Institutional Struggles Over Political Uncertainty Under a Religious Tutelary Regime; Iran Under the Presidency of Hassan Rouhani (2013-2021)

Abstract

This article examines the strategies and policies of the tutelary institutions to control and restrain the electoral institutions by placing the politics of uncertainty at the center of institutional conflicts in the Islamic Republic during the presidency of Hassan Rouhani. Despite the existence of electoral institutions in Iran, tutelary institutions, with Vali-y Faqih at their head, have a constitutionally superior position. The article argues that in this period, the control of electoral uncertainty by tutelary institutions in order to prevent undesirable results leads to the weakening of institutional independence, the concentration of power in tutelary institutions, the intensification of electoral manipulation, the creation of institutions parallel to the electoral institutions, the polarization of conflicts institutionally, and, in general, the ineffectiveness of electoral institutions.