined by the relative power of reformists and conservatives. As a result, I argue that Iran’s democratic transition is fragile and it’s the fate is determined by the relative power of reformists and conservatives.

The COVID-19 pandemic has strengthened the hands of authoritarian regimes. Unlike those who have claimed that the outbreak tends to accelerate the movement toward greater geopolitical competition, we argue that the pandemic has necessitated further cooperation between democratic and authoritarian governments, thus enhancing the longevity of the latter. This explains why the global pandemic has caused no fundamental changes in the regional security dynamics of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), in part because it has ironically prolonged the rule of authoritarian in the region in the name of providing public health. Despite the rhetoric of religious pluralism, moderation, as well as constitutional reforms, sentiments echoing narrow and virulent nationalism and right-wing populism have simultaneously prevailed. On balance, the persistent use of repression in liberalized autocracies in the region has manifested itself in the form of repressing protesters during tough economic times.  For example, in protests against unemployment in Oman in 2018 or against tax reform in Jordan in 2019, and during Saudi Arabia’s 2017-20 Qatif unrest or in Algeria’s ongoing political protests, such patterns of behavior have been visible.  Even in those regimes that have introduced constitutional reforms in the aftermath of the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings, when priority has been given to combating a global pandemic, a floundering economy, and other emerging threats, such as the campaign against terrorism, authoritarian regimes have wound up consolidating their rule, thus exploiting such crises in order to grab further power at home and seek geopolitical advantage in the region.  However, it is short-sighted to underestimate the possibility of the spontaneous eruption of popular uprisings that could pose a destabilizing threat to authoritarian regimes at some point in the future.

The present research is aimed at studying the effects of parenting styles on teacher authoritarianism and the possibility of its reproduction in class management in the schools of Urumia.The research method is operational and in terms of data gathering is descriptional-correlation and the statistical universe includes all Teachers of Urmia city,4506 subjects,and 351 subjects were selected as statistical sample by using Cochran statistical formula and random-stratified sampling method.The data gathering tool is stansard questionnaire of parenting styles of Baumrind and authoritarian personality of Asorno-Altemer. SPSS was used to analyze data and also r correlation and multi-variable regression model.The result of this research indicates that the correlation between the components of permissive and authoritarian parent styles with teacher authoritarianism at a meaningful level less than 0/01 and 0/99 reliance was confirmed and the type of relationship is positive and direct and the linear relationship between authoritarian parent style components and teacher authoritarianism at a meaningful level of less than 0/01 was confirmed and the type of relationship is negative and inverse.The results of regression analyse show that the existing variables in model could explain 0/24 of the dependent variable variations of authoritarianism.

Geopolitical factors have always significantly influenced the politics and behavior of governments due to the continuity and stability of their effects. In Turkmenistan, due to the geopolitical characteristics of this country, examining and paying attention to these factors and their effects play an important role in terms of understanding and predicting the policies and behavior of Turkmenistan’s government. Also, these characteristics seem to become more important because of this country’s neighborhood and many commonalities with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The main question of this article is about the effects of Turkmenistan's geopolitics on the politics and the behavior of its government. Based on this study, it will be argued that Turkmenistan's geopolitics has, directly and indirectly, affected the politics and behavior of Turkmenistan’s government by creating threats and issues such as instability and insecurity. It has also caused authoritarianism and centralism in the government.

Reza Shah's government can also be considered a government based on an ideology. This ideology has different components and at the same time, based on it, various institutions were created during Pahlavi's rule. Accurate knowledge of the Pahlavi government, especially in the era of Reza Shah, is obtained with a correct understanding of this ideology. Therefore, the state of the Pahlavi government is "linked" to this ideology in a very fundamental way. Looking at its situation, the three most important elements in it were considered the main ideological components of the government, which are: "authoritarianism", "monopolism" and "personalization of power". Of course, nationalism and antiquarianism can also be added to these. In this research, the focus is on the political components of the government's ideology. In sum, according to these three components, the ideological characteristic of Reza Shah's government can be considered as "concentration of exclusive personal power". In the meantime, the military institutions, which Reza Shah had placed the main support of his power on, played a very important role in the continuation of the government and the implementation of its ideology. The "police" was one of the most important of these institutions, which was completely at the service of the "person" of Reza Shah, and before and after he reached the throne, he fulfilled his wishes completely. This article seeks to understand the "problem" of the "police" in the ideology of the government with a descriptive and analytical method. And at the same time, its most important findings are that the "police" based on the principle of "concentration of exclusive personal power", was one of the main tools for creating order and suppressing Reza Shah's opponents. The most important result of this research is that the police played a role in establishing the "concentration of exclusive personal power" mostly by "suppressing and censoring the press", "dominating the elections and parliament" and "suppressing the opponents of the king". And this act was exactly based on the ideology of Reza Shah's government.